OneDamNote Yes, knowing just how LONG it can take to run down a pickup issue would help customers see why a "simple repair" could cost as much as buying a new pickup. Those with vintage guitars & pickups generally understand the time/cost issue and are willing to pay. Those with recent OEM pickups need to be educated about the true cost of handwork (custom winding, rebuilds, etc.) so they stop trying to haggle over the cost/value of my time. You are correct--I need to make my own video about the steps it takes to 1) track down a pickup problem, 2) building a custom pickup from scratch.
+Kirk Janowiak If you want to know what to charge, first figure out what your hourly overhead runs. It isn't worth the same amount everywhere you go even if the quality is the same. In my shop I have little overhead because it's a paid for old downtown building and I live upstairs and am semi-retired. Weigh that with the amount of demand that I have. In my area there is little demand for a job as this compared to the every day stuff I take in. Also I stay as busy as I like but here, it's not repairs all day every day. If you have a shop where you're full 24/7 then you have to decide what you have time for and you'd be foolish to charge less per hour than the volume you already have. If you get too busy, then you gotta raise prices to thin out the work load a little bit or raise prices to hire some help. Being too busy is as bad as not having enough work. Anytime a job takes time away from another project that you could be making more money on, you have to raise the price or it isn't worth doing. If you aren't set up with the equipment and you seldom have a call for this, then the price has to go up to cover your investment. If it's unreasonable though, then you'll never get a rewind job because it's cheaper to find a 1966 pickup and replace it with original. You can't charge the entire investment to your first customer to get your investment back. Figure out your overhead per hour and adjust for your time and expertise and material markup. In this case, the winding wire. If you never get a call for this kind of repair but want to carry the equipment, then advertise for the service. You'd be surprised how many people want a custom wound pickup in addition to pickup repairs as well as how far away they'll drive or mail to get good service. So how much is it? I don't know, too many variables and I only know my own LOL!
This video is more about diagnosing and reconstruction of a pickup. No need for a sound sample, im sure everyone watching this knows what a old-school fender single coil sounds like
Was it just me or was that nerve wracking. I know shit about pick ups but when he started to cut all that original wire away with that craft knife I broke into a cold sweat. Nice job in the end. I'd love to learn all this chap knows and be doing this for a living. Love watching the Stew Mac videos. Very meditative.
I was always told that the cursory lacquer dip was to prevent corrosion between the magnet poles and the coil - so if that low E pole had rusted all the way down the lacquer helped to seal the parts. Interesting and obviously very time consuming work, thanks for letting us see you dissect an older pickup! Interesting that it was NOT wax potted, probably pretty live and microphonic?
There's an average number of turns Fender used to do for each guitar model; people have documented this kind of stuff. 1966 Tele bridge pu's had about 7600-7800 turns of wire around the coil.
+David Olenick right! If I had to live on what most people want to pay for fixing their gear, I would be eating weeds and drinking rain water. There is little respect for electronic repair and the knowledge, skills and equipment needed to do a proper job, that is why there are so few repair techs around anymore, just no money in it...
+David Olenick if it were only that easy! Most people don't want to pay virtually anything to get their gear fixed, the basic view is that repair techs just aren't worth much more than minimum wage, you can earn more as a luthier than as an e-tech. It's like "I don't see it how can it be much money for that little part" whereas for a luthier its "I see the difference so I understand the cost". I really appreciate these Stew-Mac articles, Dan is just so talented and a fountain of knowledge and is worth whatever he charges, amp techs OTOH just don't get that level of respect in my experience.
I would like to see the wire ends joined at the solder points. also, a view of the meter would have been nice. also a count of the wind would have been informative.
A really interesting video, for all of us who not only love our guitars, but also like to know about the workings and the guts of the beasties. Thank you!
Great video! Only addition I would have done was write the date that you rewound the pickup on the OG tape. In another 50 years, that would have been valuable info! Also, instead of dipping the pickup in lacquer prior to winding, could you do it with wax?
The primary function of the lacquer in that case is to create an isolating layer in the pole pieces, preventing it to create a short in the wire. Wax wouldn't work as well, it's just too soft.
I notice you did not scrape off the rusted pole. Any reason for leaving it rusted? just got a 1965 Hagstrom 1, and was rubbing the rust off the pole pieces pressing hard (heavily rusted), I discovered the poles are not one solid piece, as a small metal cap on two poles broke loose. The top part is actually a little steel cap that is glued onto the pole underneath. Apparently the rubbing alcohol I used to free the rust dissolved the glue. This happened on only these two two pole pieces (the 3rd and 4th). I cleaned the old glue off, and put a tiny pinch of super glue (with pressure overnight) to secure the two caps. (I assume all the poles have caps, but did not want to disturb the rest). Have you ever seen pickups made this way, with metal caps fixed on top of each pole? They were magnetized. If you put them upside down, they would repulse, but the correct way, and it they fit right back in place. They work fine, but I'm curious nevertheless if this strange construction is unique to Hagstrom, or are other pickups made like this...
