Getting consistant results from pickup to pickup...

[achase4u]

I know this probably comes with time and experience more than anything, but I just thought I'd see what you guys thought.

Im still new to winding, but after winding maybe 30 pickups and experimenting Ive found a good formvar strat tone I like. I've been trying to narrow down the winding pattern and tension so its consistant, but am I chasing my tail with that?

I mean, to an extent, that wire is going to go where it wants, hence the handwound pickup scattering. I just aim for a certain number of turns per pass, and try to do that while keeping the wire from jumping around too much and making a nice evenly shaped coil.

I can get the pickups to sound about 85-90% identical when I try... it just seems to me I should be able to get them closer. Not sure if I need to really strain to get the winding pattern exact or what.

Also - with the tension, I guess the purpose of good tension is to keep the wire nice and neat on the coil, but should you try to avoid the two ends of the top flatwork going up at all?

[mick]

Look at your magnet strength too , if you want consistency other things than wind pattern etc come in to play , I would avoid the ends lifting ,once my bobbins are assembled I run super glue around where the 2 end magnets protrude through the top flatwork ,..thats my way of doing it and others might do something different ?

Mick

[achase4u]

I seem to have found a sweet spot where the coil doesnt deform but I still get nice snug windings.

Yea, I need to get a gaussmeter or magnetometer to measure things.


Just goes to show though. I just did a neck pickup for a strat with 8400 turns, it was real bright - then did 8250 turns and got a thicker warmer pickup. It was actually the same bobbin and magnets. They hadnt been exposed to anything that would alter gauss either...

crazy...