Newbie and first questions

[fidule]

Hi everyone,

i'm french (sorry for my horrible english ), i'm a strat player.
i 've had the idea for building my own strat pickups since last year, but i've done nothing, i've read web pages and this forum for a while seaching informations. This week i've ordered materials for flatwork, eyelets, cloth wire...
i found on ebay NOS awg44 Plain Enamel and NOS awg 42 (i don't known what could be: PE or formvar, possible for poly? the wire could be from 1950's or 60's) at decent price, so i'm waiting for all these materials.

what i haven't got is Alnico rods, because in France it's very expensive.
i find this: http://www.guysmagnets.com/product_i...products_id=44 (5x19mm)

and http://magnetking.thomasnet.com/viewitems/alnico-magnets/rod-magnets?&bc=100|1001|1005|1039&forward=1 (5x15,8mm)

i wish building 2 or 3 sets for my strats, i wish to have a very bluesy strat sound with a lot of midranges and little overwound.
i'm thinking about the structure of the coil and i want to try this: the pole of the magnets will have the same height, the top of the pole nearest as possible from the wire, more wire at the top of the coil, the wire wound with tight tension, and a superficial waxpotting.

Can it works for what i want to have?

But i don't know which Alnico 5 rods use, which lenght 15,8 or 19 mm. 19mm seems to me too long, the coil will be tall and bright or how can i manage to have midrages with 19mm magnets? Which lenght is better for what i want?

Thanks You

Have a nice week end

[fidule]

Nobody can help me ?

[chevalij]

Salut,

I think you should use the 18mm magnets, although 17 is ideal. You can always push the top flatwork piece down a bit to reduce the coil height. The space between the flatwork should be close to 11mm. The 44 AWG is way to small for pickups. Stick with the 42.

[kevinT]

As always, stewmac info is good for starters.

http://www.stewmac.com/freeinfo/I-5967.html

[Peter Naglitsch]

I would recommend that you start off with someting a bit more traditional to hone youre skills. Don't expect no1 (or no 2 or 3...) to be the ultimate pickup. Do a traditional strat pickup, maubee a bit overwound (AWG42) and see if you like doing pickus and if you actually can get one together. Then you might start playing around with offset coil shapes and other stuff.

Traditional flush poles strat pickups have magnets that are 17mm long.

[Dr. Guitar]

Not for beginers

I have the personal opinion that if someone is new to something like guitar building, or pick up winding, that certain materials should be off limits. If you found some NOS wire from the 50's I say leave it for the pros. That wire should be left for rewinds on the real pick ups from that era, not your first test run. You can't hear a difference in the wire, but there is differences in appearance that could be crucial to someone's restoration of a vintage instrument.

This forum has many posts about who supplies what, and great recommendations to back it up. I say find a supplier in new materials, and go from there. Remember to stick with parts and materials that are on your skill level.

I'm going to try this guy for a lot of my parts.
http://ampge.com/components.htm

[fidule]

Thanks for your advises,

Dr Guitar: i've contact the guy of your link, but he don't answer,
for the NOS wire, it is the less expensive that i've found



i will try to found 17 or 18 mm Alnico, but it seems to be not standard dimensions
At which price do you consider that Alnico rods are interesting to buy? i found a large range of price: from 10 dollars for 10 rods to 100 dollars for 10 rods in France !
i've found a french supplier of 15 mm Alnico at low prices,
Do you think if it is interesting to wind awg 44 wire around 15 mm lenght Alnico rods?

Thanks

[Peter Naglitsch]

Steven Kersting (the guy in the good doctors link) do not work weekends. He will answer you but not as fast as you might want to. I have ordered some stuff from him and it is of good quality. He is the only one that I know of that suply A2, A3 and A4 magnets, rods and bars. He has magnets that is 0.656 = 16.7 mm for 0.85$. Thats a decent price and pretty close to 17mm. The shipping will be quite high but if you buy a couple of them (and at the same time get some A2 or A3 for future experiments) the shipping per piece will not be too bad.

[Sock Puppet]

http://www.spelektroniikka.fi/

Might be useful to you.

S.
gp17.pdf