I know it would have been satisfying after watching it go through all that but he only got sent the pick up. He would need a whole guitar to do a sound test. He may not own a Tele.
Pickup would very probably pass the sound test on guitar. Even dead pups can play, but sound weak and thin, with tone control they lose the power very quickly. Have the same experience with single pups on vintage Mustang. They worked but were very weak. What makes me wonder is why he didn't unwinded whole pickup by hand? Great opportunity to learn something about pickup winding technique from 66 Telly ;-)
+Mo jek if you want to learn something *good & useful* about pickup winding technique study the Dimarzio x2n , G&L Z-coil pickup and try to combine this designs .
Sorry, I meant '65 onwards were machine wound. I have '65 Strat set in here 2 years ago that had both CBS and pre-CBS pickups, a transitional set. The CBS grey bottoms were all machine wound and the formvar Leo era was hand wound....
1966 - 2013 ..47 yrs old.. I'm 47 now and feel nearly dead '' smoke to much"..making a little bit of sound but not much ..dm depressed now :(... glad u didn't wax it...it makes pickups sound null
It will vary a bit from one pickup to the next, but most Telecaster pickups will have somewhere between 4000-5000 feet of wire wrapped around the bobbin.
No need to destroy an original 1966 pickup...99.99% of that wire is perfectly fine....... Next time apply some heat from a heat gun, once the coil is hot use your coil winder to UNWIND the existing wire onto a blank spool until you get down to the break... Repair the break and varnish the repair..then re-wind the original wire back with the proper tension... Measure the before and after winding capacitance to make sure you match it to keep it sounding the same...The capacitance is integral for the Q and resonant frequency...
the people asking for a sound test are getting on my nerves. there are many, MANY videos that you can go and listen to a 60s fender single coil, which BTW, I'm sure almost everyone here knows what a fender single coil sounds like. go type that into the search and be quiet. This video was clearly about deconstructing and rewinding a pickup, theres plenty other videos/records you can hear the sound of a single coil
11 лет назад+1
Isn't it kind of necessary to count the wraps in order to replicate the original or is there a regular turn number to be applied depending on the year of production and model?
Hello Erick, I am Paul HendriX from Pauls Pickup Place, www.Hendrixpickups.nl in the Netherlands, please excuse my bad grammar. Thank you for sharing this video it is nice to see the same movements that I perform when repairing pickups. I respect to see you first heat up the solder joints and unwind the coil, to see if the pickup can be rescued. My question to you is: PE wire is beautiful, speaking of vintage materials, but it often causes a mall coil, I noticed in my shop. Scraping off insulation, to be able to solder, already damages the wire. This of course is well known to you. But do you happen to know of a way to reduce this damage in the first place. I already use solder which has copper in it, it repairs the the wire a little. Thanks for your time, kind regards Paul.
haii thanks for video, may i know how can i get data the number of windings high output pickup like bill lawrence L500xL or another that have output resistance 17k
Jak widzę te dzisiejsze lutownice ze spiczastym,stalowym grotem oraz lutowie bez kalafonii to od razu nerwicy dostaję. Porządne lutownice jakie bywały dawniej posiadały grot z miedzi zaś lutowie (stop cyny i ołowiu) posiadało w środku kalafonię i wtedy takim sprzętem można było komfortowo pracować. Dzisiaj taką lutownicą można jedynie smarkać, a nie lutować zaś jednocześnie nerwy stracić. Natomiast przetworniki do gitar elektr. nawijałem na zwykłym gramofonie 50 lat temu ... Wtedy to były czasy .
Is there a way to measure the DC resistance as you wind? So you know when you've reached your target? Is it safe to scrape off a little insulation of the wire periodically, to use as a test point? (I'd think it should be, as long as you put enough layers between test points so there's no chance they could contact each other.) Or do you just know roughly how many winds you need to achieve a certain resistance? I suppose another way would be to intentionally over-wind, then remove winds and keep testing periodically until you hit your desired resistance. A waste of wire though.
There could have been issues with the magnets. and reguarless of age. one wrap of pickup coil tape around the magnets will protect the wire even better from rustor ? but overall a great vid. thanks
I'm a bit baffled because I could swear Erick says as he peals the base plate off "I can see the tape holding the pole pieces in". As far as I know the magnet poles are held in place by their interference fit with the holes in the flatware, having been forced in under pressure. I'm guessing the purpose of the piece of tape can only be to insulate the poles from the grounded baseplate. I suspect that if the poles are grounded it increases the pickups self capacitance, moving the self resonance down in frequency, so the pickup looses some sparkle.
