Every clod has a silver lining

[J M Fahey]

Thanks

Just googled "annealing" and it refers to full "softening" or "fully undoing tempering"; in the same page it mentions normalization as a special case of annealing, the same but to a lesser degree, just enough for removing brittleness but keeping strength.

Thanks again, sometimes itīs necessary to know the usual word rather than the Dictionary suggested one.

In any case, might be wrong, but guess that thermal treatment dos not change (or change much) steel magnetic properties.

[ken]

If you heat Alnico over 500F or so, doesn't it lose its magnetic ability?

[salvarsan]

In any case, might be wrong, but guess that thermal treatment dos not change (or change much) steel magnetic properties.

(edit) I was curious to know if that had been investigated.

A search on "steel permeability after annealing" using Google Scholar got 28,000 hits. These are the scientific studies, primary references which are assumed to have strict methodologies and reproducibility, i.e., more fact than opinion. Even so, maybe 1/4 of them are relevant.

From the abstracts alone, they say steel permeability changes according to the crystal structure of its carbides which change depending on their proportion and final heat treatment.

Bigger crystals in steel mean more changes in physical properties in response to heat treatments.
This applies to iron carbides and silicides both.

Big crystals mean greater high-field magnetic permeability, higher hysteresis losses (and a higher Barkhausen noise figure).

Low carbon steels show less magnetic (or any other) change from heat treatments.

The primary effect of cryogenic treatment on metals is a finer crystal structure, mainly from expansion/contraction thermal effects.

Everything you do in building a pickup makes a sonic difference but no one change makes much sonic difference (except magnets and the idiot holding the guitar pick).

A salable pickup is an aggregation of many incremental changes -- no single feature dissected in isolation is sufficient explanation of the final results.

[salvarsan]

If you heat Alnico over 500F or so, doesn't it lose its magnetic ability?

Yup. Curie point. Happens to all permanent magnetic materials, sometimes permanently.

[big_teee]

Cartridge reloaders anneal brass to soften the necks, so they don't split when you resize them.
It works slick.
Never annealed anything else.

https://www.americanhunter.org/wp-co...nnealing_f.jpg

[charrich56]

Rick Turner a few years back was pushing hard for people to research magnetic circuit effects by "getting the coil out of the way" - that is, winding a medium or low Z coil where its buffered self-resonance would be outside the audio range, so that the coil could be held constant, while varying the magnets, pole pieces, and overall construction materials.

This would allow collection of quality data and maybe subtle effects such as annealing, pole piece composition, etc could be experimented with, measured, and listened to.

Unfortunately, most people misunderstood what he was trying to do, but in the context of this conversation, it would be worth doing for some enterprising person to go down that route, even if the conclusions were for some of these things, "It just doesn't matter."

Trying to separate out different effects of materials and their effect on the pickup sound without doing something like this, is kind of a mug's game, if you're also having to deal with a big self-resonant hump in the audio range which changes every time you change something. Once you get some unambiguous data about materials, then find something you like and work with the coil, windings, fine tune the resonant frequency, etc. to finish the recipe.

Of course, there's the "20 years of tweaking, and some luck" camp as well, which some people have had some success with.

[J M Fahey]

I also anneal cartridge brass , and aluminum sheet.

Sometimes I buy surplus/overstock for cents on the dollar for my chassis and often get way too hard material, no big deal if shearing but poor for punching and bending.

[rjb]

Join the club

I also anneal cartridge brass , and aluminum sheet.

Lots of folks anneal various metals.
Jewelry makers do it all the time- anneal the piece, diddle with it til it gets work-hardened, anneal it again, etc.
I've annealed brass while fabricating custom parts for saxophone mechanisms.
What's this have to do with silver wire pickups? Hell if I know.

[salvarsan]

Lots of folks anneal various metals.
...
What's this have to do with silver wire pickups? Hell if I know.

It's a friendly rambling discussion that could only improve over pizza and beer (but, by Gawd!, it doesn't have to be that way!).

Random factoid: silver and copper become more ductile at cryogenic temperatures. Cryo treatment could be a form of stress relief that would prevent cut-through on the inner winds when the pickup cycles through a wide temperature range over its lifetime. Some pickups die after a few years because of it.

[ken]

Cryo treatment could be a form of stress relief that would prevent cut-through on the inner winds when the pickup cycles through a wide temperature range over its lifetime. Some pickups die after a few years because of it.

