Seymour's new cryo-silver pickup

[David Schwab]

Let's not forget the cost of the extra publicity associated with introducing a new product. And then there is all that research that went into justifying every word in that product announcement.

Businesses have advertising budgets. Unless they are advertising more, they just change the ad they run. But that's part of doing business, just as R&D is.

Sometime when you have a free moment, try putting a 500 ohm resistor in series with your 10K pickup and notice how much worse the sound gets.

How is that relevant? The resistor is a passive element. If the coil has higher resistance it's still part of the coil and is generating current, unlike the resistor.

[salvarsan]

When you buy copper magnet wire, for the most part it's based on the price of copper per pound, plus processing. It changes on a regular basis. The last I heard copper magnet wire was about $18/pound. Currently raw copper is $4.30/Lb. Silver is $28.95/lb. So figure the cost of that as magnet wire.

Yo.

Small co-wreck-shun: Silver spot price is per troy ounce (= 14.6 oz per pound), so its price per pound is about $425.

The $1200-1500 setup charge vanishes into noise when they process a half ton of copper into mag wire.

[Busterdawg]

And that's nothing compared to this...

Attention all you lefty jazz guitarists -

1958 Gibson Model ES-175D Left Handed Guitar - eBay (item 190485896527 end time Jan-31-11 20:19:31 PST)

$500,000.00

(I realize you're talking about marketing hype with established companies but I just had to share)

[Mike Sulzer]

Businesses have advertising budgets. Unless they are advertising more, they just change the ad they run. But that's part of doing business, just as R&D is.



How is that relevant? The resistor is a passive element. If the coil has higher resistance it's still part of the coil and is generating current, unlike the resistor.

It is totally relevant except at the highest frequencies where it does not account for the effect of the coil capacitance on the increased resistance. Since it is clear that you do not understand the physics of how magnetic induction works, you should just accept the model, which is well justified. The voltage source goes in series with the inductance and resistance, and the coil capacitance goes in parallel with that combination. You can see that at low frequencies, adding another resistor in series with the pickup is the same as increasing the resistance of the coil.

At high frequencies it is not, but since the cable capacitance is considerably larger than the coil capacitance, and since the external resistor is affected by the cable capacitance, this is not a bad check, even at high frequencies.

Well now, I am not businessman, but I can see how introducing a new product, potentially expanding the sales of the company, might require an increase in advertising budget in order to get the investment to pay off. On the other hand, you need to turn your snark detector. What I am saying is that if you are going to base your sales campaign on an analogy to wacko "audiophile" nonsense, you might need to spend even more.

[salvarsan]

What I am saying is that if you are going to base your sales campaign on an analogy to wacko "audiophile" nonsense, you might need to spend even more.

That's why, when we all discussed silver-wound coils a while back,
we put a hypothetical $2500 pricetag on the pickups.

Seymour Duncan's pricing suggests that he's following the 5:1 ratio rule-of-thumb for MSRP:build cost. A small production run of glass-filled bobbins and stainless steel jacket nickel slugs may be very expensive. Add in cryogenic treatment plus R&D and you have a $120 build cost.

Against that data, SD's silver-wound pickup seems rationally priced.

More's the pity.

[Mike Sulzer]

A small production run of glass-filled bobbins and stainless steel jacket nickel slugs may be very expensive.

You know, those slugs are the one thing I find very interesting here. It looks like an intention to set the eddy current losses, occurring in the outer layer, independently from the permeability.

I have no doubt that these eddy current losses, which are a very complicated frequency dependent thing, influence the sound over a range of frequencies, not just the resonant peak, because I can measure the effect. And if you can measure it, it is very likely that you can hear it.

My own inclination, at least for test purposes, would be to use a ferrite slug of appropriate permeability slipped into a metal tube of a given material. Or to just use the ferrite core alone as I usually do, and get the eddy losses with an appropriate metal jacket around the whole coil. The point is that you have two variables that you have to get right: 1. the leakage flux, which determines the size of the model inductor occurring in series with the frequency dependent loss, and 2. the magnitude of the loss.

[frankfalbo]

Well now, I am not businessman, but...increase in advertising budget in order to get the investment to pay off...if you are going to base your sales campaign on an analogy to wacko "audiophile" nonsense, you might need to spend even more.

Let's not forget the cost of the extra publicity associated with introducing a new product. And then there is all that research that went into justifying every word in that product announcement.
Sometime when you have a free moment, try putting a 500 ohm resistor in series with your 10K pickup and notice how much worse the sound gets.

Marketing expense has no bearing on the price of these pickups. Also so far the only marketing effort has been the "free" kind of posting on our website, social media, etc.