So, if you reflowed the pickup wires a little longer and added more solder your problem would have been solved without having to unwind the pickup, which gave it it's classic sound in the first place... ?
after viewing a few others on this subject, the finish end was soldered to the black, ground, lead wire. Don't understand the difference, while on this one the finish is soldered to the white lead wire, regards,
Nice video, but definitely under wound for most 1966 Tele bridge pickups. Most were in the upper 6s for that year. Before doing all this, did you check to see if the pole pieces simply needed to be re-magnetized?
very nice and informative! a bit surprised your using an old pump solder sucker instead of a Hakko 808 or Aoyue desoldering iron, required in the shop.
how many rounds and what gauge of the wire was? this is like show how to get 4th street and direction is like go there about and you guess the town and country???
Oooohh. Every time you touched the point of your X-acto to the coil wire, I felt an actual jolt up and through my spine. (I've never been afraid to do things to any of my guitars that others called insane, but it's been years since I actually jabbed, sliced, or drilled into anything that could be called 'vintage'. So now that I'm headed into my own 'Vintage' years, maybe it's just that I've become 'tele'-pathic with the axe's silent screams out into the ether... OUCH! Or maybe it's just me!
+Obsoe Hollerith - vintage and broken is still broken... I mean, if your leg was broke, you'd fix it wouldn't you, no matter how old and vintage you were...?
I was expecting a diagnosis first, lacking that, I was horrified as he was touching the coil with the knife... but, it seems, he was determined to rewind it anyway
I would have put an ohmeter on the black ground wire and then use the test probe on each magnet, you may find that the coil grounded out on one or several of the poles, this can do bad things to old pickups. '66 onwards were machine wound, not hand wound. I would have counted the turns per layer, myself. I'd also measure the wire diameter with a micrometer, but good luck finding a match with current modern plain enamel, It won't sound the same as original with new wire, unfortunately.
I guarantee you he checked the Gauss of the magnets before rewinding. They don't always show every single thing they try in the videos, and even then the only way the pickup wouldn't make sound at all is if *several* of the poles became demagnetized, which is incredibly unlikely. If just one or two became demagnetized there would still be a weak sound coming out of the pickup rather than no sound at all.
I wanted to hear it as well, but he must ship the pickup back to it's owner ... he doesn't have the guitar. I had a 65' once upon a time ... sure wish I had it back.
I recently tried to resolder lead wires to my ‘90’s Strat pickup but one side of the coil wire broke. Took one wind off the coil to reconnect but of course forgot to remove insulation so didn’t work. How do you remove insulation from such a fine wire without breaking?
people who know pickups know better than I do so take this with a grain of salt but as I understand it the amount of winds around the coil correlates to the resistance of the pickup so someone might simply eyeball it and then test the resistance of the pickup afterwards or buy a fancy pickup winder that counts the amount of winds you've done. Theres more too it than that but thats round about the basics as I understand them
Mostly through documents noting the number or winds when the pickup was created, and from people who have taken the time to meticulously unwrap the entire length of wire from pickups. You can also measure the resistance of a given length of pickup coil wire and the overall resistance of the pickup and extrapolate the approximate number of winds from that information. Here's a link to a document listing the typical number of winds for a few common picks at the bottom of the page. www.stewmac.com/freeinfo/i-2105/i-2105.pdf
+Wutipong Wongsakuldej he said it was erratic but no mention of inductance and resistance values as opposed to the other pickups values .this may give insight where the problem is
Were it wax you can warm it with a good hot lamp and uncoil the string easily. Were it lacquer, you're pretty much SOL. You mmiiighhtt be able to use a little lacquer thinner brushed on, but it'll most likely wreck a bit of your outer windings.
What is the point in doing that? If you can't save original pickup just tell the customer to buy a new one. Cutting original bobin is death to that originality.
To start winding, you run the copper wire through an eyelet in the pickup's fiber base. Turn by hand for 6-10 wraps to ensure that the wire won't be pulled off the bobbin when you start the motor. Tele pickups are usually wound counterclockwise.
Your pickup is microphonic. which is why you're hearing the sound of you touching it with your pick. The most likely culprit is a loose spot in the coil. This isn't always a bad thing, some player prefer it. You can always have a repair shop re-pot the pickup or try it yourself. www.stewmac.com/video-and-ideas/online-resources/learn-about-guitar-pickups-and-electronics-and-wiring/none-of-your-beeswax-potting-pickups-with-paraffin-.html
I don’t think it matters how many winds. It’s more like that it should be within a certain measurement readings on the multi meter. He said around mid 5 k range. It’s probably not going to sound exactly like the original but same flavor.
