Gibson Magnets

[JGundry]

For anyone interested Gibson did magnetize their own bar magnets when in Kalamazoo. I talked to a lady today that worked in the small parts shop at the Gibson Kalamazoo plant. She mentioned, without me asking, that she ruined her watch there magnetizing bar magnets for pickups. She started working at Gibson in 1964.

[David Schwab]

She mentioned, without me asking, that she ruined her watch there magnetizing bar magnets for pickups.

Ha!

[rudutch]

sounds like you can dispel some more rumors now

[Possum]

...

1964 though. What did they do in '56 through '61? You can't conclude anything except that in '64 they did. Its like saying that because someone worked at Fender in '65 on their machine winder and thinking ok then all early Fender pickups were machine wound. Still interesting though.

[JGundry]

I actually figured they did get them supplied magnetized because the odd ball sized magnets Heritage has are magnetized. But if you figure Gibson was cheap, which they were, it certainly makes sense that they would save a buck and charge them at Gibson. They were charged before they went in the pickup according to this lady. Also 1964 is pretty close in timeline to 59' so it does not seem like much of a stretch that they would have charged them in 59'. You are still getting PAF spec. pickups now and then in 64' especially if they have gold covers. Still Ted McCarty years in 64'. Gibson did a lot of things in house that they could have farmed out. It makes sense this would be one job they would keep in house.

Also this lady knows quite a bit about Gibson. She gave me an extremely good contact for the place that makes Gibson parts with some of the old tooling purchased from machine shops that went under in Kalamazoo. I called the place and found out the plater Gibson used is not too far from me. The place they used to plate Gold parts is about 4 miles from me. Anyway she had good information for sure.

As a side note according to someone who knows way more about it than me, Fender was both machine winding and hand winding in 62'.

[Possum]

....

Those platers do incredible work, Wolfe turned me onto them, too pricey with small number of pieces but way better than any gold plated covers you can buy. Downside is that heavier gold plating is a treble killer.

[Joe Gwinn]

Downside is that heavier gold plating is a treble killer.

Gold is a very good conductor, almost as good as copper, and better than aluminum.

Electrical conductivity - Wikipedia

[David King]

Joe,
They almost certainly wouldn't be plating with 24kt gold but rather with 12 or 14kt. It would be interesting to see these conductivity figures along with other common plating metals like nickel, chrome etc. Should we expect to see a direct correlation between conductivity and eddy currents?

A lot of "gold" plating is actually an amber colored lacquer over nickel plate. It's pretty realistic until it starts to rub off. I see it on a lot of guitar parts.

[Joe Gwinn]

They almost certainly wouldn't be plating with 24kt gold but rather with 12 or 14kt. It would be interesting to see these conductivity figures along with other common plating metals like nickel, chrome etc.

We would have to know the alloy composition of the gold plate. Actually, I'm not sure I believe that the plate is not pure gold. Possum may know what's used.

Should we expect to see a direct correlation between conductivity and eddy currents?

Yes. Eddy current power loss varies in direct proportion to the conductivity.

A lot of "gold" plating is actually an amber colored lacquer over nickel plate. It's pretty realistic until it starts to rub off. I see it on a lot of guitar parts.

Well, the good news is that this lacquer will have no effect on eddy currents.

[Possum]

...

These guys aren't using 12 kt. and maybe not even 14 kt. Its a much darker richer gold than you'll ever see on anything except Gibson's top of the line guitar parts. The cheap stuff is probably 10kt. and if you polish it with anything except a soft rag it rubs off, it is gold though...

[Mike Sulzer]

But if you figure Gibson was cheap, which they were, it certainly makes sense that they would save a buck and charge them at Gibson.

Excuse me if I am displaying too much of a pro-corporate bias, but why use the critical term "cheap" to describe a business decision to minimize expenses while gaining more control over the quality and consistency of the product?

[Mike Sulzer]

I doubt that anybody plates gold thick enough to affect the conductivity at audio frequencies. (Even with parts intended to be handled. I have stopped using some gold plated tuners because the nickel shows through in about a year of use.) Reflection of light is determined by the same skin depth formula that we use for audio and rf. It decreases with frequency, and light is much higher in frequency than audio.

These guys aren't using 12 kt. and maybe not even 14 kt. Its a much darker richer gold than you'll ever see on anything except Gibson's top of the line guitar parts. The cheap stuff is probably 10kt. and if you polish it with anything except a soft rag it rubs off, it is gold though...

[Joe Gwinn]

These guys aren't using 12 kt. and maybe not even 14 kt. Its a much darker richer gold than you'll ever see on anything except Gibson's top of the line guitar parts. The cheap stuff is probably 10kt. and if you polish it with anything except a soft rag it rubs off, it is gold though...

OK, but anything other than 24 kt gold is gold alloyed with something. What is that something (or somethings)? I assume these are standard plating alloys, with known properties. Reach into your bejeweled past...

[Joe Gwinn]

Gold plate need not be pure gold, but there are many variations

Cyanide or Cyanide Free Gold Plating Solutions

The conductivity of the as-plated alloy may be far less than that of any of the constituent elements. I doubt that there is any real published data, so we will need to experiment.

The classic experiment is to plate a nonconductor that has been coated with graphite, yielding a free-standing foil made of the plating metal.

Graphite is how they are able to plate baby shoes.

[Possum]

....

Man, its been a long time since I alloyed my own gold, pretty sure it was copper and something else. Seth Lover is the one that said the gold plated PAF's sounded dull because of the gold plating. Personally I hate gold plating on anything on a guitar, it never lasts and always wears off sooner than later. Gibson has always had a reputation for being cheap. They bought magnets no one else wanted to save a buck. Their first attempt at recreating PAFs, they refused to pay the extra expensive to use plain enamel wire and probably a few other details, the end product certainly was no PAF. They moved Epiphone from Korea to China at the expense of quality. When price versus quality comes up its always price with them.