Best Fender Factory-Made Stratocaster Pickups?

[Possum]

...

Finally a resolution, no production pickups were machine wound then in that early period ever on that machine. Didn't think so since no one ever found such a thing. Great story though, so it was there and is a cool piece of history. Maybe you can ask him if the original girl's machine had rubber band driver belts?
Greenfingers where did you get those Gibson winder shots from? I've seen that machine before but not good close ups like those?

[RedHouse]

I'm glad to see that felt wireguide, I have something very similar myself on my winder.
(although not round like that)

[JGundry]

Finally a resolution, no production pickups were machine wound then in that early period ever on that machine. Didn't think so since no one ever found such a thing. Great story though, so it was there and is a cool piece of history. Maybe you can ask him if the original girl's machine had rubber band driver belts?
Greenfingers where did you get those Gibson winder shots from? I've seen that machine before but not good close ups like those?

Huh?! That is what you got out of that information? That was the proof you were looking for? Nothing was said about when the machine was purchased. And the info from Abigail is 3rd hand. I got the book that has the 1960 start date for machine winding and they say Fender machine wound and hand wound for a period of years starting in 1960 before going to full machine winding. If this machine was in use when Fender was hand winding Abigail was probably was busy hand winding anyway. The other two guys started at Fender in 1978 and 1990ish?

I know enough from talking to old Gibson guys to know that the attitude about this old equipment can be very flip. Some people pay to attention to and remember details from 50-60 years ago and can go into great detail. And others are like "What is the big fucking deal? I don't remember what I had for lunch. I don't know if I saw that thing being used but I never knew I would quizzed about it 60 years later!" Both people are telling you everything they know about it. If you end with the WTF guy you are going to miss out on a lot of information. Obviously Abigail is well respected and has shared with people like Seymour Duncan. But in this instance concerning this machine there is nothing iron clad so far.

I think the mounting method of the bobbin will help sort out which pickups were machine wound on a single bobbin machine. Likely this Coweco or one like it is what was used for single bobbin auto winding. I'll let you know what I find out.

I want to know what a reasonable start date for machine winding was with first hand evidence of my own. Right now 1962 is a rock solid date IMO. 1960 is likely. And if the early machine wound pickup show evidence of being mounted to a single bobbin winder then the Coweco is the likely machine.

Until then someone get the number off that machine. If a sales slip to Coweco from 1956 can be produce I think that speaks volumes.

[JGundry]

I'm glad to see that felt wireguide, I have something very similar myself on my winder.
(although not round like that)

Gibson used felt to tension on all of their winders. At least the 4 different machines that I know of are felt tensioned.

[Possum]

.....

"So Abby dosent remember it, and John Page said it was from R&D. If i get anymore info Ill post it.
P.S,.. he also said it was never used for production only for R&D and the counter was not to be trusted."

Hey they were THERE, I wasn't. It wasn't used for production and it was used as a handwinder. Pretty much settles it for me. Now the real question that remains is if they were machine winding in '62, WHAT machine were they using? Is it even in condition to auto wind pickups? If it was never used by R&D as an auto winder maybe it won't auto wind. We can't really expect they would keep every winder they ever had either. I was told that shop closed up and they threw all the old winders away, and the WB has one of them, I think his is a hand winder if I remember. Obivously the '66 machine probably wasn't there auto winding pickups in '62, or was it? There's alot of questions still left but this particular machine apparently was a prototype machine used as a handwinder, and that really fits.

Another thing that bugs me, if you really study that photo of that machine it looks like the automation parts are missing, compare it to the Coweco David posted, a simple machine but you can easily tell how it works. The Fender Coweco has none of those parts, I don't think it actually CAN do an auto wind as it is....

[JGundry]

Every part is on the photos posted. The wire guide is in two parts and props up the white card Abigail uses. There are three gears on the back of the machine that control the auto traverse, sloped cam on the front. It is all there.

There are two details I'm going to look at to see if I can confirm the Coweco was used for machine winding production. When I get the time I will sort that out.

All you can take away from the greenfingers info is the Fender used the Coweco in R&D since 1978 and third hand info that Abigail does not remember using it long ago but uses it now for hand winding. That is it. If Fender threw away a bunch of old production machines as you said, this may be the last sole survivor of several Cowecos that were used for production that was relegated to R&D. The WB machine does not have a rubber band!

[RedHouse]

Gibson used felt to tension on all of their winders. At least the 4 different machines that I know of are felt tensioned.

I meant mine looked nearly just like that pic, I've change mine a bit since though.

[drfunkphd]

Pickup winding is on the horizon for me at some point...maybe...but for the time being I have John at Dawgtown pickups building all my pickups and I have yet to find any better. I had him wind me a handful of custom spec sets and they sound great!

John does hand wound/scatter wound to spec using all the same (or as close as can be found) materials from bobbins to magnets to wire, pots them the same as the Leo-era stuff and the results are amazing. I got him to wind me '56 and '62 Strat sets for a couple clones that I built and the Fender CS stuff I have used before doesn't even come close. The Dawgtowns sound big and full, the neck pickups are my go-to Strat sound and nail the SRV/Hendrix/Eric Johnson tones. If the originals sounded that good, then it's no wonder that people shunned CBS era Fender stuff...I know from dealing with the CBS era amps that quality seriously suffered to cut costs. There's too much cheap mass produced crap being made right now and I think younger players have no idea what good tone sounds like.

