Lollar Pickups Mini Humbuckers
The P90 rout is more versatile than most people realize — and this demo proves it. The Lollar Mini Humbuckers in the Frank Brothers Arcade Goldtop, through the Benson Monarch cranked with the R2R Electric Rangemaster. Welcome back to Edge of Breakup.
In this episode the Lollar Mini Humbucker Pickups take center stage — installed in the Frank Brothers Arcade Goldtop via P90 soapbar conversion rings, into the Benson Amps Monarch and Benson 2x12" cabinet via the Boss Waza Tube Amp Expander with the Benson Tall Bird for reverb, and the R2R Electric Rangemaster treble booster in the second half.
The P90 hunt on this guitar has covered the Fralin Stock P90, Fralin Hum-Cancelling P90, Righteous Sound Monte P90, Lollar '50s Wind, Standard Wind, and High Wind P90s. This episode takes a deliberate detour into a different pickup format entirely. Lollar's own soapbar conversion rings allow their Mini-Humbucker, La Prima, Firebird, and MiniBroiler pickups to drop directly into any standard P90 soapbar rout — no routing required. The P90 rout turns out to be one of the most versatile formats available, and the Mini Humbucker is one of its best applications.
The Lollar Mini Humbucker's internal architecture is what makes it distinctive. Steel cores rather than alnico rod magnets — this gives the pickup higher inductance, more bass, more output, and a smoother attack than an alnico-core mini humbucker. When you push the amp, the steel core produces more of a grind and sustain character than alnico. The result sits tonally between a full-size humbucker and a P90 — tighter, brighter, and more defined than a full humbucker, with more warmth and sustain than a true single coil. Hum-cancelling by design.
DC resistance: Neck 6.6K / Middle 6.7K / Bridge 7.2K. Recommended pots: 500K. The middle position on this guitar — Mini Humbucker neck and bridge blended in parallel — is a genuinely new sound for the Arcade Goldtop, not available with any P90 configuration.
The R2R Electric Rangemaster enters at 17:03 — pushing the Mini Humbuckers' already tight transient attack into the Monarch's preamp for the treble-boosted British lead tone these pickups are extremely well-suited for.
Coming up on the channel: Lollar La Prima Mini Humbuckers, Lollar Gold Foil Soapbars, and Lollar Firebird.
🎸 Lollar Mini Humbucker: https://www.lollarguitars.com/lollar-pickups
🎸 Frank Brothers Guitar Company: https://www.frankbrothersguitars.com
🔊 Benson Amps: https://www.bensonamps.com/guitar-amplifiers
Subscribe for more boutique tone explorations.
🎸 Frank Brothers Arcade Goldtop | Lollar Mini Humbuckers (P90 Conversion Rings) | B5 Bigsby
🎛️ R2R Electric Rangemaster (second half)
🔊 Benson Amps Monarch | Benson Tall Bird | Boss Waza TAE | Benson 2x12"
Recording: Universal Audio Apollo x4 | Lauten Audio LS-208 | Royer R10 & R121 | Sennheiser E906
