Q: lacquer "potting"?

[MWaldorf]

Hopefully this isn't a stupid question, but I've read a few places about people dipping their pickups in lacquer as opposed to wax to pot them. I haven't tried potting my winds one way or the other, and I'm curious if anyone here has lacquer potted pickups, and if so, perhaps how it compares to wax?

Thanks, Mel

[J M Fahey]

The word "lacquer" coupled to "pickup" gives me the chills , yet there is something to it.

To begin with, transformers and motor windings *are* potted in something close to lacquer, but itīs actually either "transformer varnish/enamel" or potting Epoxy , which can either be air dry or oven dry types.
In a pinch, I have successfully potted transformers in plin household "marine Varnish" and even in home type oil/synthetic paint (colour is irrelevant and doesnīt hurt anyway)
We are talking paints, varnishes or enamel which dissolve in turpentine or similar, which is "oily" and does not attack plastics.

Now the word "lacquer" makes me think of old car pint, dissolved in strong thinner, which attacks plastics and most wire coatings, specially modern ones, so itīs dangerous useless on ickups.

One problem with the "strong" varnishes, even worse with Epoxy, is that they become solid forever, pickup becomes disposable, while itīs easy to remove a wax potted winding, wipe bobbin clean with a plain piece of cloth, no need for solvents, and rewind it.

[big_teee]

Unless you are talking vintage pickups that were lacquer dipped?
Wax gets my vote, because it is so easy to work with, and wax potted pickups can be modified by simple heating.
T

[MWaldorf]

Thanks guys, I didn't realize that lacquer would have the same finality of epoxy.

[Possum]

Lacquer potting was seldom used and for good reason. Lacquer only penetrates a few layers of wire in, it doesn't get in deep. I've seen it used on old Tele neck pickups, and P13's, but nowhere else.

[jack briggs]

Lacquer potting was seldom used and for good reason. Lacquer only penetrates a few layers of wire in, it doesn't get in deep. I've seen it used on old Tele neck pickups, and P13's, but nowhere else.

late 60s Strats were lacquer potted.

[Lollar Jason]

"late 60s Strats were lacquer potted." Confirmed- seen many made that way in that later 60s era and it doesnt work that well. The other thing I have seen which works better is bondable wire- used in the 40's on a number of items but never across the board for all models of a certain manufacture. done correctly bondable has a far more uniform result than lacquer. Trick to it is if you use solvent to activate it then you need to be careful not to use too much solvent. too much solvent just makes a huge mess and takes a long time to solidify.
The way I do it is to run the coil wire through a felt pad that gets wetted with denatured alcohol. Takes some trial and error but if you are throwing wet bonding off the coil during winding you are using way too much solvent. Fender trapazoids and epiphone new yorkers used bondable wire among others so really you would use it for mechanical reasons like winding a bobbinless coil or a coil wound on a bias rather than using it for potting.

[David Schwab]

I've seen P bass bobbins that were either lacquer potted, or they used self bonding wire.

I've used vanish. The problem is it doesn't seep in all the way, and it takes forever to dry. On coils I cut open days later, it was still wet inside.

I switched to wax after those experiments.

[Telemachos]

Anybody know what kind of lacquer Fender used back then? I'm looking forward trying to do an exact clone of those lacquer dipped single coil pickups typically seen on the late 60ies Strat and Tele pickups. I'd prefer an alternative to a solvent based lacquer if that was what Fender did. I'm aware that the lacquer is only good a few layers on the outside of the windings, but that's what I'd like to have too. It's an experiment. I also wonder if those late 60ies pickups were only dipped or if Fender used some vauum device to make the lacquer penetrate the windings. I mean, how long do you have to keep the pickup in the lacquer to get it the way it did back then? Do you have to heat up the lacquer? To me it's a completely new terrain to explore.
Any pointers are welcome. Thanks

[Joe Gwinn]

Beware alcohol in the solvent, unless one can ensure total drying. The problem is that alcohol pulls moisture out of the air, and water has a very large dielectric constant (about 80, versus maybe 3 for wax).

This greatly increases the coil's self-capacitance - instant mud. This was discussed at some length a few years ago, probably around the time that Devid Schwab was sacrificing P-Base bobbins to Science.

[Telemachos]

I'll keep your advise in mind. THX

[Mark Hammer]

I've only seen lacquer on a stock Telecaster neck pickup from the early 70's. And the reason why I saw it was because it just stopped working and the guitar's owner asked me to rewind it.

Although yes lacquer IS used on motor and transformer windings, those things tend to use much heavier gauge wire than a pickup does. So if the lacquer shrinks over time and tugs at the wire of a motor, the wire wins and the lacquer loses. In a pickup coil when #42 or #43 wire and lacquer-shrinkage duke it out, I gather that lacquer wins and the wire likely loses, hence the coil fractures I was asked to fix.

I'm sure that Fender thought it was a great idea for a little while...until the repair requests started coming in. Go wax.

[Telemachos]

Yes that's most likely to happen. I usually go w. wax, but like I said for a spot on retro clone I was thinking about going into each single authentic detail. However out of curiousity I'm still interested to know what kind of lacquer Fender was using. I seems to leave some dark tan over the windings. At least from what I have seen so far. I wonder if it was solvent based. Strange. It seems that the whole Fender lacquer era lays in the dark. I haven't seen anybody sheding a light on this yet, nowhere

[Lollar Jason]

they used acrylic for many of the custom colors and nitrocellulose for other colors and clear but dont quote me on that. I worked in finish shops for a number of years and yes there is such a thing as heated lacquer which is done to decrease drying time as far as I recall- we did have special equipment to spray heated lacquer but I wouldnt try heating it for what you want to do- nitro can be explosive. I have heard a number of stories about paint booths exploding. As far as dipping the coils I dont think they did it for more than several minutes- typically the outer layer of the coil is all that solidifies.

[Telemachos]

Yes, I second that. Had a few of them for repair. It's only a few layers that get penetrated. I like the idea of having just a few layers fixed. Gives it some dynamics. My late 60ies Strat is a squeaking pig when played in front of a Marshall. It has some quality to it though and it can be handled w. today's tech. An other reason I'm asking the lacquer thing is that I had one guy asking for a spot on recreation. I told him that I can do it but he was asking for a lacquer dip on top of his demands. Never heard from him again.