Working on my first micro-coil...

[rhgwynn]

Magnetism has nothing to do with the orientation of the coils Rob.

With a single polarity all the way through, you either get two coils that are in phase, or out of phase; you will not get hum-canceling.

But that is all moot, because I am NOT making a stack.

-Rob

[John_H]

[ATTACH=CONFIG]23444[/ATTACH]

With a single polarity all the way through, you either get two coils that are in phase, or out of phase; but you will not get hum-canceling. But that is all moot, because I am NOT making a stack.

-Rob

Rob, you don't know what you are talking about. I tried to help, but you won't listen. It's for threads like this that we have a beginners section. Attn. Mods

[copperheadroads]

Magnetism has nothing to do with the orientation of the coils Rob.

Agreed ,& I don't think too many understands this

[rhgwynn]

That said, with this design, you would have a coil wound around slugs that are magnetized to a south polarity. Say for the hell of it, I wrapped the lower half the other way around, which is still a south polarity. That leaves you with a CW-S^ coil and a CCW-S^ coil; please explain how that is hum-canceling.
-Rob

Never mind; I just figured it out. Epiphany. I get it.

Please though, back to micro coils.

-Rob

[big_teee]

I thought the Forum was a place to discuss and learn.
Whether it be here in the main forum or in the BC.
Please be Civil Everyone.
Rob, sometimes on complex designs, you may have to purchase the pickup your trying to emulate.
To Use as a Guinea Pig.
T

[rhgwynn]

I thought the Forum was a place to discuss and learn.
T

Me too. But it's all good.

I figured out what they were alluding to - and am moving on.

-Rob

[David King]

Rob,
The discussion you linked to has some photos. It has no actual information other than a bunch or 2nd hand supposition by guitar players of what it is and how it works. Most notably it has no info on that the materials are.
Are the blade-like vertical pieces under the coil made of forbon or are they steel? Without that info you are completely dead in the water.
How do you know it uses a neo magnet? What is the keeper made from. Why would it have blades and slugs and screws all inside a single-coil? What is the DCR?
Do us all a favor and buy the pickup or link to the associated patents so we can see what the hell is going on.

It's fine if you want to do a little show and tell about these pickups but come prepared. If you show us a picture of a black box and say "Anybody want to build a black box with me?" I'm not sure you will get many takers but I can guarantee you will get some derision from some of our more jaded members. We all enjoy popping a balloon from time to time.

[rhgwynn]

Rob,
The discussion you linked to has some photos. It has no actual information other than a bunch or 2nd hand supposition by guitar players of what it is and how it works. Most notably it has no info on that the materials are.
Are the blade-like vertical pieces under the coil made of forbon or are they steel? Without that info you are completely dead in the water.
How do you know it uses a neo magnet? What is the keeper made from. Why would it have blades and slugs and screws all inside a single-coil? What is the DCR?
Do us all a favor and buy the pickup or link to the associated patents so we can see what the hell is going on.

It's fine if you want to do a little show and tell about these pickups but come prepared. If you show us a picture of a black box and say "Anybody want to build a black box with me?" I'm not sure you will get many takers but I can guarantee you will get some derision from some of our more jaded members. We all enjoy popping a balloon from time to time.

Sorry, the only information available about this design comes second hand. The framework is steel, the magnet is a neo, and it has a metal bar that is there as a control to reduce the magnet's pull on the strings. BL is not a DCR kind of guy; anyone who asks will get a lengthy response on how they are looking at things the wrong way. He has plenty of info on his thought processes on his website (Pickupology) - but no specs. I dont know if he has patents on the design; though I thought to look, I just haven't yet.

I just like to explore theory, mess around building things; even if it's crap in the end, I will have learned something. I invite others to join in and see what happens when they try as well. I'll go look and see if he patented this or not. Btw, I dont have the money to buy the pickup; like I said, I'm just dicking around anyway. But seriously, thanks for the coherent response.

-Rob

[Peter Naglitsch]

Bill Lawrence is perhaps THE most knowledgeable and respected pickup maker alive.
His designs are both unique AND widely respected for being GREAT pickups.

That, is up for discussion...

