Rewiring Pickups

[Polar Bear]

Hey guys, just a quick question, there's a whole lot of broken pickups on trademe I was wondering how difficult it is to rewind them? Is it worth doing? What sort of wire does one use?

PB

[GrantB]

Really fine stuff...so fine in fact, it's surprising not more p/ups cease working...have np idea osrry where to get it from...not much help sorry

[Tsuken]

I have a shedload of crappy pickups lying around - the wire from which you're welcome to if you wanted I don't suppose there would be any intrinsic "Samick-ness" that would adhere to the wire so you'd probably be ok.

[Polar Bear]

*Gulp*

IS that wire made in the U S of Fackin' A?

[Tsuken]

As in Unfortunately Samick Always?

[Polar Bear]

Ba Dom Tish!!

[Tsuken]

Ba Dom Tish!!

I thought it was worth better than that....

[Bg]

it would be enamelled wire that is used for inductor winding. The guage makes a difference to tone, so can't specify which....

[ash]

Pickups are usually wound with AWG42 wire which is about 0.06mm in diameter. Good US made pickups use enamelled wire usually. I don't know what the Korean factories use, but it is often the same diameter, however has some attribute which makes it somehow inferior.

Winding takes a bloody long time by hand and it is very difficult to do without breaking the wire. Imagine what your fingers would feel like after 5000 turns per coil on a pair of humbuckers...

Thats why I don't bother.

[B45-12]

What I've done in the past for this and rewinding xformers (for vintage radios) is use a bobbin on a older hand drill mounted on a stand I made you can clamp to the bench - I bought a whole load of belden enamelled copper wire years ago in various gauges including 42 - but from a junk shop. Dick Smith I notice is nowv starting to stock enamelled wire in various gauges

Generally feed the wire by holding it in a lump of cotton wool while I turn the drill handle (gets quite hot sometimes as well) - the reel sits in a sort of cradle with wheels/rollers so it turns easily) but as Ash says it breaks VERY easily and even with this aid it takes quite a time (typically about 4 hours).

However for those repairing the output xransformer on Granny's valve radio there is one further tip - every couple of layers wrap the coil in a layer of plumbers tape (that thin white stuff they use for wrapping around pipe threads to seal them). I also finished the few I've done off with an outer layer of electricians tape.

Agree with Ash - life it too short to do this unless it's deeply cherished or similar pup.

[GrantB]

But if you DO want to bother, I see Stew Mac now stocks all sorts of crazy do it yourself pickup parts including wire....worth a look. Otherwise buy some gems rom Pete
http://www.vintagevibeguitars.com...and no, I don't have shares in this guys co....I just like his work. cheers

[artyone]

I did my first one a while back,actually from scratch,for a bass and it was an awesome sound,I used neodenium slugs topped with 5mm bright mild steel.I mounted the bobbin on a battery drill and,yes,the hardest part is soldering breaks.The enamel is real tricky to get off.

[philipnz]

I unwound 5 pickups off my Rickenbackers once. It was a really nervewracking job. To take them down from 10 ohms to 7.5 ohms meant taking about 400 metres off each one. In total over 2 kilometres of this fine wool like wire. Soldering the ends back on was really tricky as the insulation and wire itself melted with very little heat. It all worked but I'd never want to do anything like it again.

[Rog]

I made my first pickup in 1961. I used some 1/4" rod my father found for me, magnetised it myself, cut it into small sections and remagnetised them (using a DC coil I made for the job). I used formica for the bobbin - filed it all out by hand - then hand wound the coil, tring several different gauges until I got some results. Until I learned to have light hands, I had to do quite a bit of reworking.

You're all smegging spoilt these days - LOL!!

FWIW, when I made my guitar necks, I used a mathematical formula I found in the library and it worked our reasonably well.

From these early beginnings, I learned physics, electronics and mathematics - excellent learning tools.

[Gelato]

You're all smegging spoilt these days - LOL!!....

Yeah Rog, I'm sure your guitar sounded great as you carried it 50 miles to school in 16 feet of snow with shoes made of old nails that you made yourself Man times were tough back then