That's why, when we all discussed silver-wound coils a while back, we put a hypothetical $2500 pricetag on the pickups.

Seymour Duncan's pricing suggests that he's following the 5:1 ratio rule-of-thumb for MSRP:build cost. A small production run of glass-filled bobbins and stainless steel jacket nickel slugs may be very expensive. Add in cryogenic treatment plus R&D and you have a $120 build cost.

Against that data, SD's silver-wound pickup seems rationally priced.

Thanks you Salvarsan and others like Dave, David, etc. for your kind words. Salvarsan, you're not way off, but those are not the numbers, and 5:1 is not part of any of our cost models. Also there's no "production run" on the bi-metallic pole pieces. Between our machinist and the Custom Shop, we hand make each one, one at a time. The Cryo is weird because they charge batch prices. I'm not sure how many we'll send to have done at a time, but I'm sure we'll optimize that to get the most Cryo into a batch for the least cost. If people order a Cryo pickup from the Custom Shop (not Zephyr but just Cryo a la carte) then we might end up saving them up for the next batch. Not sure.

We may have had NAMM rush typos, especially when you have non-experts doing the website preparations. The VP's weren't really available for technical proofing during the days before the show. We'll get it fixed up.

[frankfalbo]

You know, those slugs are the one thing I find very interesting here. It looks like an intention to set the eddy current losses, occurring in the outer layer, independently from the permeability.

I have no doubt that these eddy current losses, which are a very complicated frequency dependent thing, influence the sound over a range of frequencies, not just the resonant peak, because I can measure the effect. And if you can measure it, it is very likely that you can hear it.

My own inclination, at least for test purposes, would be to use a ferrite slug of appropriate permeability slipped into a metal tube of a given material. Or to just use the ferrite core alone as I usually do, and get the eddy losses with an appropriate metal jacket around the whole coil. The point is that you have two variables that you have to get right: 1. the leakage flux, which determines the size of the model inductor occurring in series with the frequency dependent loss, and 2. the magnitude of the loss.

Also, we listened, and it sounded awesome.

[Dave Kerr]

I'd love to hear samples of these pickups against a conventional PAF type pickup modded with these new pole pieces subbed in and the turns count of the PAF type identical to the Zephyr. Reminds me a bit of a discussion started by Belwar a while back.

[Mike Sulzer]

Also, we listened, and it sounded awesome.

That is the goal. And the purpose of the science is to better understand how to reach that goal now as well as years from now, and how to reach other related goals.

[flyneye]

I've an idea for funding my future forrays into silver, gold, platinum and palladium. I'll Ebuy some nice desirable vintage pups and photograph them nestled in the cleavage of some centerfold/pr0n starlet ( I have some interesting connections) with a certificate of authenticity I should be able to maximize my profit on the now super collectible pickups and repeat my performance with my line of precious metal/jewel encrusted audiophool l33t pickups ensuring market supremacy and a reason to hang out with ever increasing numbers of the rich, famous and amply endowed.

[salvarsan]

And the purpose of the science is to better understand how to reach that goal now as well as years from now, and how to reach other related goals.

My favorite observation is that whenever a craft's science advances, the art advances with it.

10 years ago, only a fraction of the boutique builders used an ohm meter.

Now, they use inductance meters, talk about eddy currents, grades of copper,
different wire insulations, steel grades, and partially demagnetized Alnico,
whether isotropic and anisotropic.

[salvarsan]

I'll Ebuy some nice desirable vintage pups and photograph them nestled in the cleavage of some centerfold/pr0n starlet

You should insist that all sales be final, payable only by electronic transfer.
You don't want to handle anything touched by the clients you'll get.

[belwar]

Currently raw copper is $4.30/Lb. Silver is $28.95/lb.

Noo noo no no... Copper is about $4.30/lb that is correct. Silver is 28.95/Ounce. Specifically Troy ounce which is 1 troy ounce = 0.0685714286 pounds.

That comes out to $422 per pound. Then you have the small batch fees, coatings, shipping, etc. You're easily looking at $500/pound.

I dont think I have ever weighed the wire on a pickup, but i'd guess that what about a 1/32 to a 1/64 of a pound?

[Rick Turner]

Alexander Dumble wanted me to wind silver wire pickups about 35 years ago, and I just never got around to it. As exotic as I got was the Litz pickups, and they are really special.

Given the price range of microphones, I think it's about time someone really went all out on a guitar pickup and pushed the limits of materials without regard to cost. I think this is simply fantastic.

Just remember, a rising tide lifts all boats, and perhaps this will make truly exotic pickups more acceptable in the general market.