The newer Fender ceramic magnet-based or "Vintage Noiseless" stuff, IMHO, is an affront to my lord almighty - C. Leo Fender.

As for picking a year specifically, anything from '54 to '62 does it for me. The subtle tonal qualities that come with hand/scatter winding make such a difference to my ears. Choosing between my '56 Strat and my '62 Strat is like choosing between a brunette bikini model and a blonde bikini model...with either one hanging off of me, I'm going to get your attention. Add your own plugging into a "Twin" joke here.

[David Schwab]

The newer Fender ceramic magnet-based or "Vintage Noiseless" stuff, IMHO, is an affront to my lord almighty - C. Leo Fender.

Leo wouldn't think so... he used ceramic magnets in his G&L pickups, right?

[Bill M]

I forgot about this thread until it was just revived. Well, I'll update my end, I have done a few pre cbs rewinds over the last 8 months and still have not come across a machine wound pickup prior to 1963.

drfunkphd, Hendrix primarily used cbs strats that had machine wound pickups. I personally love mid/late 60's strats. A lot of great music was recorded with them. I think machine wound pickups get a bad rap but, when properly done sound very good. My old auto traverse winders are far from being precision pieces of equipment and thats where some of magic comes from. I use the winding techniques that were originally used on the model pickup that I am replicating. When doing rewinds, which I do quite a few, it is my obligation to rewind a customers vintage pickup as it was originally wound. I get many comments on how their rewind sounds exactly how it did before the pickup went bad. This tells me I did my job properly.

With regard to cbs era amps all I can say is many of them can sound much better by cleaning up the lead dress and getting rid of the shielded wiring. Actually silverface amps generally had better transformers than their blackface counter parts. I've blackfaced many silverface amps in my 20+ years in the amp business with many happy customers.

[JGundry]

I forgot about this also. I now have in possession a Pre CBS Strat pickup that is machine wound and with a little basic investigation that the TPL gear set on the Fender owned Coweco in this thread produces a TPL that matches the TPL of my Pre CBS Fender Strat pickup. The bobbin mounting method also is the same as evidenced by the marks the mounting method leaves behind on the pickup. IMO it confirms that the Coweco Fender still owns was in fact used to machine wind Pre CBS pickups. The machine wound Pre CBS pickups sound great IMO.

[Bill M]

Hey Jon, do you know what year the pre cbs strat pickup is? Any markings on the p'up bottom? 1963-64 pickups may have been wound on a coweco, I never disputed that. I do know that by late 64 the mounting marks that you mention disappear, which is when they probably started using a multi bobbin winder. Do you know what gear set is in the fender owned coweco? I'll let you know this, the pre cbs machine winds that i have rewound did not all have the same tpl. actually neither do cbs pickups, which confirms my opinion that fender had more than 1 winding machine. Maybe even a different type than the meteor, or another meteor with a different setup.

[Rob DiStefano]

highly subjective stuff, but since yer asking for opinions, the only 'best' of anything is the thing you personally like best. everything about guitars is subjective.

for pickups, i like the old fender single coil anomalies, the ones where the winder was watching the clock and daydreaming about a chicken fajita lunch with a few ice cold cervezas, and the strat coil got overwound to around 8.5k turns instead of 7k or so. i don't like fender ice-pick-in-the-ear, whether pre-cbs or the fmic type. as long as the recipe is a good one, meaning the materials are good (vulcanized flat work, alnico 5 mags, 42awg formvar or plain enamel), the winding tension and number of turns are both 'fat', the pup with more than likely have my kinda tone ... 'fat' single coil.

my first new electric guitar was a '63 jag - worse mistake i ever made, what a dog, i was young and stupid and dazzled by all the knobs and dials and the big poster of the beach boys. shudda bought the strat i came in (to jimmy's music on 48th street) to buy in the first place. again, subjective stuff.

my dad and i wound 4 or 5 dozen single coils from the late 50's to early 60's. no counter, just an eye for the coil and take a few ohm readings. they were good pups, none-the-less. our winder was a rube goldberg device that used a phonograph and later a singer sewing machine. hey, it worked. last year i had the urge to wind my own (as if i didn't have enuf work to do), and put together a winder (sans counter) using a micro mark jig saw motor. i made a few digital counters, but none were all that accurate past 500rpm. i did some looking around and settled on a sidewinder - fantastic winding machine, love it.

micro mark jig saw winder ...


sidewinder ...

[copperheadroads]

Winding 8.5k on a strat bobbin unattended would cause it to implode & create a Black hole ,Possibly reversing the Earth's rotation ....AHHH maybe not ........

[Rob DiStefano]

Winding 8.5k on a strat bobbin unattended would cause it to implode & create a Black hole ,Possibly reversing the Earth's rotation ....AHHH maybe not ........

yer probably right ... 'unattended' being the key word. 'hand guided' it's no big deal, but does fill the coil quite nicely with 42awg fv.