humbucker question

[jj19902003]

is it possible to make a humbucker with 3 or 4 coils? but joined. you know wht i mean? like a humbucker is pretty much 2 single coil pickups joined. is it possible to have a humbucker with 3 or 4? and wht would it sound like? etc...

[madialex]

Go On ebay and do a search on mother buckers, don't remember who makes them, I wanna say Kent Armstrong maybe???

[jj19902003]

ok sweet but wht kind of sound do they make and for wht genre of music?



ok so i checked those out but they still look like regular humbuckers.

wht im talking about is basically 2 humbuckers put together to form one.

[David Schwab]

A humbucker by definition has two coils. Three coils wouldn't cancel hum. Four coils is just two humbuckers... which is what the Mighty Mite MotherBucker is... it's actually two Strat size dual rail pickups.

I don't see any point in it, but it probably gets some different tones... especially if you include some out-of-phase tones.

[jj19902003]

A humbucker by definition has two coils. Three coils wouldn't cancel hum. Four coils is just two humbuckers... which is what the Mighty Mite MotherBucker is... it's actually two Strat size dual rail pickups.

I don't see any point in it, but it probably gets some different tones... especially if you include some out-of-phase tones.

well yes, i know a humbucker is two coils but i was just trying to explain my idea so ppl would understand. i was just wondering wht would happen if you used 4 joined coild for a single pickup and then for the second pickup 4 more joined coils

[Spence]

I can't find fault with your enthusiasm though I think you should learn the basics before working on any grand schemes.

[jj19902003]

I can't find fault with your enthusiasm though I think you should learn the basics before working on any grand schemes.

oh yes i know, im not planning on making one. i was just wondering if such a thing exist and if it was possible and wht sound they would give off

[Joe Gwinn]

A humbucker by definition has two coils. Three coils wouldn't cancel hum.

Well, I had not thought about this, but it isn't impossible for a three-coil setup to cancel hum, if the sizes and polarities (signs) of the three coils are chosen correctly. But it sure won't usually happen by happy accident.

Consider a plebian two-coil humbucker. Typically, there will be two coils of equal effective area-turns product, connected in series-opposing (as seen by hum fields). Arbitrarily split one of the coils into two half-coils, each having one half of the area-turns product of the coil being split. Connect the coils of this pair series-aiding, so the pair will generate the same hum voltage as the single coil the pair replace. Connect the pair (as a unit) with the other (unsplit) coil in series-opposing. A typical arrangement (at least in instrumentation, if not guitar pickups) would be to put the unsplit coil halfway between the the two half-coils.

For the record, all passive humbuckers (including those based on a perhaps large dummy coil) are a kind of gradiometer, which means that they measure something (magnetic field change in our case) in at least two places and add and subtract weighted measurements, reporting only what is different between those various places, things that are uniform tending to cancel in the addition and subtraction.

With asymmetrical arrangements of the measurement points, only uniform things (those that don't vary with positon) will cancel reliably.

With symmetrical arrangements of the measurement points, both uniform (that is, constant) things plus things that vary linearly with position can be made to cancel reliably.

The symmetry of interest here is not just of geometry. The weights and signs with which the measurements enter the summation also matter.

This setup can cancel hum quite well, better than the two-coil setup it replaced, because the three-coil setup can be better balanced against non-uniform hum fields (from nearby power transformers for instance) than the two-coil setup. The issue is symmetry. A side-by-side or over-under three-coil setup can be symmetrical, while a side-by-side or over-under two-coil cannot. (A concentric two-coil can be symmetrical.)

So the basic benefit of symmetry will be better cancellation of hum from such things as the power transformers in guitar amplifiers (and like gear), electric motors, and ballasts in nearby lighting fixtures, which can be an issue in small venues and home studios (next to the boiler).

How it will sound (you remember - it's for music) is another matter. How the three-coil setup senses the motion of the strings will be different than for a two-coil. If this is a good thing or a bad thing is hard to say from theory. A lot will depend on how the magnetic fields are shaped, an issue ignored above, as it's independent of humbucking.

[David Schwab]

Thanks for that useful info Joe. I actually knew it could be done, and have even drawn out some ideas for something like that in the past, but it really seemed like more bother than it's worth.

The only reason I thought about it is to get the thickness of two side-by-side coils in series, with, maybe, less high frequency attenuation from phase cancelation. But now you have three coils to deal with. A three coil pickup is useful for coil splitting, as long as the third is a dummy coil.

Steve Miller played an Ibanez back in the day with a single three coil pickup, and the original Mighty Mite Mother Bucker was a three or four coil humbucker... I forget which. Had regular Gibson size bobbins.

Then in 2004 they used that name for a Duncan Invader styled two coil humbucker.

Here's a patent from 1978 for a 3 coil pickup...

4222301 (PDF)

[Arthur B.]

