Heavy metal pickup project

[therizky]

Hi...,what's up?

lets just get straight to the point.

i need some help and suggestion regarding to the pickup that im going to build.

the goal is to make a set of humbucker to be fit into the indonesian crafted squire fat strat,capable of playing 80's heavy metal and modern metalcore with ease,thats mean tight bass and mid,with melodic treble.

1.i just achieved one and a half kilos of 0,003 mm wire ( AWG rules dont apply here,but after looking at gauge reference table,it supposed to be 46 awg or so)... ive decided to not go with impedances (its wrong istn it!? and also the thinner the wire,the greater the impedances per foot) so looking at the count turns seems good..... to get started,im gonna start with 9000 or 10000 turns per bobbin...is that too much or what?

2.Magnets...i got a few ceramics liying around...but i got to try something else...alnico??? what number? my general thought that the magnet must be....strong....

3.bobbins....custom made of course...either made from a folder material or tiny plate steel is the choice....also,it must be wise to make the bobbin a little higher than standard,to avoid the thing to sound too muddy....

sorry if this thread has been brought before,but just looking at the similar thread dont satisfies me,and also...i dont get the answers.

thanks.

[Dave Kerr]

You've got enough wire to wind a mittful of pickups - I'd start with off the shelf bobbins and the ceramic magents that you have on hand first and see what you get. 9-10K turns per side is a lot, but your wire is thin enough to make it fit, and the ceramic magnets should be brighter relative to alnico 5. You'll need plenty of practice using that thin wire to get decent tension and avoid breaks, so I'd focus first on winding technique before tweaking materials.

[David Schwab]

3.bobbins....custom made of course...either made from a folder material or tiny plate steel is the choice....

You can't use steel for bobbins. You should avoid any conductive material such as aluminum or brass. But steel will "short out" the magnetic circuit.

What kind of tone are you looking for? Just loud? To give some examples of hot pickups, a Duncan JB has about 6800 turns of 44, and a DiMarzio X2N is aboutis about 7700 turns per coil.

You can try 9 to 10K turns, but it might sound like mud unless you have a strong ceramic magnet.

[RedHouse]

Old metal and new metal are done differently, might not get there in one pickup.

Take early Sabbath for instance, Tony's SG on songs like Iron Man and Paranoid back in the day had P90's (or P90 copy's) +boost into amp, where the later Sabbath (Dio onward) tone is humbucker/JCM800. Then there's the new bands many using EMG and relying on the effects units and amp get the metal tone.

Might be hard pressed to get new and old on one pickup.

[David Schwab]

I think he will be fine with a hot humbucker, just maybe not as hot as he's thinking. 6000-7000 turns with a strong ceramic magnet should get a good tone.

[belwar]

Alnico 9 !

[David Schwab]

Alnico 9 !

Neodymium!

[copperheadroads]

i just swapped out the pickups from a nj series bc rich mockingbird for a guy, its the same pickup found in all the cheap bc rich guitars . he gave the old pickups to me .the bridge was 18k & the neck was 17k but the bobbins are very tall im guessing they were about 3/8" tall between the flanges they would make a great prototype that's for sure

[therizky]

"You've got enough wire to wind a mittful of pickups - I'd start with off the shelf bobbins and the ceramic magents that you have on hand first and see what you get. 9-10K turns per side is a lot, but your wire is thin enough to make it fit, and the ceramic magnets should be brighter relative to alnico 5. You'll need plenty of practice using that thin wire to get decent tension and avoid breaks, so I'd focus first on winding technique before tweaking materials."

the wire is 0.03 mm not 0.003...sorry,cant edit the trhread,still i got lots...and thin...

everything is ready....at first i wind using utility drill...the wire breaks fast no doubt...then a lamp lights on my head,i got a dead discman around, i discarded all unnecessary component,leaving only power jack and disc motor,plug it into a variable power supply,some practice on horizontal windingnthen i'm done

the motor is 3.0 v dc and the power supply can raging from 3 to 12 volts dc...cool,can go very slowly to very nuts,the"surface" is made from scratched disc reinforced with some sheet of brass.crap.... but it'll do the job

"You can't use steel for bobbins. You should avoid any conductive material such as aluminum or brass. But steel will "short out" the magnetic circuit.

