Un-wind vintage pickups ..........

[Electricdaveyboy]

Most time broken vintage pickups will be rewouind with new vintage spec wire.
I would like to unwind the vintage pickups and use the old original wire again.
Did anyone of you winders build a machine to get the old wire off the pickups without damage ?

thanks
david

[Spence]

Use an old record player to mount a spool on which will accept the wire you're unwinding.

[Stan H]

Use an old record player to mount a spool on which will accept the wire you're unwinding.

Ingenious

[David King]

Would one have to warm the wax to unwind a wax-potted pickup successfully?
Would one need to clean the wax off to reuse the wire and keep it from being too sticky through the tensioner?

[Electricdaveyboy]

Todays kids do not know what a record player is...
hail hail to the good times.


I plan to rewin my own pickup and do not want to use new wire.
It is an old p-90 ,not waxed ot laquered.A good point to start the unwinding with.

[kevinT]

you'll only need to decide on what speed....33, 45, or 72.... or was it 73..been a long time

[myfoot]

Seem like it was 78

[Possum]

...........

whats a "record player?" I that like an iPod?

[madialex]

whats a "record player?" I that like an iPod?

Surely you jest

[David Schwab]

Surely you jest

Of course he jests! Dave remembers the old wax cylinder Edison players... right Dave?

I wound my very first pickup with magnet wire I unwound from a Gibson Mudbucker.

[Possum]

....

Actually I knew Edison, mean tempered old fucker. Yeah, I learned guitar solos by playing LP's on half speed, what 15rpm, or did I do that on a tape machne, remember reel to reels? Guitar players these days have it easy, all that shit is tabbed out and videos showing how to do everything. We actually had to figure it all out by listening and obsessing on guitar and eventually stumbling into discovering that there were patterns on the neck where those guitar heroes played, then we discovered they all stole that stuff from the old blues records. Then you had to try to bend 12 guage strings because you didn't know Clapton and those guys were using banjo strings on the higher strings. Then we discovered 8 guage strings which made everything so easy, wow......then SRV made 12 gauge strings cool again....

[David King]

So did Clapton unwind Robt Johnson's pickups at 45 or 78 RPM?

[David Schwab]

Actually I knew Edison, mean tempered old fucker. Yeah, I learned guitar solos by playing LP's on half speed, what 15rpm, or did I do that on a tape machne, remember reel to reels? Guitar players these days have it easy, all that shit is tabbed out and videos showing how to do everything. We actually had to figure it all out by listening and obsessing on guitar and eventually stumbling into discovering that there were patterns on the neck where those guitar heroes played, then we discovered they all stole that stuff from the old blues records. Then you had to try to bend 12 guage strings because you didn't know Clapton and those guys were using banjo strings on the higher strings. Then we discovered 8 guage strings which made everything so easy, wow......then SRV made 12 gauge strings cool again....

Edison's lab (the one in West Orange, NJ) is down the street from the house I grew up in. My father said his dad worked for "Old man Edison" and he got fired for throwing Edison's cat in the furnace after it ate my grandfather's lunch!

I always thought that was an awful story... My dad's side of the family never seemed to like cats. I love them myself.

My dad was old enough to remember meeting Edison. My dad would be 108 if he was still alive.

It's 16 RPM. Actually it's 16.666 RPM (half of 33.333). I used to do that all the time. Now there's software that does it and transposes the pitch.

I remember using Black Diamond guitar strings.. boy they were stiff! Then I found Darco Funky's and Ernie Ball Slinkies. I fluctuate between 9's and 10's depending on the guitar.

I stick with .045's on bass.

[GlennW]

It's a good thing Edison didn't eat your grandfather's lunch.

[kevinT]

Guitar players these days have it easy, all that shit is tabbed out and videos showing how to do everything. We actually had to figure it all out by listening and obsessing on guitar and eventually stumbling into discovering that there were patterns on the neck where those guitar heroes played,...

Tell me about it. They started having some videos and cassettes in the 80s showing how to play licks and limited numbers of songs...remember the Star Licks series with Wolfe Marshall? However, today players have a lot more variety of songs tabbed out and availble on the internet as well as YouTube.. There is a guy SoloDallas, on YouTube, who nails AC/DC songs including Angus' tone. He breaks down each song note for note including the solo. Gibson even has him highlighted in their email newsletter.....that was unheard of back in the day. Hell...they even have devices that can actually slow down a song, take out the backing tracks so that you can actually hear the solo by itself while staying in the correct key...go figure. Do you know how many hours I spent learning Paul Gilbert solos?...its crazy. I used to break down the solo in sections and record the section about 25 times and listen to it over and over while figuring it out on the fretboard. I'm surpised i'm not bald because it was enough to pull out your hair.