P-90 Newbee need advice

[godi]

Hi guys

I have little experience winding (with good results) Fender style single coil pickups, but here I'm building a John LENNON Les Paul Junior Custom clone (or style) guitar, and I need advice from experience guys about P-90 pickup, well I think I'm at the right place

Pictures are at : John LENNON Les Paul Junior Custom clone or style - DIY

I bought from Mojo a plastic bobbin for the P-90 bridge pickup, one side of the bobbin have two holes and the other side have a center nutch (or slut).

1 - Does the two holes are made for the wiring, ground in one hole and hot in the other one ?

2 - If so, do I need to install metal eyelets in these holes ? I plan to use original Gibson style metal braid sheild wire with the hot in the middle of the wire.

3 - Does the two holes should be oriented on the bottom or on the top of the bobbin ?

4 - What kind of glue is best for the two magets ? I have some Alnico V bar magnets.

The neck pickup (Charley CHRISTIAN style) will be more Custom made, I'm going to build a steel rail with two Alnico V magnets under the base (P90 style). Not a real clone but rather "style" pickup.

5 - Should the poles of the two pickups be oriented the same way, North, North or South South or one pickup North and the other one South ?

6 - I have some Essex magnet wire 42 guage, is 10,000 turns is a good target ?

7 - 10,000 turns for both pickups ?

8 - I also have in stock four neodymium bar magnets that are 2 inchs long x 1/2 inch wide and .062 thick, can you see any use in my project or should I stick with the Alnico V bar magnets ?

9 - How thick is a "real" Charley Christian pickup over the body ? I plan to radius the rail at 12 inchs to match the 12 inch radius finger board and the ABR-1 bridge.

Well, that about it.
Thank you all for your help and support, I should be able to build something "decent" with these questions reply.
Jean GODBOUT

[J S Moore]

The holes are for the wiring but not like a Fender single coil. The leads are attached to the magnet wire and then fed through the holes in the bobbin, which are oriented to be on the bottom of the coil. I use a couple of dabs of crazy glue for the magnets. It holds well enough but you can get the magnets off later if need be.

As for orientation with the other pickup it depends on whether you want one to be RWRP.

10,000 turns is actually standard output for P-90's. I tend to do 10,500 for the bridge and 9,500 for the neck for most of my sets. It just seems to be a nice balance.

If you want traditional P-90 tone stick with the Alnico. Otherwise experiment away with the neo. I do think they will be too strong in that size though.

[Possum]

....

You seem to be missing the baseplate and the keeper if you're making a traditional P90. Keeper goes on over the pole screws on the bottom of the pickup, then your magnets butt up against that with identical poles against it. So south and south or north and north. You don't need glue. Then the brass baseplate you solder the braided ground to the baseplate, solder the coil start to the hot lead and the coil end to the ground braided wire. Then baseplate slips over the pole screws and use a sheet metal screw into the baseplate, through the keeper into the bobbin. This holds the magnets in the pickup as well. You may have to drill out your commercial keeper and baseplate to accomodate the sheet metal screws. I use a 9/64 drill. The sheet metal screws are phillips pan head #6x 1/2" Vintage recipe for P90s was 10,000 winds which ends up being around 8k. For bridge wind it hotter than that and for neck maybe a little less, depends on what magnets you're using...

[godi]

A picture worth thousand words

I found this picture of a Lindy FRALIN P-90 pickup on E-Bay :

http://jeangodbout.com/lennon-les-pa...ck-dog-ear.jpg

Is that how Gibson used to make the connection on the coils ?
That not very "clean".

Does the pickup whould be plotted with wax with the baseplate on ?

Thank

[ShannonH]

Is that how Gibson used to make the connection on the coils ?
That not very "clean".

I've seen them like that. I actually solder the shield to the base plate near the magnets so it looks nicer, but that will work. It's just a ground.

I wax pot mine.

[David Schwab]

Is that how Gibson used to make the connection on the coils ? That not very "clean".

See photos below.

Does the pickup whould be plotted with wax with the baseplate on ?

Gibson didn't pot their pickups back then. I don't know if they pot the P-90's now.

[LtKojak]

Gibson didn't pot their pickups back then. I don't know if they pot the P-90's now.

I don't know either 'bout P-90s, but they surely put a lot of wax in their P-94s. That's the main reason they're not that good sounding, if you ask me.

To make a good sounding set, I had to change their magnets, as the neck p'up was mud city and the neck p'up was... anemic, for the lack of a better word.

I went with an A5/A5 for the neck and an A5/A8 for the bridge. This magnet combo made'em come to life. Anyway, I wish the neck one was a bit underwound... it improved a lot, but still no cigar. With about 800 turns less would've been a lot better. The neck p'up sounds ok, though.

[Possum]

...

You don't want to pot P90's, they were never potted as PAFs were also never potted. Yes thats how vintage P90s were wired. On mine I use brass baseplates like the late 60's mid-70's were, I drill a hole in the corner and use vintage Gibson type braided shield wire and push it through a little bit and solder the shield to the plate, so its inside the pickup and you don't see the connections, this is the modern method and very clean. Gibson still uses the old method, it works....

[soundmasterg]

You don't want to pot P90's, they were never potted as PAFs were also never potted. Yes thats how vintage P90s were wired. On mine I use brass baseplates like the late 60's mid-70's were, I drill a hole in the corner and use vintage Gibson type braided shield wire and push it through a little bit and solder the shield to the plate, so its inside the pickup and you don't see the connections, this is the modern method and very clean. Gibson still uses the old method, it works....

So the older P90's had nickel silver baseplates? How is the sound different?

Greg

[Possum]

...

I have an old dog ear one, now that I look at it, it too is brass but they were zinc plated, cool, never realized that before. You can get nickel silver ones now, they are just more clear sounding and don't bump the mids much as brass does. They are cool, nice to have an alternative.

[David Schwab]

So the older P90's had nickel silver baseplates?

I had a set of P-90s with the flat baseplates from an old SG and they were nickel silver.

[Possum]

...

David both photos you posted are brass baseplates, you can plainly see the brass showing through. Do you have a photo of the n/s plate? I've only seen the later brass plates and the zinc plated brass ones.

[David Schwab]

Do you have a photo of the n/s plate? I've only seen the later brass plates and the zinc plated brass ones.

No, I don't have those pickups any more. I know they weren't brass though because I modified one of them to mount Charlie Christian style with the three screws from the top, so I cut the mounting tabs off the sides.

They were like these in this thread.. you remember that thread, you started it.

http://music-electronics-forum.com/t16007-2/#post132580

[godi]

Les Paul Junior

Any one of you know the correct radius of a vintage LP Junior body?

Thank

[Possum]

...

The color of that metal looks wrong for nickel silver. NS is more brassy yellow, that stuff looks real zincy color to me. Look at the phillips mounting screws, I know those are zinc plated and the baseplates are the same color. Probably just a better zinc plating than the old stuff was, which oxidized easily....