vintage correct tele neck covers?

[Possum]

Anyone know where to get a close match to vintage tele neck covers, most of the modern ones have big cutouts on the skirt area....

[voodoochild]

Originally Posted by Possum

Anyone know where to get a close match to vintage tele neck covers, most of the modern ones have big cutouts on the skirt area....

Allparts has the closest to "vintage spec" tele covers. I personally don't like the sound of the vintage covers considering they were actually brass. The more modern nickel silver ones suit me best.

[Spence]

Actually, AllPrats have now returned to using the shit ones with the huge cut-outs that Possum describes.

[voodoochild]

Originally Posted by Spence

Actually, AllPrats have now returned to using the shit ones with the huge cut-outs that Possum describes.

Wow! Did not know that. I bought some to check them out a few years back and they were nice. I just didn't care much for brass.

[Possum]

There must be some out there somewhere, I see one of the ebay winders using ones that look like Fralin's. I found some like that but they are ten bucks each.

Nothing wrong with brass covers, I do a repro of my friend's '51 nocaster neck pickup, they have a cool old tone thats like nothing else.

I couldn't tell about AllParts, everyone takes photos from the top so you can't see down there......

[the great waldo]

Check out mojotone.

Cheers

Andrew

Otherwise 10 dollars is not much to pay if you get a good price for the pickups and the covers are what you want.

[David Schwab]

Originally Posted by the great waldo

Otherwise 10 dollars is not much to pay if you get a good price for the pickups and the covers are what you want.

It is if you want to buy 100 covers!

[the great waldo]

If your making pickups for a living the material costs can be claimed against tax, Mojotone do nice covers for about 7 dollars retail. A pickup takes maybe 30 mins time to put together with 20 dollar material costs a 100 dollar pickup gives you earnings of 70 dollars for 30 mins work including any profit, which is not bad by anybodys standards, unless of course you´re a lawyer, then it´s peanuts.

CHEERS

Andrew

[Spence]

Originally Posted by the great waldo

A pickup takes maybe 30 mins time to put together
CHEERS




Andrew

Seriously? Any 30 minute tele pickup will be shit.

[David Schwab]

Originally Posted by the great waldo

If your making pickups for a living the material costs can be claimed against tax, Mojotone do nice covers for about 7 dollars retail.

If you are making pickups for a living, you buy stuff wholesale, and not $10 for a cover.

What do you think Fender pays for a cover? Probably under a dollar.

[kevinT]

Originally Posted by the great waldo

If your making pickups for a living the material costs can be claimed against tax, Mojotone do nice covers for about 7 dollars retail. A pickup takes maybe 30 mins time to put together with 20 dollar material costs a 100 dollar pickup gives you earnings of 70 dollars for 30 mins work including any profit, which is not bad by anybodys standards, unless of course you´re a lawyer, then it´s peanuts.

CHEERS

Andrew

It cracks me up when folks provide scenerios like this....Have you ever wound a pickup? It takes a lot more than 30 minutes that is for sure.....

For example, when you add in the chore of potting, which is 15 to 20 minutes itself...(10 in the pot and another 5 to 8 minutes wiping down the pickup)....Add polishing, which is another 20-25 minutes and packaging the pickup and applying product labels. Add another 25 minutes to box it up for shipping and printing the mailing labels ...And this is after you have the pickup assembled.

Material costs come out of your income that you bring in from making pickups...you make less income and that is what you convey on your taxes.

If you have a trader's license you can generally get wholesale pricing. Mojo and guitarpartsusa.com apply certain percentages to items which is not as much discount as wholesale pricing.

[the great waldo]

Hi KevinT

I was actually refering to making a single coil telecaster style pickup, I have noticed that you make humbuckers at a similar price ie. 115 u.s.d. which is a a very reasonable price, and having just made up a batch of humbuckers myself and I am well aware of how much extra work that involves compared to making a single coil pickup, two coils to wind screws into the bobbins magnetizing magnets tape etc. Unfortunately unless one makes the parts oneself we have to rely on mass manufacturers to supply the the hardware for pickup making to keep prices reasonable. Living in Europe I have to put at least 30% increase on any parts that come from abroad fo0r customs duty and thats on top of shipping, however if I really wanted a special kind of pickup cover I would and have paid 10 dollars or more if the customer wants it. We live in a world where people pay 210 euros for a pair of 3 dollar pickup surrounds DMC WTO ver 1.0 front aged factory outlet. I have been making a living and not getting rich making and repairing guitars for over 30 years and will continue to do so until I am incapable of working, I just sometimes get deppresed by all the old guitars sound better than new ones, zinc batteries make your effects pedals sound better than alkaline ones and all the other mumbo jumbo bullshit that seems to be prevalent in the music buisness these days, people seem to have forgotten that Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton and all the other great players took the time out ot learn how to play their instruments and entertain people. A lot of customers seem to think that buying a Clapton strat is going to make them great guitar players. Dream on !!! Sorry about the moan it´s been a long day.

