Wax potting under $20!

[R.Madgwick]

Well I've seen a lot of things around with people using glue jugs for melting wax, which I'm more then sure works amazing, most of the "specialty" things like that are incredibly expensive for what they are. I've used double boilers which work great as well, but are in my opinion a subtle pain in the rear. So I began testing a handful of cheap heating elements such as hot plates, a disassembled toaster (horrible idea) and lastly a $15 dollar tiny crock pot.

While the hot plate was basically a stove, so that was out the window right away, taking apart the old toaster I though maybe i could use the variable toasting settings to control it better, but after hacking it apart, figuring out how to setup the thing was where I gave up, so I basically Gallaghered a vintage toaster for no reason lastly this little proctor sylex crock pot I found on amazon for 14.99. I think its 1-1.5qt in holding capacity, tiny little thing, so I put 1lb of paraffin and 1/4lb of beeswax in there and turned it on high. After about 1 hour there was little melting, so I put the lid on to see how much heat it would retain as it obviously wasn't getting that hot. After about another hour in there all the beeswax melted, a good portion of a paraffin was melted but I contribute this uneven melting to the density of the paraffin block vs the broken up bees wax chunks. I took a knife and cut the paraffin wax up as best I could, waited a little longer and checked the temp, well it seems on high left alone, this crock pot will bring the wax to about 165-170 not much higher. and removing the lid and turning of the heating element seems to give the was about a 10 minute cooldown time to get into the 150 range.


For hanging the pickup in there I have a roll of garbage twist ties, they can be acquired at hydroponics stores, not sure if hardware stores carry them, they are a green roll at least few hundred feet with a small spring steel cutter to cut them to desired length. The wood stick is a shish kabob skewer. I know its rather high tech, I'm sure a million things would work from using the hook up wires, to clothes hangers.

2013-02-22_19-51-19_573.jpg Photo by Madgwick86 | Photobucket
150* spot on.


Now a little about me since I'm some what new.

I'm Ryan, a machinist and hobby guitar builder/pickup maker. When I say builder I mean assembler, I'm more of a tech, minor repair guy and would never claim to be anything of a luthier. I love to build budget strats that play and sound like a million dollars (or a decent american made guitar) I also have unique outlook on tone I feel which is why I ventured into making pickups. I've really only been satisfied with a few pickups I've ever purchased mostly being Dimarzio's Liquifire, wired backwards in the neck position. I love 44awg, I experimented with everything from 42-48, It seems to me, a 12-14k Single coil strat pickup made with 44awg and a alnico 9 bar mag in a rail like position is the perfect blend of high output without getting into the fatness of p90 esque tones. Its mid range is incredibly strong, its very full and punchy while still retaining a alnico 3 like warmth and chime. Much more top end then my a5 43awg pickups, and its not as "crunchy" as a 7k a3 42awg pickup.

But enough about me, heres a few more pics.

Collection, Left early 90's ESP Eclipse, Mid Schecter Damien Elite 5, Left Frankenstein Warmoth scalloped neck, Local Luthiered mahogany/maple body. Down in front is my incomplete partscaster.
2012-12-28_22-15-51_25.jpg Photo by Madgwick86 | Photobucket
Heres frank in the mini studio.

Parts caster Flame Top
2013-02-25_22-46-01_155.jpg Photo by Madgwick86 | Photobucket
My first A9 bar strat pickup, have since toned them down to under 14, some closer to 12 for more top end.
2013-02-25_23-02-09_333.jpg Photo by Madgwick86 | Photobucket
A9 w/ my rail that broke after potting
The gorilla glue was a terrible idea for this, didn't realize it would swell up, but I cut the a9 bars a little to short and the top was very loose :\, I assumed a no holes strat cover would fit, but I'll have to dremel down the top fiber to get it in and it makes me nervous using a dremel that close to a coil

Partscaster finished, A9 Bar bridge 14k, A3 mid/neck 6.5k The tone from the bridge/Mid in parallel is extremely nice, I was really surprised as I thought of all the positions that would be the the unbearable one if any. And I'm just in love with a3 hot wind strat pickups.