Well, I had not thought about this, but it isn't impossible for a three-coil setup to cancel hum, if the sizes and polarities (signs) of the three coils are chosen correctly. But it sure won't usually happen by happy accident.

Consider a plebian two-coil humbucker. Typically, there will be two coils of equal effective area-turns product, connected in series-opposing (as seen by hum fields). Arbitrarily split one of the coils into two half-coils, each having one half of the area-turns product of the coil being split. Connect the coils of this pair series-aiding, so the pair will generate the same hum voltage as the single coil the pair replace. Connect the pair (as a unit) with the other (unsplit) coil in series-opposing. A typical arrangement (at least in instrumentation, if not guitar pickups) would be to put the unsplit coil halfway between the the two half-coils.

Using two dummy coils around a regular single coil isn't such a bad idea. It should be a great alternative to the usual humbucker. I would split up the middle coil into smaller ones as well and parallel the four for a high output low impedance pickup.

[madialex]

Well, I had not thought about this, but it isn't impossible for a three-coil setup to cancel hum, if the sizes and polarities (signs) of the three coils are chosen correctly. But it sure won't usually happen by happy accident.

Consider a plebian two-coil humbucker. Typically, there will be two coils of equal effective area-turns product, connected in series-opposing (as seen by hum fields). Arbitrarily split one of the coils into two half-coils, each having one half of the area-turns product of the coil being split. Connect the coils of this pair series-aiding, so the pair will generate the same hum voltage as the single coil the pair replace. Connect the pair (as a unit) with the other (unsplit) coil in series-opposing. A typical arrangement (at least in instrumentation, if not guitar pickups) would be to put the unsplit coil halfway between the the two half-coils.

For the record, all passive humbuckers (including those based on a perhaps large dummy coil) are a kind of gradiometer, which means that they measure something (magnetic field change in our case) in at least two places and add and subtract weighted measurements, reporting only what is different between those various places, things that are uniform tending to cancel in the addition and subtraction.

With asymmetrical arrangements of the measurement points, only uniform things (those that don't vary with positon) will cancel reliably.

With symmetrical arrangements of the measurement points, both uniform (that is, constant) things plus things that vary linearly with position can be made to cancel reliably.

The symmetry of interest here is not just of geometry. The weights and signs with which the measurements enter the summation also matter.

This setup can cancel hum quite well, better than the two-coil setup it replaced, because the three-coil setup can be better balanced against non-uniform hum fields (from nearby power transformers for instance) than the two-coil setup. The issue is symmetry. A side-by-side or over-under three-coil setup can be symmetrical, while a side-by-side or over-under two-coil cannot. (A concentric two-coil can be symmetrical.)

So the basic benefit of symmetry will be better cancellation of hum from such things as the power transformers in guitar amplifiers (and like gear), electric motors, and ballasts in nearby lighting fixtures, which can be an issue in small venues and home studios (next to the boiler).

How it will sound (you remember - it's for music) is another matter. How the three-coil setup senses the motion of the strings will be different than for a two-coil. If this is a good thing or a bad thing is hard to say from theory. A lot will depend on how the magnetic fields are shaped, an issue ignored above, as it's independent of humbucking.

Ok Joe, now I feel even more stupid than I did before, gee thanks!!! LOL, just kidding. I think you explaned it pretty well, even enough for my pea brain to understand.

[black_labb]

has anyone been tempted to make a guitar with about 15 coils all bnext to eachother with a switch system to give you a huge number of combination methods. in reality you probably could ge the same with less, but im thinking out of phase coils in phase with some others, and then out of phase with another combination.

might take alot of wiring, and probably wouldn't be too good, but would make for a fun project to brag with.

[Brock Little]

Try one of these. Krank it up to 11!

http://www.rockandrollweekend.com/Mr.Horsepower.htm

[David Schwab]

Using two dummy coils around a regular single coil isn't such a bad idea. It should be a great alternative to the usual humbucker. I would split up the middle coil into smaller ones as well and parallel the four for a high output low impedance pickup.

It would be interesting... and probably sound like a single coil. You can do all number of things, but what I think prevents people from making all these variations in pickups is guitarist seem to want the familiar sounds from Fender and Gibson pickups. When something different comes a long, they reject it for the most part. You can't afford to market something that no one wants.

Bartolini started out making pickups with two coils for each string. The reason was for higher fidelity. Bass players love Bartolini pickups, while most guitarist hate them. Or look at the various Lace pickups, especially the alumitones. Very hi-fi, with lots of top end. Most of the reviews I have read focus on how they don't sound like "traditional" pickups, and don't get the tone the reviewer was looking for.

Don't get me wrong... I like all these oddball things... I'd rather have three gold foil Dearmond pickups on a Strat than all the usual things out there trying to sound vintage.

[Arthur B.]

This thread dropped away before I could respond.

It would be interesting... and probably sound like a single coil.

That wouldn't such a bad thing in a neck pickup. It would match the output of a conventional bridge humbucker but still deliver traditional single coil clarity.