Cheers

Andrew

[the great waldo]

Hi Spence

Seriously? Any 30 minute tele pickup will be shit.

Why?

Cheers

Andrew

[David Schwab]

Originally Posted by the great waldo

Hi Spence

Seriously? Any 30 minute tele pickup will be shit.

Why?

Cheers

Andrew

I'm going to guess because it takes longer than that to make a pickup. Not wind it, but the while process.

I wind a single coil in about 6 minutes. Takes hours to get the pickup together.

[Spence]

Originally Posted by the great waldo

Hi Spence

Seriously? Any 30 minute tele pickup will be shit.

Why?

Cheers

Andrew

If you're ever in my area, come over and see how long it takes to make a great sounding pickup. For sure, some factory in asia can knock up a tele pickup in 30 mins or less. I make a living replacing things like that because they sound shit.
So I'm not complaining, just making a valid point.
Next time you put your car in for an oil change you can deduct the cost of oil and filter and work out what you got charged for labour.
When you're winding a pickup and doing all the things Kevin listed, work out what your time is worth.

[Possum]

the Mojo neck covers have the big cutouts. StewMacs are a little better.

[voodoochild]

Depends on how you look at it in regards to how long it takes to make a pickup. I use a CNC winder. I don't count the time it takes the machine to do it. The value of the machine is all that adds up in the equation at the end of each year. Also wax potting doesn't really count. What counts is how much time YOU are actually spending on the pickups themselves. If you look at it that way then yes a standard Fender style single coil should take approx 30 minute of YOUR time. I personally multi task while wax potting or while the machine is winding so therefore my labor is actually going into something else and not the pickups.
I forgot to mention that I don't sell my pickups by themselves so packaging, marketing, shipping materials, diagrams, etc need not apply. I pop my puppies right into the guitars I build which cuts out all that extra stuff.

[kevinT]

Originally Posted by voodoochild

Depends on how you look at it in regards to how long it takes to make a pickup. I use a CNC winder. I don't count the time it takes the machine to do it. The value of the machine is all that adds up in the equation at the end of each year. Also wax potting doesn't really count. What counts is how much time YOU are actually spending on the pickups themselves. If you look at it that way then yes a standard Fender style single coil should take approx 30 minute of YOUR time. I personally multi task while wax potting or while the machine is winding so therefore my labor is actually going into something else and not the pickups.
I forgot to mention that I don't sell my pickups by themselves so packaging, marketing, shipping materials, diagrams, etc need not apply. I pop my puppies right into the guitars I build which cuts out all that extra stuff.

So basically you're talking from the time you put a fully assembled bobbin (already insulated) on the winder to installing the hookup wire and that is it....well then that would be around 30 minutes per single coil. But I would hardly say that that is the timeframe needed to complete a pickup. That is not the full picture but only a small slice of the pie.

Assembling the flatwork and mags to insulating/dipping the assembly in lacquer..just that alone is pushing roughly an hour.

For me, the clock starts once you pull the bobbin out to be wound (humbuckers) to having the package ready for the post office...everything that is necessary to complete an order.

[chevalij]

Just finished a Tele set. Total time from assembling the bobbins, winding, neck cover, bridge string and leads was about 1 3/4 hours. Still have to pot, charge and pack so you can add about another hour to that.

Strat pickups are a little faster of course, but I also build up bobbins in advance when I get the chance. With pre-built bobbins, it'll still take me a little over two hours to get a set ready to ship. I don't count the time that I'm warming the pickups before potting

[Shepherd]

If you can get a wholesaler account at Mojo, the covers are less than $4 each.

[Possum]

I have a wholesale account but their tele covers are way wrong for vintage, big cutouts on the bottoms....

Stewmac used to have pretty good ones, they show them on their website but in my StewMac stock some are almost full skirt and some have the big cutouts, not sure what they are selling now...