I think I would have tried re-magnetizing the pole pieces, before I destroyed all of that nice vintage wire... But then I am just a fan of old vintage wire.
Rachel Woodruff: I have some experience with restoration of very old magnetic pickups. If the resistance of the winding is correct for how full the bobbin is, you test the magnets. You can easily re-magnetize pole pieces, and 9 times out of 10, that will restore the pickup to it's original output. In my opinion, to rewind a vintage pickup, is to make it a modern reproduction. No better than new.
The magnets would not affect the resistance reading of the coil. The resistance could not be measured (it gave and erratic reading) indicating a bad coil. He tried to unwind just a little but that didn't work so re winding was the only option here.
Yes, he did say "erratic reading", But that could have been caused by his technique of touching the leads while contacting the wires. It is highly unlikely that a damaged coil wire would give any reading at all. a reading of OL is the only reason to disturb the wire on a vintage pickup. I'm not saying he was wrong, just that he should have tested the magnets, before taking the coil apart. It takes all of thirty seconds to test and re-magnetize a pickup.
+Tim Hallas ''old vintage wire'' is complete bullshit --- coil is a coil --- no matter the age of the wire you use (get some free advice --- throw out the old crappi (shitty) alnico "magical vintage" magnets --- use modern innovative rareearth magnets --- neodimium or samarium (or even ceramic --- barium ferrite --- if you don't have lot of money) --- and will be happy (^___^) ) --- all of the pup's company do it
My customers need to see this so they understand the time and effort it takes.
Would that help them justify any price objections? Have someone come help make a video for your work. Never to many guitar videos.
OneDamNote Yes, knowing just how LONG it can take to run down a pickup issue would help customers see why a "simple repair" could cost as much as buying a new pickup. Those with vintage guitars & pickups generally understand the time/cost issue and are willing to pay. Those with recent OEM pickups need to be educated about the true cost of handwork (custom winding, rebuilds, etc.) so they stop trying to haggle over the cost/value of my time. You are correct--I need to make my own video about the steps it takes to 1) track down a pickup problem, 2) building a custom pickup from scratch.
Kirk Janowiak Please do. They are very interesting to watch and you never know who might it inspire one day to carry on the craft.
+Kirk Janowiak
If you want to know what to charge, first figure out what your hourly overhead runs. It isn't worth the same amount everywhere you go even if the quality is the same. In my shop I have little overhead because it's a paid for old downtown building and I live upstairs and am semi-retired. Weigh that with the amount of demand that I have. In my area there is little demand for a job as this compared to the every day stuff I take in.
Also I stay as busy as I like but here, it's not repairs all day every day. If you have a shop where you're full 24/7 then you have to decide what you have time for and you'd be foolish to charge less per hour than the volume you already have. If you get too busy, then you gotta raise prices to thin out the work load a little bit or raise prices to hire some help. Being too busy is as bad as not having enough work. Anytime a job takes time away from another project that you could be making more money on, you have to raise the price or it isn't worth doing.
If you aren't set up with the equipment and you seldom have a call for this, then the price has to go up to cover your investment. If it's unreasonable though, then you'll never get a rewind job because it's cheaper to find a 1966 pickup and replace it with original. You can't charge the entire investment to your first customer to get your investment back. Figure out your overhead per hour and adjust for your time and expertise and material markup. In this case, the winding wire. If you never get a call for this kind of repair but want to carry the equipment, then advertise for the service. You'd be surprised how many people want a custom wound pickup in addition to pickup repairs as well as how far away they'll drive or mail to get good service. So how much is it? I don't know, too many variables and I only know my own LOL!
@@excidedous Where is your shop?
I really wanted to hear it once the work was completed. The title of the video does not mention a demo, but there should have been one.
Totally
This video is more about diagnosing and reconstruction of a pickup. No need for a sound sample, im sure everyone watching this knows what a old-school fender single coil sounds like
In what guitar? Not like he's got a tele just laying around without the bridge pickup. He was only sent the pickup.
i've been playing for forty two years, and to this day, the gauge of the coil wire amazes me. So fragile, but such a necessary part.
Was it just me or was that nerve wracking. I know shit about pick ups but when he started to cut all that original wire away with that craft knife I broke into a cold sweat. Nice job in the end. I'd love to learn all this chap knows and be doing this for a living. Love watching the Stew Mac videos. Very meditative.
Happy (belated) 50th birthday, pickup!
I have that exact same solder-sucker! Bought it more than 20yrs ago as a teen.
That's the best craft knife advert I've seen in years
I was always told that the cursory lacquer dip was to prevent corrosion between the magnet poles and the coil - so if that low E pole had rusted all the way down the lacquer helped to seal the parts. Interesting and obviously very time consuming work, thanks for letting us see you dissect an older pickup! Interesting that it was NOT wax potted, probably pretty live and microphonic?
