Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum

Forum Ringside => Pickups => Topic started by: Sollophonic on January 04, 2024, 06:46:11 PM

Title: Rather Odd Telecaster Bootcamp Pickups?
Post by: Sollophonic on January 04, 2024, 06:46:11 PM

I have had these Bootcamp pickups for some time, they have been in a Squier Standard Tele that I haven't played for some time that I lent out to someone and have only just got back.

I got the pickups used about four years ago, I put them in the guitar wired to a four way switch and at the time thought they were quite low output, but as I was letting a beginner guitar have the guitar for a while, I didn't think about it too much.

I usually play Teles with higher output pickups, so when I got this guitar back, restrung it and played it, I was surprised how low output the pickups were. I then looked at the original box and then the pickups themselves and they are labelled as Bootcamp Brute Force.

Both pickups have an output of just over 5K, whereas the Brute Force pickups should be about 8K neck/14K bridge.

Were there lower output pickups made in this range or could it be that the magnets/wiring has gone on them?

(https://i.postimg.cc/q79MWV2C/BareKnuckleBootcampBruteForceFront.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/Y9YqHnxD/BareKnuckleBootcampBruteForceRear.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/cCW14R9x/BareKnuckleBootcampBruteForceFrontOutput.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)
(https://i.postimg.cc/YS4CXqLH/BareKnuckleBootcampBruteForceRearOutput.jpg) (https://postimages.org/)

Title: Re: Rather Odd Telecaster Bootcamp Pickups?
Post by: timmy_b on January 10, 2024, 12:16:42 PM

It looks like, from the photos, your pickup selector switch is set in position 2 when you are taking the measurement. This would have the red wires of both pickups connected to the output and, as such, both pickups are connected together in parallel, so you are measuring the resistances of both pickups at the same time, in parallel, which would be about right for the figures that you're getting. To get the most accurate readings, put the switch in position 1 (bridge only) to measure the neck pickup and position 3 (neck only) to measure the bridge pickup.

That doesn't answer the output level question, but it would be a good idea to get an accurate reading from the pickups first before investigating anything else that could be contributing to a low output.