B/H Round Table & Misc

[mcgruff]

Pickup winding has been on hold for a bit. It's part of a larger project to see what I can do with an Epiphone dot. So far I've re-wired it with Jimmy Page wiring, made a couple of humbuckers, and recently I built a new amp: a WF-55 (5F1 champ) from ampmaker. Different pickups interact with different amps differently (that's one nice thing about having JP wiring - more chance of finding something that works) so I thought I'd better pause in the pickup winding until I've got the champ to try them out on. Future pickups will be wound specifically to work well with this amp.

As for the champ... wow! Here's a clip with the volume turned up full:

http://ccgi.mcgruff.plus.com/~mcgruff/misc/wf-aiken-vol-11.wav

Turn the volume back a bit and smash the preamp stage with clean boost and EQ to increase the mids:

http://ccgi.mcgruff.plus.com/~mcgruf...rated-riff.wav

The little amp that sounds huge:

http://ccgi.mcgruff.plus.com/~mcgruf...aiken-rock.wav

Clean sound, neck pickup. Lead track is set to just slip into break-up when you push hard. This feels very responsive and is great to play:

http://ccgi.mcgruff.plus.com/~mcgruf...of-breakup.wav

Great little amp. I love the simplicity of the circuit - very easy to build. It may be a tiny 4-watter, but it's got a huge sound.

All clips were recorded direct using a line out and cab sim. The line out was another, highly recommended DIY project: the Aiken reactive load. This takes the signal from the speaker out and therefore captures the full flavour of the amp including output stage and transformer. The circuit is designed to mimic the impedance response of a real speaker which seems to help preserve dynamics.

If you're recording, the raw signal will need some EQ or a cab sim to mimic a speaker frequency response. Or you could plug it straight into a slave amp or PA.

[big_teee]

Here are some Guitars that can be used for Test Guitars.
This list changes daily.
I have several of the Left Hand models.(A whole Room Full)
Cheap Lefties are harder to find.
I have had good luck with the B-Stock models.
Usually not too much wrong with them.
I usually rip out the cheap pots switches and rewire all of it.
New Items & Specials
Here's the main Electric Guitar site.
http://www.rondomusic.com/electricguitar.html
http://www.rondomusic.com/electricguitarleft.html

[big_teee]

Anyone heard from Sonny and Stratz?
I guess they are MIA!
Been pretty quiet around here!
T

[SonnyW]

Anyone heard from Sonny and Stratz?
I guess they are MIA!
Been pretty quiet around here!
T

Hi,T - I have been pretty busy and just haven't had too much to say on pickups lately. I have been mostly doing guitar tech work, and not selling all that many custom pickups. I might have plenty to talk about soon enough though. I signed up to rewind a dead DeArmond Rythm Chief. The dreaded monkey on a stick one. It is coming in the mail. I don't know what came over me, it isn't like I haven't been warned enough by reading posts in the forum, but I decided to take it on anyway. I will probably lose my shirt on it but I can chalk it up to learning, and who knows it might not be all that bad. Plus its kind of a rite of passage kind of thing.

[SonnyW]

UPDATE: OK so the DeArmond Rythm Chief came today in the mail. It turned out to be a model 1000 by my investigations. It is the dreaded Monkey on a Stick model. I spent a good part of the evening getting it apart. I can see why no one wants to work on these. They were never meant to be taken apart again. But thanks to having read and seen all the other posts here, especially David's detailed one, I was able to get it down to the bobbin without significant damage to the innards. I took lots of notes. The pickup wasn't exactly open, it read 69 Megohms. I took a photo of that. Getting the bobbin out was the biggest chalenge, the flanges are paper thin. I used an Xacto, my smallest flat blade screwdriver, and an artists pallet knife plus a heat gun. (did have one accident, one of the felt pads charred big time from the heat- I didn't get a photo of the smoke cloud. But anyway that's no problem I have plenty of felt and can cut another one)

The full bobbin weighed 26 grams, and the wire measured .0021 inch. It looked like PE. Anyway a single build. So that would be #44 AWG. I have some #44 Elektrisola PN155 which measures .0023 that I plan to use for the rewinding. I took the bobbin apart, and carefully removed just the outer coil wire as nearly as I could tell, and weighed that, it was 11 grams. Then I removed the remaining wire and weighed that it was 4 grams. Then I took all the rest of the parts from the bobbin and magnets and weighed them that was 11 grams. So based on that and the tables from Essex on ohms per kilogram, I calculated that the inner coil would have been around 1814 ohms and the outer coil would have been 4990 if the .0023 wire had been used. So that adds up to 6.8K ohms which seemed a tiny bit low. But taking into account that my wire is about 9% larger diameter it seems reasonable. My internet searching says these have the following readings that I have found: 6.9K 7.3K, 7.4K. So I figured I would use the coil estimator and round up a bit to get my turns count. I measured the bobbin cores and put that in the coil estimator and came out with 2300-2373 turns for the inner coil, and 4329-4498 turns for the outer coil. So rounding those up a bit I am planning to use 2400 turns on the inner coil (unless it looks too fat) then put in the rest of the magnets and wind another 4500 for the outer coil. I am hoping that will get me to around 7K.