Someone wrote those tele pu last 50 years. Almost on the nose. 55 years- rewind. Wires just became worn. Sounds great.
There's an average number of turns Fender used to do for each guitar model; people have documented this kind of stuff. 1966 Tele bridge pu's had about 7600-7800 turns of wire around the coil.
YA! I wanted to hear that pickup!!!!
What a job. Combines love for mechanics, electronics and music ties them together. Repair ppl make more than most musicians :)
+David Olenick
right! If I had to live on what most people want to pay for fixing their gear, I would be eating weeds and drinking rain water. There is little respect for electronic repair and the knowledge, skills and equipment needed to do a proper job, that is why there are so few repair techs around anymore, just no money in it...
You have to charge more for the easy jobs so you don't have to charge as much fr the hard jobs. Thanks for the reply
+David Olenick
if it were only that easy! Most people don't want to pay virtually anything to get their gear fixed, the basic view is that repair techs just aren't worth much more than minimum wage, you can earn more as a luthier than as an e-tech. It's like "I don't see it how can it be much money for that little part" whereas for a luthier its "I see the difference so I understand the cost". I really appreciate these Stew-Mac articles, Dan is just so talented and a fountain of knowledge and is worth whatever he charges, amp techs OTOH just don't get that level of respect in my experience.
I would like to see the wire ends joined at the solder points. also, a view of the meter would have been nice. also a count of the wind would have been informative.
Very cool video. And yes I wanted to hear that pickup too!
I fixed the speedometer in my truck by heating up the solder joints. Took about 20 minutes and I was back in business.
That's a lot of beating mate, 20 mins..
Thank you for the answer. I though Stew-Mack had a book out with the information
A really interesting video, for all of us who not only love our guitars, but also like to know about the workings and the guts of the beasties.
Thank you!
Vintage Fender Guitar Pickup Spec Info
LEGEND:
Pickup Name, coil wire guage, coil wire insulation(PE=plain enamel, F= formivar, P=poly/poly-nylon) number of turns (per coil), average resistance DC, Magnet type/grade (A=alnico, C=ceramic) special interest notes are in italics
Telecaster Bridge
50-51 43 PE 8000 CCW 8.0k A5 North
51-64 42 PE 9200 CCW 7.5k A5 South
60's/70's 42 PE/Poly 7800 CCW 6.4 A5 South
Great video! Only addition I would have done was write the date that you rewound the pickup on the OG tape. In another 50 years, that would have been valuable info!
Also, instead of dipping the pickup in lacquer prior to winding, could you do it with wax?
The primary function of the lacquer in that case is to create an isolating layer in the pole pieces, preventing it to create a short in the wire. Wax wouldn't work as well, it's just too soft.
I notice you did not scrape off the rusted pole. Any reason for leaving it rusted? just got a 1965 Hagstrom 1, and was rubbing the rust off the pole pieces pressing hard (heavily rusted), I discovered the poles are not one solid piece, as a small metal cap on two poles broke loose.
The top part is actually a little steel cap that is glued onto the pole underneath. Apparently the rubbing alcohol I used to free the rust dissolved the glue. This happened on only these two two pole pieces (the 3rd and 4th).
I cleaned the old glue off, and put a tiny pinch of super glue (with pressure overnight) to secure the two caps. (I assume all the poles have caps, but did not want to disturb the rest).
Have you ever seen pickups made this way, with metal caps fixed on top of each pole? They were magnetized. If you put them upside down, they would repulse, but the correct way, and it they fit right back in place.
They work fine, but I'm curious nevertheless if this strange construction is unique to Hagstrom, or are other pickups made like this...
@mmcneiley. That's why he dipped it varnish. To seal the magnets. No need for tone killing tape.
are you kidding me? no sound test? wtf man?
I know it would have been satisfying after watching it go through all that but he only got sent the pick up. He would need a whole guitar to do a sound test. He may not own a Tele.
could have still done a sound test without the guitar just as he did at the start of restoration
Pickup would very probably pass the sound test on guitar. Even dead pups can play, but sound weak and thin, with tone control they lose the power very quickly. Have the same experience with single pups on vintage Mustang. They worked but were very weak. What makes me wonder is why he didn't unwinded whole pickup by hand? Great opportunity to learn something about pickup winding technique from 66 Telly ;-)
Godamnit, I watched all that and no sound test at the end!!!
+Mo jek
if you want to learn something *good & useful* about pickup winding technique study the Dimarzio x2n , G&L Z-coil pickup and try to combine this designs .
Sorry, I meant '65 onwards were machine wound. I have '65 Strat set in here 2 years ago that had both CBS and pre-CBS pickups, a transitional set. The CBS grey bottoms were all machine wound and the formvar Leo era was hand wound....
