When is too much aging? Opinions please?

[WBPickups]

An endorser of mine wanted to get a custom pup made for him and he wanted it to look old, really old... extremely old with some major wear look. More than his original one he sent in.

No, he didn't want a PAF replica but something for his collection of very worn in PRS's. The first pic is a picture of his original 86 PRS Standard "T" bridge pickup that he sent in for a repair and subsequently cloned for sound on the new one. So after I repaired it and ran it through the tonal analyzer to get some readings. I built up this DC one with some old Dimarzio bobbins I had but decided to really age the hell out of them. He loves them but I think I went a little over board with it.

His PRS pup after the repair.


the new one

[LtKojak]

An endorser of mine wanted to get a custom pup made for him and he wanted it to look old, really old... extremely old with some major wear look. More than his original one he sent in.

Don't ask me, I hate the "Old" "Worn" "Relic" look with a passion.

[Dave Kerr]

There's a thread not too far back where there was some good discussion on tarnishing the metal in a fairly controlled manner. I think it was David Schwab who had a missing screw and got a pretty good match using acid fumes iirc.

[Clint Searcy]

Wow, I just got a set of DiMarzios in the shop to fix. The base plates were drilled out so they could be mounted "Eddie style" and he wants them fixed. They look a lot like the second picture there. Very authentic looking work.

[kevinT]

Need to rust/oxidize the screws and slugs a little. Ferric chloride will do the trick. Staining and abusing the bobbins is only half the battle.

[David Schwab]

My God, that PRS pickup is beat to hell!

The Dimarzio bobbin pickup looks good. That's not too much, if you like that sort of thing, and I really don't for the most part.

The pickup I had to age a screw on was a Tim Shaw from the 80's. I had to rewind it, and in the process lost a screw! I think I ended up distressing a new screw slightly and hanging it over vinegar? I don't remember now, but it came out great.

[David Schwab]

Wow, I just got a set of DiMarzios in the shop to fix. The base plates were drilled out so they could be mounted "Eddie style" and he wants them fixed. They look a lot like the second picture there. Very authentic looking work.

Solder some nuts to the base plate. I had to do that on an old Hi-A pickup, and an Overlend EMG mini humbucker, since they used rather thin brass for the screw tabs.

[WBPickups]

Need to rust/oxidize the screws and slugs a little. Ferric chloride will do the trick. Staining and abusing the bobbins is only half the battle.

I was going to go more on the rusted side of things on the screws & slugs but he wanted it something like his neck that wasn't so rusted just slightly aged on the scews. I just used a little muratic acid to dull them out and some Marlboro ash.

I have about 50 years worth of Muratic Acid in the outside shed.

[WBPickups]

My God, that PRS pickup is beat to hell!

Here's the guitar that it came from... It was cleaned recently and a temp bridge pickup installed at the PRS factory.

[Possum]

....

The relic thing can be fun, but tedious sometimes. This is my first attempt at relic creme bobbins, I didn't rust any of the parts though, they eventually will on their own because of the treatment I did. I could have gone further with this but I didn't charge for it so didn't want to spend toooooo much time on it....

[theboss]

Here's the guitar that it came from... It was cleaned recently and a temp bridge pickup installed at the PRS factory.

That guitar is famous to those that have been to the birds and moons forum.

[WBPickups]

That guitar is famous to those that have been to the birds and moons forum.

Yeah, when I got the call about the pup dying out. I thought he was joking at first and maybe a beer bottle may have finally got the best of it..

That guitar has a lot of great history. It was a freak puncture accident and an easy fix but was daunting since that guitar is kinda famous and I didn't want to have to rewind it but we had a plan if it came to that. I had a back up 86 dead T bridge that we were going to use the original wire if it came to some major surgery but it didn't just a slight repair of the damaged wire on the slug coil.

[Plucky]

Nice job on the aging. I think it's just fine. By the way, I hope you have good insurance on your shed...

P.S. Don't use the brown acid...

[kevinT]

"Marlboro Ash"...interesting ...I'll have to find some smokers/ash trays. This June marks 20 years of not smoking after smoking for ten years.

I know that guitar very well. Rest assured there is a lot of beer residue on that pickup. Maybe those lighter stains are dried up foam.

In fact, Frankie lives right around the corner from me (5 minutes away). He uses this axe every time they open for KIX and Jaxx in Springfield VA.

[kevinT]

The relic thing can be fun, but tedious sometimes. This is my first attempt at relic creme bobbins, I didn't rust any of the parts though, they eventually will on their own because of the treatment I did. I could have gone further with this but I didn't charge for it so didn't want to spend toooooo much time on it....

Nice job. I like the leather backdrop.

I know those screws...are they from who I think they're from?