Internals of a Gibson Grabber G-1 pickup... ?

[Chris Turner]

Does anyone know the specs of a Gibson Grabber G-1 pickup (the original, not the re-issue)?

Configuration, DCR, wire gauge, etc?

[Chris Turner]

Any educated guesses?

[enkindler]

Any educated guesses?

I am pretty sure they are alinco bar magnets but the only time I've ever seen them (and this was in the early 90's) is after the wire broke off at the epoxy, as you probably know they were potted with black epoxy.

My notes say they were about 6kΩ but I was poor back then and this was with a very cheap multimeter.

The G3, the three single coil spender version had clear potting epoxy for a bit, if you look around the web you will see how they were made and they weren't a very deep coil IIRC.

I'm betting Lollar's 60's Tbird pickups would be a good spot to start if you needed to WAG it, even though I think those have a steel reflector plate.

So there is your "guess" until the real experts come in.

Edit: here is a link to a picture of a clear G3 pickup.

http://www.flyguitars.com/graphics/part19c.jpg

[David Schwab]

I was going to say they were about 6k, but I couldn't remember where I heard that. Bill Lawrence designed the bass and its pickups.

[jason lollar]

I have specs handwritten in one of my notebooks not at the shop here- remind me and i will see if i can find it. I am pretty sure they are ceramic magnets- sideways dual bobbin ugly ole black epoxied units, the third wire orange is just for grounding the pole pieces if I recall correclty. Unless they went really light with the epoxy they are almost impossible to take apart without damaging the plastic pickup cover.

[Chris Turner]

I have specs handwritten in one of my notebooks not at the shop here- remind me and i will see if i can find it. I am pretty sure they are ceramic magnets- sideways dual bobbin ugly ole black epoxied units, the third wire orange is just for grounding the pole pieces if I recall correclty. Unless they went really light with the epoxy they are almost impossible to take apart without damaging the plastic pickup cover.

So you think they're sidewinders then, like some of the old '60s Thunderbird pickups?

At 6K, I wonder if it's two 3K coils wired in series or two 12K coils wired in parallel... given the size of the pickup, it seems more likely that it's 2 3K coils in series.

[jason lollar]

the pickup with the black plastic cover with the adjustable pole pieces down the center? They are a "sidewinder" made of basically mini bucker parts. I dont know of any early 60's thunderbird pickups that were sidewinders- thats a later thing.
remind me in a couple days and i will see if I can find it- i remember something about having to figure out how it was wired- I think it may have had a rotary switch that did a bunch of odd things like series parallel etc- took me a while to figure out what it was suppose to do so i should have that documented too but as years go by that old handwritten stuff I did 15 to 30 years ago gets harder to find

[jason lollar]

OOPS! I was thinking of the Ripper not Grabber- ripper grabber- grabber ripper, differnt pickup sorry! DOH

[enkindler]

Correct,

I never did tear one apart but these did not have the poll pieces IIRC the sidewinders were on the Ripper the Grabber (not 3) the one with the one sliding humbucker was the entry level guitar.

They may have had a steel plate though, the epoxy was really thick on the Grabber. I did not see an obvious plate like you see on a lot of the Tbird pickups. Just potting material.

The bad part is that the movable pickup killed a lot of these, they did no strain relief and so it had a lot of stresses on those wires sticking out of epoxy over the past 30+ years.

Mr Lollar, weren't the early 70's gibson basses (sorry forget the name) and the 60's thunder-birds configured like two small kay speedbump (to reference another recent thread) pickups or blade magnets with a steel plate at the bottom. The Grabber was not nearly as hot as the T-bird pickups I ran across when played though.

Sound wise they kind of reminded me of the Kramer 450B pickups if long/short wood/metal neck comparisons are of any use.

IIRC Bill Lawrence did design the ones on the III but I think the sliding one was too cheap...e.g. like the Squires of today that do not have "Duncan designed".

I'm digging things out of memory from a time I did not wind and maybe I just remember that they were both heavy although the 450B was what I played until I could afford a TB2000.

Edit: now that I think about it, I am pretty sure the early 80's Explorer basses used the same or similar pickups if you can find any information about them.

[Chris Turner]

the pickup with the black plastic cover with the adjustable pole pieces down the center? They are a "sidewinder" made of basically mini bucker parts. I dont know of any early 60's thunderbird pickups that were sidewinders- thats a later thing.
remind me in a couple days and i will see if I can find it- i remember something about having to figure out how it was wired- I think it may have had a rotary switch that did a bunch of odd things like series parallel etc- took me a while to figure out what it was suppose to do so i should have that documented too but as years go by that old handwritten stuff I did 15 to 30 years ago gets harder to find

RE: Thunderbird pickups...
Ah, okay. I just remember seeing some that were sidewinders (photos by David Schwab, I think). I thought they were the older ones.

[Chris Turner]

OOPS! I was thinking of the Ripper not Grabber- ripper grabber- grabber ripper, differnt pickup sorry! DOH

[enkindler]

RE: Thunderbird pickups...
Ah, okay. I just remember seeing some that were sidewinders (photos by David Schwab, I think). I thought they were the older ones.

IIRC that is mid 70's and newer.

[David Schwab]

RE: Thunderbird pickups...
Ah, okay. I just remember seeing some that were sidewinders (photos by David Schwab, I think). I thought they were the older ones.

1976 Bicentennial Thunderbird.

[David King]

1976, the tall ships and a lot of so-so basses too I'm afraid.

[Chris Turner]

remind me in a couple days and i will see if I can find it- i remember something about having to figure out how it was wired- I think it may have had a rotary switch that did a bunch of odd things like series parallel etc- took me a while to figure out what it was suppose to do so i should have that documented too but as years go by that old handwritten stuff I did 15 to 30 years ago gets harder to find

Here's a reminder for Mr. Lollar.

[jason lollar]

yes early 60's t birds would be similar to two speed bumps put together.
its like a giant firebird pickup except the steel inductance plate is the baseplate like a speedbump instead of a seperate internal part like a firebird