What kind of tone are you looking for? Just loud? To give some examples of hot pickups, a Duncan JB has about 6800 turns of 44, and a DiMarzio X2N is aboutis about 7700 turns per coil.

You can try 9 to 10K turns, but it might sound like mud unless you have a strong ceramic magnet. "

i can't say just..loud... not that flat....jb use alnico 5 and x2n use ceramic,...can take it as a references....though i never tried to mimic any boutique brand,is that x2n use bar magnet?

"Old metal and new metal are done differently, might not get there in one pickup.

Take early Sabbath for instance, Tony's SG on songs like Iron Man and Paranoid back in the day had P90's (or P90 copy's) +boost into amp, where the later Sabbath (Dio onward) tone is humbucker/JCM800. Then there's the new bands many using EMG and relying on the effects units and amp get the metal tone.

Might be hard pressed to get new and old on one pickup. "

i know...id like brian may sounds for instance,though he well known to use treble booster to create his tone....iron maiden from fear of the dark era has melodic rich tone too...their strat must be stacked....for modern day...Heafy from Trivium or Tuck from Bullet for my valentine use EMGs....for somehow i dont like active...it sounds dummy and unnatural.

of course i cant put the recipe all together in the same bobbin...im gonna try to wind lots of wire on it,but still not running outta specification has been determined,...if its turned out loud...then i like it.

alnico 9? neodymium?

why don't try electromagnet? these concepts has been flying around my head lately.
two coils in the bobbin (four for humbuckers) one for pickup and one for long iron bar as the core...magnet strenght can be controllled by the battery used...can be 9v,AA,AAA etc...maybe ill do it for experiment.

"i just swapped out the pickups from a nj series bc rich mockingbird for a guy, its the same pickup found in all the cheap bc rich guitars . he gave the old pickups to me .the bridge was 18k & the neck was 17k but the bobbins are very tall im guessing they were about 3/8" tall between the flanges they would make a great prototype that's for sure"

18k&17k ohms impedances? must be 8 or 7.5 k per bobbins tall coil are needed to produce more treble detail...but if you do it on a strat...might need a little digging.

[David Schwab]

sorry,cant edit the trhread

Yes you can. Press the "Edit Post" button under the post.

is that x2n use bar magnet?

Yes, a bar magnet, just like any other humbucker, but it has blades instead of poles pieces.

id like brian may sounds for instance,though he well known to use treble booster to create his tone.

He also uses single coils often wired in series. Vox amps that didn't have the top boost circuit need a treble booster.

Heafy from Trivium or Tuck from Bullet for my valentine use EMGs....for somehow i dont like active...it sounds dummy and unnatural.

The EMG-85 and 81 are nice sounding pickups. They don't sound active, and they are very quiet. They are kind of compressed sounding though, but that's OK because I like to use a compressor. I don't use them anymore though.

of course i cant put the recipe all together in the same bobbin...im gonna try to wind lots of wire on it,but still not running outta specification has been determined,...if its turned out loud...then i like it.

None of those tones you like use over wound pickups.

why don't try electromagnet?

You don't like active pickups, but you want to use an electromagnet? I think an electromagnet would induce hum in the signal. But try and see.

[Musiclogic]

old metal and new metal from 1 pick-up...yep...it's been done, called the "Ultra Distortion" by Kent Armstrong. The pick-up is chunky enough to satisfy most 70's metal, while remaining clean and tight enough for todays metal. Probably the best guitar pick-up I have ever heard for this broad of an application, and I have used everything in mods from Dirty Fingers to Freds and Airs, nothing comes close, this should be where you look to go in my opinion.