Excellent DIY video !
Was sort of hoping you'd do the potting that was missed by the factory.
Very nice and informative, but... why it was not tested in the amp at the end as it was at the start? It would be a gran finale.
1966 - 2013 ..47 yrs old.. I'm 47 now and feel nearly dead '' smoke to much"..making a little bit of sound but not much ..dm depressed now :(... glad u didn't wax it...it makes pickups sound null
Nice job Erick
Hi Erick, I never heard of a solder sucker before, can you tell me more. Love the pickup info man, you should really write a book!!!!!
"Solder Sucker" lmgtfy.com/?q=solder+sucker
Nice. Would be nice if you showed it working at the end of the video
How is the amount of wire determined?
By the resistance.
Very cool video.
How does he keep the edge of the string in place? At the beginning there seems to be a dab of glue in it.
Wow, I had no idea. Approximately how many feet of wire would be on a Tele p/u?
It will vary a bit from one pickup to the next, but most Telecaster pickups will have somewhere between 4000-5000 feet of wire wrapped around the bobbin.
No need to destroy an original 1966 pickup...99.99% of that wire is perfectly fine....... Next time apply some heat from a heat gun, once the coil is hot use your coil winder to UNWIND the existing wire onto a blank spool until you get down to the break... Repair the break and varnish the repair..then re-wind the original wire back with the proper tension... Measure the before and after winding capacitance to make sure you match it to keep it sounding the same...The capacitance is integral for the Q and resonant frequency...
the people asking for a sound test are getting on my nerves. there are many, MANY videos that you can go and listen to a 60s fender single coil, which BTW, I'm sure almost everyone here knows what a fender single coil sounds like. go type that into the search and be quiet. This video was clearly about deconstructing and rewinding a pickup, theres plenty other videos/records you can hear the sound of a single coil
Isn't it kind of necessary to count the wraps in order to replicate the original or is there a regular turn number to be applied depending on the year of production and model?
i wish he would have explained why he coated it in lacquer. had it not originally been coated? or did it just need to be refreshed?
great video, thanks Erick
Hello Erick, I am Paul HendriX from Pauls Pickup Place, www.Hendrixpickups.nl in the Netherlands, please excuse my bad grammar. Thank you for sharing this video it is nice to see the same movements that I perform when repairing pickups. I respect to see you first heat up the solder joints and unwind the coil, to see if the pickup can be rescued.
My question to you is:
PE wire is beautiful, speaking of vintage materials, but it often causes a mall coil, I noticed in my shop. Scraping off insulation, to be able to solder, already damages the wire. This of course is well known to you. But do you happen to know of a way to reduce this damage in the first place. I already use solder which has copper in it, it repairs the the wire a little.
Thanks for your time, kind regards Paul.
No, your grammer is really good. I know some people in America that have worse grammer.
No sound test??? Sound of pick-up depends Also on how many turns the copper wire was rounded . Did you count the thickness of the copper woundings ?
haii thanks for video, may i know how can i get data the number of windings high output pickup like bill lawrence L500xL or another that have output resistance 17k
So you don't need to scrape the enamel off the ends of the wires before soldering to the eyelets?
Jak widzę te dzisiejsze lutownice ze spiczastym,stalowym grotem oraz lutowie bez kalafonii to od razu nerwicy dostaję.
Porządne lutownice jakie bywały dawniej posiadały grot z miedzi zaś lutowie (stop cyny i ołowiu) posiadało w środku kalafonię i wtedy takim sprzętem można było komfortowo pracować. Dzisiaj taką lutownicą można jedynie smarkać, a nie lutować zaś jednocześnie nerwy stracić.
Natomiast przetworniki do gitar elektr. nawijałem na zwykłym gramofonie 50 lat temu ... Wtedy to były czasy .
How did you know how many turns of wire you needed on the pickup?
Is there a way to measure the DC resistance as you wind? So you know when you've reached your target? Is it safe to scrape off a little insulation of the wire periodically, to use as a test point? (I'd think it should be, as long as you put enough layers between test points so there's no chance they could contact each other.)
Or do you just know roughly how many winds you need to achieve a certain resistance? I suppose another way would be to intentionally over-wind, then remove winds and keep testing periodically until you hit your desired resistance. A waste of wire though.
You can caluculate the dc resistance roughly, so you know, how long the wire needs to be
and also you can scrape off the wire a bit but you better put on spray lacquer afterwards just to be sure the cut wouldn't damage anything.
There could have been issues with the magnets. and reguarless of age. one wrap of pickup coil tape around the magnets will protect the wire even better from rustor ?
but overall a great vid. thanks
RESPECT! this is great!