[big_teee]

Thanks for sharing all your info and pics.
Great post.
I use a similar crock pot.
Mine gets hotter faster than yours.
I have a cooking thermometer that hangs on the side that I use.
150f for most pickups is great.
The lid does make a huge difference in holding the temp in.
I don't suspend the pickups like you do.
The heat is on the side of the pot, and I just let them sit on the bottom.
Another trick I got from CopperheadRoads for cleaning the wax.
Let the pot sit for a while before turning it off and cooling.
With the wax in a full solid form, turn on the pot.
When the pot starts to heat up you can lift the chunk of wax out of the pot.
Then you can trim all the residue off the bottom.
That way you don't have to replace all the wax.
How does the A9 magnets, compare to the A8s?
T

[big_teee]

There are several methods and concepts to potting pickups.
The crockpot, and other standard potting methods work just fine.
I've done hundreds of pickups with standard potting.
On making pickups, there doesn't always have to be a right or wrong way.
Use what works for you!
T

[Lyrebird Steve]

Been using the crockpot method for a while as well..

... look for a cheap "Milk Thermometer" ... they have the temp range you want your wax at marked on it .. super easy to see if it's too hot or too cold

[R.Madgwick]

Don't know why my phone doesn't post responses often, terry I had wrote up a bit about the a9's but it messed up when I get home I'll post my thoughts and experiences with it.

And I didn't post this with intentions of any discredit to other options but when I first started looking into porting pickups not a lot of simple examples are given around the internet in a easy to find fashion, it seems the things I did find were very expensive in retrospect to what the end goal actually is.

And I really like the look of that milk therm, my girlfriend would probably be ecstatic if I stopped coveting the meat therm in wax too lol

[R.Madgwick]

The a9 is pretty brutal, I don't have much a8 experience besides trying some magnet types with a high output wind I ultimately decided to go with A9 for. I find the A8 eq to be quite flat, like a organic or less harsh ceramic, but since my goal for my wind was to be in 16-19k range, I had a ton of mid range with the a8, reminded me a lot of a super 3 pickup, not as muddy but getting close in tones, the a9 I feel has a bit more top or high mid range, feels slightly scooped and I don't know if I'd say spongier, but a more complementing bass to the eq present. Now I wasn't a fan of either magnet on the lower ranges, I really have a fondness for A6 in the 10.5-13k range. To me it almost seems A3 is to 6 as 4 is to 8 and 5 is to 9. 6 seems often skipped and overlooked like 3 but really a great tool, tighter then and less harsh then a 5 to me. 4 to me is boomy like a 5 but less dramatic, almost very flat, which is how I felt about the 8 for the most part. and 9 to 5 is a pretty easy comparison, 5 to me is more suited for over wound vintage, 9 is more suited for over wound modern. 6,8,9 all have a very strong field, 9s I usually install almost flush to a fender pick guard, even my single coil 9 bar pickup can't really come up much higher without effecting much, and the 9 in the single is very different then I expected, at 14k w/ 44awg its output and attack are much softer then my a3 6.8k, clearer cleans without much breakup, parallel it complements the a3 very well giving the 2nd setting a much brighter attack then when I had all a3 pickups lots of quack and works very well under loads of gain.

Going to do some tracking and sound clips for my website this weekend so I'll make sure to link some here and use a "control" pickup for comparisons, most likely super 3 and Liquifire as I already have those in a guitar.

[tattoedvoodoo]

Well I've seen a lot of things around with people using glue jugs for melting wax, which I'm more then sure works amazing, most of the "specialty" things like that are incredibly expensive for what they are. I've used double boilers which work great as well, but are in my opinion a subtle pain in the rear. So I began testing a handful of cheap heating elements such as hot plates, a disassembled toaster (horrible idea) and lastly a $15 dollar tiny crock pot.

