Number of turns in Charlie Christian PU

[rocket]

Hello

I have just wound a CC inspired pickup (3mm blade, neodym disk magnets) to fit in a tall P90 cover (first time pu).

It has 5500 turns of .1mm wire (~AWG38) and ~1.5k which seems rather low compared to Lollar's (~3k) and numbers you can find elsewhere (~2.5k)
Do these really have 7000 or more turns?

My PU turned out rather and dark bassy (neck position), however good sounding to me.
It is as loud as the TV-Jones Filtertron in bridge position.

I wonder, what contributes to the dark sound with the low number of turns.
The blade (B) is about 3mm*55mm*25mm the construction is like this:


__B__
wwBww
wwBww
wwBww
wwBww
magnet
steelbase


There is no real bobbin just a piece of fiber (_) on top and FR2 on the bottom with 3 holes drilled for 15mm diameter magnets.
there is also a thin steel base (~0.5mm). It's wound (w) directly to the laquered blade.



rocket

[rhgwynn]

It's most likely the steel baseplate. They are often used to attenuate some of the highs and thicken up the sound of a pickup. Try switching to a forbon or a nickel-silver one and then see what happens.

-Rob

[jason lollar]

ohms will vary depending on the length of the blade and the shape of the coil among other things, originals do vary so 7000 is not out of the question. Also I have seen what looks like half gauge size variance on originals- 38 and a half etc.
The originals have a fairly tall coil- dont underestimate how much difference even 1/32 in height can make, it can be easily heard and certainly measured with an inductance meter.
Tone is going to vary alot with the type of metal you used for the blade- even cold rolled vs hard rolled makes a big difference. Keep the pickup a little farther from the strings than typical, they can get boomy

[David Schwab]

I wonder, what contributes to the dark sound with the low number of turns.
The blade (B) is about 3mm*55mm*25mm the construction is like this:

Could be the thick wire, which has a deeper tone with less mids, and the magnets too.

The steel reflector plate on the bottom might be doing it, but maybe not. I've used them under neos and the pickups were bright. But it was also thinner wire.

Here's a Rick high gain with neos and reflector plate:

[Mike Sulzer]

I wonder, what contributes to the dark sound with the low number of turns.

Sometimes a dark sound with a low number of turns can mean that the resonant frequency is too high: the boost you get is above the useful range of the instrument/amp/speaker. Probably not the case here, but if you are so inclined, measuring the resonant frequency of the system with the cable in place might be useful info.

[David Schwab]

Sometimes a dark sound with a low number of turns can mean that the resonant frequency is too high: the boost you get is above the useful range of the instrument/amp/speaker. Probably not the case here, but if you are so inclined, measuring the resonant frequency of the system with the cable in place might be useful info.

I think this might very well be the case, as the thick wire gives a higher resonant frequency, and also a lot of low end.

[rocket]

Sometimes a dark sound with a low number of turns can mean that the resonant frequency is too high: the boost you get is above the useful range of the instrument/amp/speaker. Probably not the case here, but if you are so inclined, measuring the resonant frequency of the system with the cable in place might be useful info.

That's a great idea.

I need get a suitable frequency generator, hopefully next week. Until then I'll to connect some switchable capacitor in parallel I see (listen) how the sound changes.