I'm a bit baffled because I could swear Erick says as he peals the base plate off "I can see the tape holding the pole pieces in". As far as I know the magnet poles are held in place by their interference fit with the holes in the flatware, having been forced in under pressure. I'm guessing the purpose of the piece of tape can only be to insulate the poles from the grounded baseplate. I suspect that if the poles are grounded it increases the pickups self capacitance, moving the self resonance down in frequency, so the pickup looses some sparkle.
I'll bet that tattoo peeking out of the shirt is a giant StewMac logo chest piece. :)
Oh man. You look like Jack Del Rio's older brother.
Fascinating
So, if you reflowed the pickup wires a little longer and added more solder your problem would have been solved without having to unwind the pickup, which gave it it's classic sound in the first place... ?
after viewing a few others on this subject, the finish end was soldered to the black, ground, lead wire. Don't understand the difference, while on this one the finish is soldered to the white lead wire, regards,
Nice video, but definitely under wound for most 1966 Tele bridge pickups. Most were in the upper 6s for that year. Before doing all this, did you check to see if the pole pieces simply needed to be re-magnetized?
4:00 "I just wanted to destroy something beautiful."
:( Sad end.
very nice and informative! a bit surprised your using an old pump solder sucker instead of a Hakko 808 or Aoyue desoldering iron, required in the shop.
how many rounds and what gauge of the wire was?
this is like show how to get 4th street and direction is like go there about and you guess the town and country???
Test it again when its done!
Oooohh. Every time you touched the point of your X-acto to the coil wire, I felt an actual jolt up and through my spine. (I've never been afraid to do things to any of my guitars that others called insane, but it's been years since I actually jabbed, sliced, or drilled into anything that could be called 'vintage'. So now that I'm headed into my own 'Vintage' years, maybe it's just that I've become 'tele'-pathic with the axe's silent screams out into the ether... OUCH! Or maybe it's just me!
+Obsoe Hollerith - vintage and broken is still broken... I mean, if your leg was broke, you'd fix it wouldn't you, no matter how old and vintage you were...?
was the skritch skritch got me shuddering
I was expecting a diagnosis first, lacking that, I was horrified as he was touching the coil with the knife...
but, it seems, he was determined to rewind it anyway
Super!!!....Once again,superjob!
So I have a question. Since potting the pickups was not a thing back then. Do people ask for vintage style pickups without being was potted still?
Holy Skills!
Excellent video! I almost always enjoy Stewart MacDonald videos and this was no exception. Thanks for sharing :^)
I would have put an ohmeter on the black ground wire and then use the test probe on each magnet, you may find that the coil grounded out on one or several of the poles, this can do bad things to old pickups. '66 onwards were machine wound, not hand wound. I would have counted the turns per layer, myself. I'd also measure the wire diameter with a micrometer, but good luck finding a match with current modern plain enamel, It won't sound the same as original with new wire, unfortunately.
Where can i get that coil winding machine?
+HmongGuitarPlayer LOL! Take a wild guess
Interesting video, thanks!
¡Espectacular!
What guitar is on the wall towards the end, On the left? The sunburst one with a black pickguard. Is it a Les Paul Recording?
to compare it to the new build, it wasnt "broken" to begin with, he said hes gettin a sound, its just weak.
Great Video.
Could you rewind it with fatter wire such as speaker wire or something?
Is Dick Dickerson still doing a guitar festival?
I can't believe he didn't tried to re-magnetize the pickup before taking it apart.
I guarantee you he checked the Gauss of the magnets before rewinding. They don't always show every single thing they try in the videos, and even then the only way the pickup wouldn't make sound at all is if *several* of the poles became demagnetized, which is incredibly unlikely. If just one or two became demagnetized there would still be a weak sound coming out of the pickup rather than no sound at all.
such a good point...
I WATCHED THIS FOR THE SOUND TEST!!!!
Did you pot the pick up? Thanks.
How did you know that it wasn't the magnets that needed to be recharged
Alnico magnets are permanent magnets. They never lose their charge.
Because it's alnico
I was told years ago that wax gives a superior sound over epoxy . True ?
I wanted to hear it as well, but he must ship the pickup back to it's owner ... he doesn't have the guitar.
I had a 65' once upon a time ... sure wish I had it back.
I recently tried to resolder lead wires to my ‘90’s Strat pickup but one side of the coil wire broke. Took one wind off the coil to reconnect but of course forgot to remove insulation so didn’t work. How do you remove insulation from such a fine wire without breaking?
Gently scrape the wire with the point of a knife blade.
Weak magnets would not change the coil resistance. Enamel insulation on "vintage" is wire broken.
