Please help with a dead Harmony Guitar pup

[Normybaby]

I own a guitar repair shop and recently one of my “music store” customers gave me a dead pickup that he removed from a 1962 Harmony guitar (see pics). I peeled back the out protective tape and everything looks good on the outside but the ground wire (outer shielding) solder joint was loose and pulled right off the center ground wire. I checked it directly with a meter and nothing(I never get lucking). I start to unwind hoping that there was some broken wire on the outside(20 or so turns and again nothing). I’m pretty sure that there’s a break at the start of the coil wire connection; looks like the pup needs to be rewound. I have a pup winder and various wire sizes; some experience winding pickups but would like to have some help with wire size/gage, coating type/ thickness, resistance and/or number of turns etc.
Thanks
Normy

[copperheadroads]

should find something here did you do a search here . here

http://music-electronics-forum.com/s...searchid=24159
they look like a DeArmond

[David Schwab]

they look like a Dearmond

They are Rowe pickups. Later on Rowe teamed up with Harry DeArmond, and they were DeArmond-Rowe.

But Rowe was the one manufacturing them.

[copperheadroads]

some specs posted here
http://music-electronics-forum.com/t4025/

[Dave Kerr]

You could try measuring the resistance of a length of wire you've unwound - as little as ten feet of wire should give you an idea. 42 AWG should read about 16-17 ohms for 10 feet, 43 AWG 21-22 ohms, 44 around 26 ohms.
Wire Gauge: Nikola Tesla Page

[jonson]

Anywhere between 8.5 and 11.5k these varied a lot. 45awg works fine and Iv'e taken them up to 14.5 k before now. Killer pickup and i keep meaning to do a David idea and stick three on a strat. Swamp body and maple neck should be a dream machine.

[Normybaby]

Thanks for the tips guys, yeah I did do a search but nothing came up.
I will use the 10ft res check; never thought of that. I have some 44awg enamel but no 43awg. I have access to a supper micrometer (50 millionths) and see if I can correlate with the resistance check.
Thanks
Normy

[David Schwab]

44 should work fine. They probably used 44 or 45.

Yes.. three gold foils on a Strat! I wish I kept my old Harmony I had kicking around. Only one pickup worked. When you get married you get talked into getting rid of some "junk".

[Possum]

The best thing to do is measure the diameter of the full coil before you peel it off. Then use a micrometer and measure the wire diameter, save the old magnet wire for future vintage reference and label where it came from. Wire gauge doesn't mean much, wire diameter is more important. Just saying its 44 gauge etc. isn't accurate, I found wire on those pickups and the Kays are sometimes in between available wire gauges. The Kays are usually formvar. Also note wire tension when you measure the coil diameter, if its real spongy you need to match that as well. If you don't have a micrometer you need one that will read to 5 places past the decimal point. I use a Mitoyo IP65, affordable and pretty accurate. These are tricky to use, you need to use almost no pressure when reading the diameter because you're also crushing the wire as you do so, so take several readings. More than likely you'll have to wind with wire thats not the same diameter so you have to make a choice whether to go skinnier or fatter wire depending on what you have. 44 formvar is real hard to come by, I scored a 13 pound roll of it a couple years on Ebay because no one wanted it, and talked the guy down on the price, will probably last the rest of my life.

[David Schwab]

AWG 44 SINGLE FORMVAR Copper Magnet Wire - eBay (item 230505109141 end time Aug-05-10 06:05:15 PDT)


They have a few rolls. They have had a lot of formvar lately, including 42 heavy.

[Spence]

Weigh bobbin and coil wire. Find the right gauge and wind it to the right weight.

[David Schwab]

Weigh bobbin and coil wire. Find the right gauge and wind it to the right weight.

Good idea.