This is as far as I have gotten today here are some pics.

[big_teee]

Great Job Sonny!
I think they sent it to the right place.
I don't remember the inner and outer coils.
What is the purpose of that?
It looks like they went to great lengths to make that one difficult to rewind.
Like you said, They never had a rewind in mind when they made it!
Thanks for Sharing!
T

[SonnyW]

I am still working on it. Gluing the bobbin together is an issue. I ruled out CA because the next person that may have to take it apart again would be me if there was any issue with the winding. I tried contact cement, which I think is what Rowe used, but that didn't work for me. I think part of the issue is the kind that I have which is for tolex and not strong enough. Then I tried RTV silicone. That worked at first, My rewind attempt went fine on the coil for the first four strings, but the bobbin came unglued on the main coil. I didn't use the neos to hold it down like I should have, so now I have had to start back over. I cut off the wire, glued up the first part of the bobbin, and am making some little makeshift fixtures to hold it down with neos on the winder, as David did.

I think the purpose of the two separate windings is because of the strings back then. There were only two plain strings and they were too loud in comparison to the other four because of having more core metal and I think the wraps were pure nickel then, which made it worse. So it was to balance out the volume of the strings. The magnet for the B string is really short too. Here are a few more photos and I will put up some more when I make a little more progress, right now I am waiting for glue to dry.

The contact cement didn't work for me. I think I have the wrong kind for this.

You can see where the bobbin came unglued and resulted in flaring of the windings. The wire actually pulled in tight under the flanges and came in all the way over the tops of the magnets of the second set of two poles. This cannot be used at all.
This is a little blurry but shows where the magnet wire came in over the tops of the magnets.

[SonnyW]

More on the Rythm Chief - Here are the little fixtures I made up to help hold the bobbin from coming unglued during the winding. I made them with some thin neo magnets I had that are 1/4 x 2 x 1/16 N42 magnetized through the 1/16 thickness. I made the fixtures out of the same kind of linnen-phenolic laminate stuff that the rythm chief bobbins are made of, that is just coincidence. I would probably have used it anyway, or sometimes I use G-10 or FR-4 circuit board laminate for this kind of thing. McMaster-Carr sells it as Garolite. When my dad had an electric motor winding shop we called the same stuff Micarta. It is used for a lot of electrical stuff. Anyway, I have a bunch of it and use it for various things, it is nice to work with. If you notice, the front panel of my winder is made of it. I sandwiched the neos inside the fixtures so they would be flush. I had some 1/32 thick pieces of garolite that I used for the outsides of the fixtures and I used 1/16 thick model airplane basswood lumber which is the same thickness as the magnets for the cores. I put them together with double sticky tape and bound the edges with titebond glue. The thin garolite is nice as it is strong and can be cut with ordinary scissors. These are one time use fixtures, so they aren't all that sophistocated but they should work fine for this time and maybe the next time if it happens. Of course the neo magnets in these fixtures will change the charge on the magnets in the bobbin. Probably for the better, and it should increase the charge, but just in case I will recharge them all on the electric charger in the end. Anyhow tomorrow I will wind again.

This one I attached to the winder spindle. I put some strips of tape to help it line up. I will still use double sticky tape to hold the bobbin in place, I tested it without the tape and it can spin off. The neos are strong, but not strong enough to prevent spinning off when the bobbin is unbalanced for the first winding.

This is the clamp, and if I need to I can stack another neo on top of it for more pull, and I probably will.

[big_teee]

Been getting some emails and calls suddenly on pickups.
I just got an order to make a set of Tele Pickups for a Tele B bender Guitar.
I'm going to install them, so it should be fun to play with the bender!
Anyone got any experience with the Bender Tele Guitar?
I will take some pictures.
T

[SonnyW]

Me too on the sudden interest in pickups, maybe it is the moon phase or sunspots or something like that. I have had more calls and contact requests emails on my website in the last three or four days than in the month before that.

