Unwind a pickup?

[Bmxbarspin724]

i have an epiphone junior. it has on humbucker, and i really dont like the sound of it. id like for it to be cleaner. is there anyway that i could unwind the pickup to make it cleaner? and if there isnt, what repacement humbuckers are out there, that have a good clean tele tone?

[Spence]

To be fair, you probably need a tele rather than a Junior if you want a tele tone.

[greenfingers]

Yea Spence is wright in what he said, A good tele sound is more than changing a pickup unfortunately, The wood of the body and neck have an affect on the tone, even the shape of the body can change the sound. So sell the epi and get a tele.

[David Schwab]

We just had a discussion over at MIMF.com about what makes a Tele sound like a Tele. The consensus is it's the bridge and bridge pickup that really gets that tone.

I agree with Greenfingers about the wood and shape part, but I do have a Tele/Les Paul hybrid that has a thick ash body, carved maple top, set maple/purpleheart neck with rosewood fingerboard. It has a brass Tele bridge, a stacked lead pickup I made, and two Lawrence L-250 strat pickups. Does it sound like a Tele? Not exactly, but it has that Tele vibe going on. It has the bite, most of the twang, but is missing that snarling pig tone you get on a real Tele. It's more hi-fi.

Now, if you just want a brighter tone, I'm sure you can either find another humbucker, or you can try and unwind that one. But they probably had it wax potted, so unwinding it might be difficult, to impossible.

But I used to unwind DiMarzio SDHB pickups for people back in the 70's when they wanted them just a little cleaner and brighter. Then they came out with the Super II, which is pretty much the unwound version.

You can also try replacing the magnet in the pickup with a ceramic magnet (assuming it has an alnico) or put in a series/parallel switch to get a clean bright tone.