You would think that since the temperature range you keep your guitar in doesn't really change too much, there wouldn't be all that much stress on the coil windings to worry about. I have heard of pickups dying from foreign objects like sand getting inside the coil somehow and cutting inner windings, or sweat getting into an unpotted Tele lead pickup and corroding the inner winds, or even flaws on magnet surfaces next to winds that cut coil winds laid over the top of them, but I have never seen a pickup actually die from too much temp change. Then again, I never keep my instrument anywhere I wouldn't want to sleep.

[rjb]

It's a friendly rambling discussion that could only improve over pizza and beer (but, by Gawd!, it doesn't have to be that way!).

Sorry if I sounded testy.
I wouldn't mind a slice with sausage and 'shrooms. Ya got any Rolling Rock?

[Silvertone Jockey]

Notice that the word Silver is part of my forum handle. I feel that this makes me more than qualified to chime in on this thread. I believe that any materials used in the construction of any thing will make a difference in the audio qualities of said thing, and I challenge anyone to refute my claims.

I'll go one better than that. When it comes to adding mojo to an instrument or amp when it comes to component selection, I use what most would call 'gut instinct' like say I have a choice of 5 or 6 different capacitors of the same value but that differ in the materials used to construct them that would work in the circuit? I choose the best one with my 6th sense which always tells me which one will sound the best in the circuit in question. This has never failed me in the past and saves tremendous amounts of time saved in swapping parts and then listening again a few days later to analyze the results.

[Enzo]

I know squat about winding pickups, but occasionally wander down here...

May I ask a stupid question (and please don;t give me the no stupid questions speech). This custom drawn silver wire being discussed. Does it come enameled or otherwise insulated? Or is that a secondary process one has to worry about after spending the $3800 or whatever it is up to now?


By the way, Juan and other doubters, I recommend Kieth Richards' book, I found it quite readable and I learned a lot about the guy. I think he is the quintessential rhythm guitarist.

[eschertron]

I know squat about winding pickups, but occasionally wander down here...

Oh, snap! Am I supposed to show my badge when I enter?

[eschertron]

Iron from meteorites was briefly discussed (Keef reminded me!) and I had some thoughts on that subject. There might be 'accidental alloys' present in such meteoritic metal that does affect the way it behaves. Follows are a couple snippets describing one such impurity that can be found in certain meteorites:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Niobium is a structurally sound metal with a high melting point and high resistance to corrosion. It is commonly combined with steel, nickel, cobalt, iron and other metals to create a strong, resistant alloy. Its stability under extreme temperatures makes it an ideal choice for components in jet engines, gas turbines and combustion equipment, while its corrosive resistance is useful for gas pipelines and chemical storage. Niobium alloys are also used in capacitors, superconductors and sensitive magnetic imaging equipment
Online Metal Suppliers, Distributors & Manufacturers | Eagle Alloys

Niobium is used in various superconducting materials. These superconducting alloys, also containing titanium and tin, are widely used in the superconducting magnets of MRI scanners. Other applications of niobium include welding, nuclear industries, electronics, optics, numismatics, and jewelry. In the last two applications, the low toxicity and iridescence produced by anodization are highly desired properties.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niobium

Niobium was mined chifely as columbite, and is formerly known as colombium (Cb). Another mined metal is pyrochlore and this is now the most important. The main mining areas are Brazil, which produce more than 85% on the world's niobium, Zaire, Russia, Nigeria and Canada. World production is around 25.000 tonnes per year. The amount of unmined reserves is not known, but there are extensive deposits of pytochlore.
Niobium (Nb) - Chemical properties, Health and Environmental effects

Meteoritic rutile: A niobium bearing mineral
Abstract
Quantitative electron microprobe analysis of rutile grains in several meteorites revealed the presence of variable Nb amounts. In iron meteorites rutile is enriched in niobium; the NbO2 content varies between 1.63 and 2.93 wt %. In the Vaca Muerta mesosiderite rutile shows much lower NbO2 contents varying between 0.04 and 0.38%. Tantalum was not detected in any of the analyzed rutiles. The present findings establish a Ti/Nb coherency and the strong lithophilic behavior of Nb in meteorites.
https://www.researchgate.net/publica...earing_mineral