black vulcanized fiber... what's the point?

[Artur pickupmaker]

David, ya gotta love those 'hippy sandwiches'... just watch out for them 'shrooms.


It is actually stronger than the same thickness of wood, so it won't split or crack.

Ken

Depens on the wood. The woods I use for it are stronger than vulcanized fiber, I did mesured how much a piece of this fiber bends with a weight in the middle and pieces with the same size and thickness of different woods. After assembled and wounded the risk of crack the wood pieces is very low, the tight wire fills the space between the top and bottom and transmits the strengh of an impact. I would say if an impact is strong enough to crack a dense and strong wood, its probably strong enough to crack AlNiCo rods and broke the wire inside.

Yeah, I love wooden pickups like this ones.

[chevalij]

i made alot of wood pickups in the 70's and found alot of reasons not to use it- plywood would be better than solid wood but aside from mechanical reasons- it looks like 70's design IMO, .

I just had to mill a Tele type bobbin out of oak. It was a bitch and took a while, but it worked. I tried lighter easier to machine woods, but they split too easily. Prototype work is fun! Prototype work is fun! Prototype work is fun!

I almost believe it now...

[FunkyKikuchiyo]

the freeze spray wouldn't cause the solder joint to harden too fast and comprimise the quality of said joint?

[ken]

All you need is a tiny squirt, at the plastic not the solder. The gas will cool the solder. If you do mess up the soldering, you can always resolder just enough to clean up the joint. The main thing is to make sure you don't mess up the bobbin.

Ken

[David King]

I just bought a 1/16" sheet of this stuff:
GRADE L (LINEN BASE) PHENOLIC SHEET from Aircraft Spruce
It's not as stiff as GR4 but it's linen based so easy on the tools and a cool color too.

[kevinT]

I just bought a 1/16" sheet of this stuff:
GRADE L (LINEN BASE) PHENOLIC SHEET from Aircraft Spruce
It's not as stiff as GR4 but it's linen based so easy on the tools and a cool color too.

this looks interesting...

[kevinT]

Another thing about plastic Fender-type bobbins, even though they can work well, is that many folks think of cheap production-line pickups and that not as much time and effort went into building it. Not as good as the fiberboard boutique pickups made from scratch....I'm thinking of MIM strat pickups.

[Joe Gwinn]

the freeze spray wouldn't cause the solder joint to harden too fast and comprimise the quality of said joint?

Too fast is not usually a problem. Too slow so something manages to move while the solder is still slushy (yielding a cold solder joint) is the usual problem.

The classic advantage of eutectic solder for electronics use is that it has a very narrow slushy range, and so hardens abruptly.

[FunkyKikuchiyo]

Too fast is not usually a problem. Too slow so something manages to move while the solder is still slushy (yielding a cold solder joint) is the usual problem.

The classic advantage of eutectic solder for electronics use is that it has a very narrow slushy range, and so hardens abruptly.

Good to know. I've never tried accelerating the cooling besides perhaps clipping a heat sink onto something, so I really didn't know. Yeah, I know moving stuff around is bad, but I've never seen a solder joint take more than a few seconds to cool, so I never thought about trying to speed up the process.

[mickmutante]

Well.. I think I saw this discussion a little late...
I love the wood appearance and as Artur, David, and SJE, I made mines totally of wood. That made them unique parts. It's more work.. but at the end it is totally worth it.