DeArmond Rythm Chief 1000 Rewind Update:

I got a good wind today that came out to about 7.36 K. There was enough room left on the bobbin when I got to 4500 turns on the outer coil that I went ahead and added another 100 more turns than I calculated just to be on the safe side with the output. That decision turned out good. Clamping with the neos worked okay. To solve the issue of gluing in the second core, I got the idea to use a different kind of contact cement, 3M spray photo adhesive. I just sprayed some on to a sheet of paper and used a toothpick to apply it. Then I clamped it for two hours to be sure. There was a still a little bit of flaring when I took it off though, the ends of the flanges are just so thin and flexible. I cured that issue though by clamping them and dripping just two drops of candle wax from a lit candle on each of the very ends then giving it a quick pass with a heat gun while they were still clamped. When it cooled off it was fine. I emailed the customer and asked him if he wanted the whole thing wax potted. The original wasn't potted. I also gave the option of bringing the ohms back down some by taking off turns in case he wants it to be closer to what this particular example probably originally was. So now I am waiting to hear back before I tape the coil and put it back in the housing. Here are some more pics.

Mounted on the fixture and clamped with neos ready to wind the inner coil. This worked good. I did use the extra neo on the outside of the fixture.
Gluing in the second core. There were 2450 turns on the first coil and that is the max. Any more and the second core would not have fit in place. I just sprayed the 3M adhesive on paper and put it on with a toothpick and then clamped it for two hours, while I did other stuff.
The finished coil. Glad to see this pic. It measured 7.36 K. There was a tiny bit of flaring on the ends.
This is clamped and cooling after I dripped a couple of drops of wax on the very ends to stabilize them. That worked too. I used # 30 magnet wire for the lead outs. You can see one of them after being soldered on in this pic. The magnet wire is so fine that it almost doesn't show up in this pic unless you zoom in.

[copperheadroads]

Me too on the sudden interest in pickups, maybe it is the moon phase or sunspots or something like that. I have had more calls and contact requests emails on my website in the last three or four days than in the month before that.

Me Three on the sudden interest .....what the hell is up with that

[rjb]

[ATTACH=CONFIG]23657[/ATTACH]

Rhythm Chief? I'm just fascinated by the tweed winder.
That's, like, crazy, man.

[SonnyW]

Rhythm Chief? I'm just fascinated by the tweed winder.
That's, like, crazy, man.

I've been posting some updates on a vintage "Monkey on a Stick" type DeArmond Rythm Chief 1000 soundhole pickup that I have been rewinding because most of the bigger winders are smarter than I am and better at managing their time and being businessmen so they don't do them anymore. They know what a pain in the kazoo these are to rewind. But the Rythm Chiefs are highly sought after and worth at least $500-700 each on the market to jazz players, so people still want them rewound, and some of the other winders like to see the details on them that aren't too well known.

Glad you like the winder. It was a fun project of mine. I used to use a modified sewing machine for handwinding, but it was getting kind of tired - it was my mom's and about the same age as me. I had originally made this winder to wind in reverse for middle pickups. But now I use it for all my handwinding. It is made from a collection of parts I had around and scrounged. The frame is from the aluminum card cage out of an old video terminal. The spindle is from a 1 megabyte hard drive. I really do mean one meg, it was that old. But it had a really high precision bearing and a big spindle. I think that drive had 8 inch platters. I made a cam for it out of a platter from a 5 inch hard drive to work the switch. The motor is from a flex shaft machine. I used an O-ring for a belt to drive it and added a variable speed control that I bought off the internet, and used the faceplate off an old variac for it. The counter is an electromechanical solenoid Swiss Sodeco model from the 1960's and was used in equipment such as in telephone switch rooms to count calls. I have had to overhaul it once. Believe it or not I had all these parts in my hoard except the speed control, one transformer and the variac faceplate. The outside is just a plywood box, and it didn't look that good so since I keep it out in my den, and since all this stuff it was made from was from the good old days, I decided to cover it in tweed tolex. The pilot lights work, one is hooked to the counter and flashes each rev. The other one is a NE2 bulb hooked to the original hard drive stepper motor which works in reverse like a generator so the neon bulb glows and is kind of like a tach indicator. So there you have the rundown on it.

[big_teee]

I wound a Tele Bridge Pickup this afternoon.
I used the 42 SPN Natural that I bought last summer.
It is one of the rolls that has the hang up issue on the end of the roll.
Right in the middle of the pickup it broke, way under the end of roll.
Now it has about 6 ends, sticking up on the end of the roll.
I weighed the roll and it weighs 6 pounds and 10 ounces, spool and wire.
I'm Calling Larry at Remington tomorrow, and see what I have to do to get it exchanged.
This Spool has Really been a PITA!
I'll let you know how the exchange works out.
TBC (To Be Continued).
T

[SonnyW]

Hi Teee
Yeah, I know what you mean about the wire, but they should replace it no problem, the cascading issue. I had the same problem and they did it for me. The next roll was fine. I think there was a time when their tension wasn't right on spooling these up.