Wierd pickup.

[David Schwab]

The EKO factory in Recanati, Italy made some iconic guitars for both Vox and Hofner, like the Beatle bass.

Have a look here: http://www.fetishguitars.com/

Pepe aka Lt. Kojak
Milano, Italy

Yeah, I've been to that web site. I love those funky old guitars.

This was my Vox Phantom XII

[Chuck H]

Potting the pickup isn't really too hard. I use a mayo jar. Put the p'up in the jar, put in enough Mcloskey's Marine Varnish to cover the p'up plus a quarter inch. Pop a hole in the jar lid and stick the "suck" end of a hand held bulb pump into it. Now seal the lid with silicone, screw it on and seal the inserted pump with silicone. Let the p'up sit for an hour or so and then evacuate some air from the jar until you see bubbles rising out of the p'up. let stand for one hour and repeat. Do this until you don't see any more bubbles. Then take out the p'up and wipe it clean. you can bake it in your oven at 150 degrees if you can stand the smell. I just let them sit for a loooong time. A little varnish will leak out and you may need to clean the p'up a couple of times. You can dampen a rag with thinner if it gets too sticky.

You can do the same thing with wax and save the long wait time. Use a combination of 75% bees wax to 25% carnuba wax and melt it at 150 to 170 degrees in the oven (the silicone and pump bulb won't melt). I don't think the wax works as well as the varnish, it's more expensive and harder to cleanup.

Chuck

[David Schwab]

I just dunk my wound coils into a can of polyurethane, let it sit for a minute, and take them out and let them drip. I let them dry overnight.

Most pickup makers use wax, but a lot of pickups, including Fender bass pickups were potted in varnish or lacquer.

[LtKojak]

Yeah, I've been to that web site. I love those funky old guitars.

This was my Vox Phantom XII

Great old piece, David. Was it playable? A lot of these old instruments weren't very playable... man, I haven't seen so many knobs in just one guitar... do they work? What do they do?

Pepe aka Lt. Kojak
Milano, Italy

[David Schwab]

Great old piece, David. Was it playable? A lot of these old instruments weren't very playable... man, I haven't seen so many knobs in just one guitar... do they work? What do they do?

It was very playable, but I was never crazy about the tone. It was stereo. Each of the three pickups was split in two... the top three courses and the bottom three. So each pickup had two volumes and two tones. Then each pickup had a three way Tele style switch for Off/Normal/Reverse. Reverse flipped which half of the pickup went through the left or right channel. Then there was a Gibson style toggle switch for stereo/mono.

It did sound cool though headphones with the middle pickup reversed.

At some point I rewired the pickups with each half in series so there were humbuckers. It sounded better then. Fuller sounding.

Then at some point I wired back as stock and sold it to a guy in Japan.

I also had two Mosrite basses, and sold the one in mint condition. I was getting tired of all these instruments I had no room for and never played. I also had a Gibson EB-2D at one point and a Hayman 3030H. Wish I kept that one.

I still have a '72 Fender Mustang and a '59 Jazzmaster, and two '73 Ric 4001's.