While the hot plate was basically a stove, so that was out the window right away, taking apart the old toaster I though maybe i could use the variable toasting settings to control it better, but after hacking it apart, figuring out how to setup the thing was where I gave up, so I basically Gallaghered a vintage toaster for no reason lastly this little proctor sylex crock pot I found on amazon for 14.99. I think its 1-1.5qt in holding capacity, tiny little thing, so I put 1lb of paraffin and 1/4lb of beeswax in there and turned it on high. After about 1 hour there was little melting, so I put the lid on to see how much heat it would retain as it obviously wasn't getting that hot. After about another hour in there all the beeswax melted, a good portion of a paraffin was melted but I contribute this uneven melting to the density of the paraffin block vs the broken up bees wax chunks. I took a knife and cut the paraffin wax up as best I could, waited a little longer and checked the temp, well it seems on high left alone, this crock pot will bring the wax to about 165-170 not much higher. and removing the lid and turning of the heating element seems to give the was about a 10 minute cooldown time to get into the 150 range.


For hanging the pickup in there I have a roll of garbage twist ties, they can be acquired at hydroponics stores, not sure if hardware stores carry them, they are a green roll at least few hundred feet with a small spring steel cutter to cut them to desired length. The wood stick is a shish kabob skewer. I know its rather high tech, I'm sure a million things would work from using the hook up wires, to clothes hangers.

2013-02-22_19-51-19_573.jpg Photo by Madgwick86 | Photobucket
150* spot on.


Now a little about me since I'm some what new.

I'm Ryan, a machinist and hobby guitar builder/pickup maker. When I say builder I mean assembler, I'm more of a tech, minor repair guy and would never claim to be anything of a luthier. I love to build budget strats that play and sound like a million dollars (or a decent american made guitar) I also have unique outlook on tone I feel which is why I ventured into making pickups. I've really only been satisfied with a few pickups I've ever purchased mostly being Dimarzio's Liquifire, wired backwards in the neck position. I love 44awg, I experimented with everything from 42-48, It seems to me, a 12-14k Single coil strat pickup made with 44awg and a alnico 9 bar mag in a rail like position is the perfect blend of high output without getting into the fatness of p90 esque tones. Its mid range is incredibly strong, its very full and punchy while still retaining a alnico 3 like warmth and chime. Much more top end then my a5 43awg pickups, and its not as "crunchy" as a 7k a3 42awg pickup.

But enough about me, heres a few more pics.

Collection, Left early 90's ESP Eclipse, Mid Schecter Damien Elite 5, Left Frankenstein Warmoth scalloped neck, Local Luthiered mahogany/maple body. Down in front is my incomplete partscaster.
2012-12-28_22-15-51_25.jpg Photo by Madgwick86 | Photobucket
Heres frank in the mini studio.

Parts caster Flame Top
2013-02-25_22-46-01_155.jpg Photo by Madgwick86 | Photobucket
My first A9 bar strat pickup, have since toned them down to under 14, some closer to 12 for more top end.
2013-02-25_23-02-09_333.jpg Photo by Madgwick86 | Photobucket
A9 w/ my rail that broke after potting
The gorilla glue was a terrible idea for this, didn't realize it would swell up, but I cut the a9 bars a little to short and the top was very loose :\, I assumed a no holes strat cover would fit, but I'll have to dremel down the top fiber to get it in and it makes me nervous using a dremel that close to a coil

Partscaster finished, A9 Bar bridge 14k, A3 mid/neck 6.5k The tone from the bridge/Mid in parallel is extremely nice, I was really surprised as I thought of all the positions that would be the the unbearable one if any. And I'm just in love with a3 hot wind strat pickups.

I know this is an older threat but i am new here. I have a small crockpot i use for wax potting. mine was heating the wax to around 180 degrees, i put a dimmer switch on it and found where 150 is and marked it. i turn it on in the morning and leave it on til i go to bed. takes a while to melt but the heat is always correct. have a great day

[big_teee]

I know this is an older threat but i am new here. I have a small crockpot i use for wax potting. mine was heating the wax to around 180 degrees, i put a dimmer switch on it and found where 150 is and marked it. i turn it on in the morning and leave it on til i go to bed. takes a while to melt but the heat is always correct. have a great day

Welcome to the Forum, and thanks for the light dimmer trick.
I use a light bulb tester to drop the voltage, and some guys use a variac for that.
Your idea sounds like a good alternative.
150F is about the upper max on some plastics. I shoot for 140-145F.
T

[big_teee]

this thread was not showing on top?
After posting this last post, now it is!
That was puzzling!
T
**edit
See the other two posts entered today, before this one.