Just out of curjousity, how d’ye know when to stop winding? Arr all pickups wound the same?
people who know pickups know better than I do so take this with a grain of salt but as I understand it the amount of winds around the coil correlates to the resistance of the pickup so someone might simply eyeball it and then test the resistance of the pickup afterwards or buy a fancy pickup winder that counts the amount of winds you've done. Theres more too it than that but thats round about the basics as I understand them
Great surgical skills !!! How much would you charge for doing exactly that job ? thanks
hooooooly shit thats a lot of windings.
+Andrew Peleikis Sure but the tightness of the wind and the thinness of the wire and the fact its enamel mean it won't come out screamin' like a p90.
Just wondering why he didn't take a gauss reading
How much would this service typically cost the consumer?
Dave Gleeson from the Screaming Jets?
how do you know how many winds the original pickup had versus what is put on it now
Mostly through documents noting the number or winds when the pickup was created, and from people who have taken the time to meticulously unwrap the entire length of wire from pickups. You can also measure the resistance of a given length of pickup coil wire and the overall resistance of the pickup and extrapolate the approximate number of winds from that information.
Here's a link to a document listing the typical number of winds for a few common picks at the bottom of the page. www.stewmac.com/freeinfo/i-2105/i-2105.pdf
Nice vid!
Bummer, I wanted to hear this pickup afterwords.
When you received the pickup did you measure the inductance and the resistance before pulling it apart to get an idea what might be wrong ?
+graham kaveman He did. He mentioned that he has an erratic reading from the pickup.
+Wutipong Wongsakuldej he said it was erratic but no mention of inductance and resistance values as opposed to the other pickups values .this may give insight where the problem is
What guage wire did you use ?
How would you handle the string if it were potted with wax or lacquer?
Were it wax you can warm it with a good hot lamp and uncoil the string easily. Were it lacquer, you're pretty much SOL. You mmiiighhtt be able to use a little lacquer thinner brushed on, but it'll most likely wreck a bit of your outer windings.
cool video, thank you
Quel son!pour l'époque !
What is the point in doing that? If you can't save original pickup just tell the customer to buy a new one. Cutting original bobin is death to that originality.
I would like to know how do you start the wind on the bobbin with the copper wire?
To start winding, you run the copper wire through an eyelet in the pickup's fiber base. Turn by hand for 6-10 wraps to ensure that the wire won't be pulled off the bobbin when you start the motor. Tele pickups are usually wound counterclockwise.
ThisLoveIsSweet Thank you very much! happy Thanksgiving!
Dean
Why does the neck pickup on my Telecaster make a loud click sound when I touch it with my pick...?
Your pickup is microphonic. which is why you're hearing the sound of you touching it with your pick. The most likely culprit is a loose spot in the coil. This isn't always a bad thing, some player prefer it. You can always have a repair shop re-pot the pickup or try it yourself. www.stewmac.com/video-and-ideas/online-resources/learn-about-guitar-pickups-and-electronics-and-wiring/none-of-your-beeswax-potting-pickups-with-paraffin-.html
@@stewmac It looks like something I can do myself if I know where to buy the bees wax.
Could be more informative if you explain how many winds and what you achieve by under/over wind. Nice vid tho
I don’t think it matters how many winds. It’s more like that it should be within a certain measurement readings on the multi meter. He said around mid 5 k range. It’s probably not going to sound exactly like the original but same flavor.
I think I would have tried re-magnetizing the pole pieces, before I destroyed all of that nice vintage wire... But then I am just a fan of old vintage wire.
Tim Hallas I totally agree. magnets demagnetize over time, but copper is always copper.
Rachel Woodruff: I have some experience with restoration of very old magnetic pickups. If the resistance of the winding is correct for how full the bobbin is, you test the magnets. You can easily re-magnetize pole pieces, and 9 times out of 10, that will restore the pickup to it's original output. In my opinion, to rewind a vintage pickup, is to make it a modern reproduction. No better than new.
The magnets would not affect the resistance reading of the coil. The resistance could not be measured (it gave and erratic reading) indicating a bad coil. He tried to unwind just a little but that didn't work so re winding was the only option here.
Yes, he did say "erratic reading", But that could have been caused by his technique of touching the leads while contacting the wires. It is highly unlikely that a damaged coil wire would give any reading at all. a reading of OL is the only reason to disturb the wire on a vintage pickup. I'm not saying he was wrong, just that he should have tested the magnets, before taking the coil apart. It takes all of thirty seconds to test and re-magnetize a pickup.
+Tim Hallas ''old vintage wire'' is complete bullshit --- coil is a coil --- no matter the age of the wire you use (get some free advice --- throw out the old crappi (shitty) alnico "magical vintage" magnets --- use modern innovative rareearth magnets --- neodimium or samarium (or even ceramic --- barium ferrite --- if you don't have lot of money) --- and will be happy (^___^) ) --- all of the pup's company do it
How do you know how many turns were on it??