Anyway, heres a simple experiment anyone can do that give you quite a bit of information that also can be applied in part to this type of pickups. Use a standard rod magnet. Make two round flanges with a center hole for the magnet, diameter roughly like the width of a strat or tele pickup. Now place one flange at the very end of the magnet and the other roughly in the middle of the magnet. Wind some 3-4000 turns of wire on the coil. What you now have is equivalent to half a single string strat pickup (gotta TM that). Using a method to secure that you agitate the strings in a very similar way you can now measure the voltage (and listen to the sound) of what the upper part and the lower part of the coil picks up.

As I understand the pickup design being discussed, the idea is that the lower part of the coil more or less only picks up noise, hum, what ever..., and the upper part is the "musical" part. Anyone doing the suggested experiment (and I have done it) knows what happens in what part of the coil. My guess is that the copper foil is probably better for hum reduction than the micro coil solution, but thats just me...

[rhgwynn]

It appears to me that there is not a patent for this. It would probably be stickered on the pickup if it was, but who knows. I can only find one patent with his name on it. But then again, maybe I just suck at searching patents...

-Rob

[rhgwynn]

The 44awg isnt here yet so I went ahead and wound with some 43PE. I was able to get 3900 turns on it.

Specs are as follows:
4.25k-ohms
1.2 H
1.4 uF

Going to get a magnet from the hardware store. Will report back soon.
I suspect (from testbed trials) that it will lack in the low end. Hopefully I can get it closer to 6k with the 44awg.

Stay tuned for pics in a few hours.

-Rob

[Mike Sulzer]

A pickup cannot have 1.2 micro f of capacitance. More like 100 pico f. You cannot measure it with a dmm or even everybody's favorite meter because the capacitance is shorted out by the wire. You need measure the resonant frequency, but maybe not quite so directly. Joe Gwinn has shown a nice way to do this somewhere on this forum.

It does not lack low end. It might sound that way because the resonant frequency is too high, but that is really not a lack of low end. You can lower the resonant frequency by adding capacitance across it.

The 44awg isnt here yet so I went ahead and wound with some 43PE. I was able to get 3900 turns on it.

Specs are as follows:
4.25k-ohms
1.2 H
1.4 uF

Going to get a magnet from the hardware store. Will report back soon.
I suspect (from testbed trials) that it will lack in the low end. Hopefully I can get it closer to 6k with the 44awg.

Stay tuned for pics in a few hours.

-Rob

[David Schwab]

[ATTACH=CONFIG]23444[/ATTACH]

With a single polarity all the way through, you either get two coils that are in phase, or out of phase; you will not get hum-canceling.

But that is all moot, because I am NOT making a stack.

-Rob

On a stack the magnets or poles can go all the way though, and you wire the two coils out-of-phase. They do hum cancel. if hey are in phase it's louder and they don't hum cancel.

Here's a stack I made once:





You are making some wrong assumptions.

Bill's micro-coil is the top half of one of his stacks. I'm not exactly sure what the purpose if the micro-coil is, but I guess he tried using just the top coil and liked it.

[David Schwab]

Sorry, the only information available about this design comes second hand. The framework is steel, the magnet is a neo, and it has a metal bar that is there as a control to reduce the magnet's pull on the strings. BL is not a DCR kind of guy; anyone who asks will get a lengthy response on how they are looking at things the wrong way. He has plenty of info on his thought processes on his website (Pickupology) - but no specs. I dont know if he has patents on the design; though I thought to look, I just haven't yet.

I just like to explore theory, mess around building things; even if it's crap in the end, I will have learned something. I invite others to join in and see what happens when they try as well. I'll go look and see if he patented this or not. Btw, I dont have the money to buy the pickup; like I said, I'm just dicking around anyway. But seriously, thanks for the coherent response.

-Rob

The magnets are most likely a samarium-cobalt, since this design is very similar to Bill's design for fender.

7227076 (fender scn).pdf

[big_teee]

The magnets are most likely a samarium-cobalt, since this design is very similar to Bill's design for fender.

[ATTACH]23452[/ATTACH]

Can you educate us, on how you find All those Neat Patents.
I suck at it too.
Thanks