Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum
Forum Ringside => Pickups => Topic started by: monkeywalker on March 06, 2006, 07:28:52 PM
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i don't think there are any posts on this already.
anyway i was wondering if anyone,apart from the guys at BKP, has ever wound or rewound their own pick up? if so how did it go?
would anyone ever try it who hasn't done before?
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Jason Lollar has a book on how to do it - Myself, I would rather trust the experts - i.e. BKP :D
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I've done it. They're right - it is very satisfying to play your own pickup. However, it took me six hours to actually hand wound it (no machine at all), so I haven't tried since.
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i'm sure i've hit my pickup by accident while strumming, but I don't think I've ever hurt it...
:twisted:
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i'm sure i've hit my pickup by accident while strumming, but I don't think I've ever hurt it...
:twisted:
I don't get it.
I'd really like to wind pickups, actually i emailed Tim asking if i could go hang with him for work experience once, but he said no; the big meanie
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i'm sure i've hit my pickup by accident while strumming, but I don't think I've ever hurt it...
:twisted:
I don't get it.
I'd really like to wind pickups, actually i emailed Tim asking if i could go hang with him for work experience once, but he said no; the big meanie
pronounce "wound" like "woond" and you'll get it.
It's that messed up language english getting the better of us again, indy :D
DAVE_MC will now refrain from owning indy any more, since it's too easy :lol:
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OH I GET IT!!! no that i didnt get it before of course... :roll: cause... i mean....
its only indy thats stupid and cant do his own language... EVERYBODY knows that...right...?!
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lol - terrible joke - "anyone ever woond a pickup?" doesnt even make sense - no wander noone got it, guh Dave - ur trying but failing
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I get it, its just not very funny :P I'd like to try winding my own pickup but im guessing it'll be hard to make one worthwhile.
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There's a guy on here that's wound a few, and from what I gather they sound ok.
I can't think of his name, oh yeah, his name's TIM :lol: 8)
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lol - terrible joke - "anyone ever woond a pickup?" doesnt even make sense - no wander noone got it, guh Dave - ur trying but failing
it does make sense, wound is the third person singular of the verb "to wound" (i.e. i've just been shot, i'm wounded!), so it makes sense.
It was a hell of a lot funnier before i had to dumb it down for all you guys...
But yeah, it was pretty weak.
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eeee i don't know.
anyway back to the subject, i've wound two pickups myself, the first one sounds alright, it's very bright, it's a humbucker and it's just a gotoh japan bridge pup that i rewound myself. i've put it in my epeiphone, i didn't wind it very hot because i wanted quite conservative sound, it's not a patch on my abraxas BKP obviously but non the less i'm happy with the way it sounds.
the second one i haven't reinstalled yet, i was winding it all last night and snapped the wire when i suddenly sneezed, bugger!
so it's not wound as hot as i wanted,i'll let you know how it sounds when i've sorted it all.
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Personally I'd love to have a go at winding a pickup.
I have a lawsuit Ibanez SG which isn't really worth spending the money of putting a decent pickup into (but it has a huge sentimental value).
As my father and myself resurrected it from the dead when I first got it in 83 it would be nice to wind a pickup for it.
Hmm a maple neck / fingerboard SH with what I think is an Ash body, if that's not crying out for a mutant pickup then I simply don't know what does.
Rob...
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How do you actually do it?
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well i don't know where to get hold of new pick up wire so i just rewound mine usin the old stuf, you have to be really careful it doesn't break though, it's very fragile and if you use too much tension the wire snaps.
when you open up the pickup they usually have ribbon or tape around them, under the first layer there are the start and finish of the coil soldered to a wire each.
on the screw coil for example the start is wired to the live wire that then goes to volume or switch etc. the finish is wired to the start of the slug coil start.
under the wires connecting the pup to external sources there are more layers of tape/ribbon, under here is the pickup wire,once you have unsoldered the connecting wires you can start to unwind the coils.
if you have new wire to put on then you can just pull the old stuff off no problem.
however if you are reusing the old wire, which i don't advise, you have to very carefully remove it with out snapping it, which is difficult as the waxpotting binds the wire together. once you get to the start you can begin to rewind.
the problem i have is getting the wind nice and tight to fit all the wire back on the coil, i find it balloons out in the middle.
no doubt this is because i'm inexperienced and generally not very good at it.
it takes massive amounts of time because it's all by hand, as you can imagine i don't have a machine that allows me to just wind the pup in a few hours,it's not something you see everyday......well not that i know of any way.
each coil takes me about ten hours to unwind and rewind, but obviously it depends on how many turns there are in the first place.
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Wow, brave stuff indeed.I must admit I wouldn't rewind a pickup with it's original wire especially if it's been potted, sure you're going to break up the capacitance but you'll never get it back on tight enough by hand without breaking it as the wax is going to stiffen the wire right up.New winding wire is expensive and very hard to buy in 'small' spools.......the smallest we use is 4 - 5lbs and even then you're looking at over £100 for plain enamel...........solderable polynylon is cheaper but comes on huge 5-6 kg spools usually-enough to make ALOT of pickups but still going to cost several hundred pounds.
A rewind can make an old p/up sound alot better in a number of ways-you can alter the wire gauge, the wire type, the number of turns and the winding pattern.A quicker method than sitting there wrapping a bobbin by hand is to find something to rotate the bobbin for you whilst you feed the wire on between your fingers-you'll have better control over the winding pattern and can control the tension too.People have made winders from all sorts of things-old record players,drills........sewing machines are a favourite.At the end of the day it's whatever suits the person doing the winder-there's no right or wrong so long as you're controlling the wire going onto the bobbin and govern the tension,wind pattern and no. of turns.
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if i could get hold of some wire i would be willing to pay the price. obviously i'm not exactly good at it but i can't help wanting to try stuff like this out, i really enjoy it and i'm learning new things every time i try something. i have this in controllable need to be doing something with my guitar, if i spent as much time playing them as i do messing about with the wiring and pickups i'd be quite good by now.
i had a feeling the pickup wire would come in very large quantities.
i was gunna email you asking how you get the wind tight enough to fit loads of turns on for pups like the warpig and miracle man, i didn't realise the wax did that to the wire in such an extreme way, it's so fragile, very frustrating to say the least
but yea i'd love to do it from scratch with new wire.
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Warpigs and Miracle men are easier.....thin wire is easier to fit!
VHIIs are trickier - thick wire and lots of turns, if you look at a VHII bobbin they're completely full. Look at a Miracle Man and they look much skinnier!
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Tim do you have a particular wind parttern for each type of pick up you do? if so, does it give greater consistancy in the sound it produces?
while we are on the subject, do you have a favorite combo of pickups or just a fave pup in general?
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I think Tim's said somewhere that the Riff Raff is one of his favourites, but I've never played one to comment on.
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Mule humbuckers all the way 8) !
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I'd really like to wind pickups, actually i emailed Tim asking if i could go hang with him for work experience once, but he said no; the big meanie
Perhaps time should start up a Bareknuckle activitity camp in the summer.
Pickup winding and guitar workshops :)
Rob...
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I can see the insurance bill ££££££££
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Especially if sambo turns up
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:twisted: