Newb hating PE

[Train34]

Thanks for the encouragement. I figure I'd rather spend time on something I enjoy. Kind of found it pretty tedious so far. If it doesn't sell I guess I'll revisit it at sometime.

[the great waldo]

Hi Train

If you've gone to the trouble of buying the winder you should spend a little time getting a feel for it (remember the first time you took a driving lesson ?) Start at a lower speed. By the way never sell a tool unless you have bought one that is better. Just a quick afterthought where is the wire breaking ?

Cheers
Andrew

Thanks for the encouragement. I figure I'd rather spend time on something I enjoy. Kind of found it pretty tedious so far. If it doesn't sell I guess I'll revisit it at sometime.

[Kindly Killer]

Thank you everyone for your help. I wasted a lot of wire and don't have much to show for it.

I can relate to that. I got a slow start. But now winding one of the last tech type things into which I dump time just for grins. For me, winding is so rewarding - so sensual - because you are messing with such a low-level electrical phenomenon. It's like sculpting with electrons. It's just so neat-o!

You actually do have lots to show for it: learned some basics, found this forum, acquired a tool... This is what I relate to most in your comments - making the world pivot around your current location with a change in perception. This is something I continue to work on in every aspect of my life; e.g. the book I can't put down right now is Effortless Mastery by Kenny Werner; it's about meditating into a mind space where you can channel music with simple efficiency; and it works like a miracle. With guitar tech type stuff I've brought over ideas from therapy about evaluating everything dispassionately, like a third-party observer; the book that has made the biggest difference for me is Self Coaching by Joseph Luciani. If I could afford it would buy cases of that book and give it to literally everyone with whom I come in contact. Coaching is an apt analogy because it helps you get so much more performance out of your mind. It's like Zen reinterpreted through the science of psychology. It's a winning strategy.

I would advise you to simplify your thinking about motivations and just enjoy the journey. A good goal at this point is to make one decent pickup that you can put in your main guitar and play at your favorite venue. That goal is just over the next hill. If you are feeling anxious about burning through a spool of expensive wire, just get a big 6lbs spool of 42 poly for cheap from Remington Industries on eBay. That will put the deadline far enough out in front of you to take the heat off - i.e. you can mess up LOTS of pickups before you run out of wire again. Also, at this point in your development the fine points of obsolete insulation materials aren't really helpful IMO.

Good luck! I hope you stick with it. I promise that if you stick it out just a little longer, it will get fun and rewarding.

HTH,
Michael

[kayakerca]

Thanks for the encouragement. I figure I'd rather spend time on something I enjoy. Kind of found it pretty tedious so far. If it doesn't sell I guess I'll revisit it at sometime.

You can get around the breakage/tension issue without too much difficulty. If you add a felt tensioner a couple of feet before the wire guides, you can control the wire tension with the felt tensioner and just guide the wire traverse action between your index and middle fingers from a point between the felt tensioner and guide stops (just before the stops). You could go one step further and build a small wire guide traverse jig from a couple pieces of metal rod mounted parallel to each other in a piece of wood or metal block, or running the wire through a piece of narrow diameter tube or a flexible CA glue tip nozzle, any of which you could be used to traverse back and for by hand and not affect the tension you set with the felt tensioner. Definitely worth a try. It is the coolest thing to hear your first set of pickups you wound on a contraption you put together from your own or someone else's design.

You have gone to a lot of effort and your are so close. Don't move on until you have seen at least one set through to see what you can actually end up with.

[big_teee]

He's already Sold the Machine!
Pickup winding is not for everyone.
Sorry It didn't work out!
T

[the great waldo]

I suppose that's one way of putting it !

Cheers

ANDREW

I can relate to that. I got a slow start. But now winding one of the last tech type things into which I dump time just for grins. For me, winding is so rewarding - so sensual - because you are messing with such a low-level electrical phenomenon. It's like sculpting with electrons. It's just so neat-o!

You actually do have lots to show for it: learned some basics, found this forum, acquired a tool... This is what I relate to most in your comments - making the world pivot around your current location with a change in perception. This is something I continue to work on in every aspect of my life; e.g. the book I can't put down right now is Effortless Mastery by Kenny Werner; it's about meditating into a mind space where you can channel music with simple efficiency; and it works like a miracle. With guitar tech type stuff I've brought over ideas from therapy about evaluating everything dispassionately, like a third-party observer; the book that has made the biggest difference for me is Self Coaching by Joseph Luciani. If I could afford it would buy cases of that book and give it to literally everyone with whom I come in contact. Coaching is an apt analogy because it helps you get so much more performance out of your mind. It's like Zen reinterpreted through the science of psychology. It's a winning strategy.

I would advise you to simplify your thinking about motivations and just enjoy the journey. A good goal at this point is to make one decent pickup that you can put in your main guitar and play at your favorite venue. That goal is just over the next hill. If you are feeling anxious about burning through a spool of expensive wire, just get a big 6lbs spool of 42 poly for cheap from Remington Industries on eBay. That will put the deadline far enough out in front of you to take the heat off - i.e. you can mess up LOTS of pickups before you run out of wire again. Also, at this point in your development the fine points of obsolete insulation materials aren't really helpful IMO.

Good luck! I hope you stick with it. I promise that if you stick it out just a little longer, it will get fun and rewarding.

HTH,
Michael

[big_teee]

That's too deep for me!
I get nothing spiritual out of winding, but I do like the end result.
Actually some pickups, I hate making, but enjoy playing them, once the chore is done!
Strat Sized mini blades come to mind!
IMO they are a Pain to make, but I love the way they sound, and none, or very little noise!
T

[jason lollar]

i would say it was due to having the two wire guides- its binding between them, when the oblong bobbin whips the wire its pinching between the two sets of guides and breaking- one is sufficient. I have shown a few hundred people how to use that type of guide, one works fine

[GunbarrelCustom]

I am having trouble with the same wire! Two humbucker coils are just junk and at $.70 a bobbin not even worth fixing lol.

I have some Remington 42 Poly wire, exactly the same specs as the mojotone PE, and I wound 2 amazing P-90s (one was a dogear) and one humbucker with no troubles. I am so excited at how great they sound! I finally have the power I wanted in a humbucker, for a Tele neck, that has lots of clarity and balls.

[big_teee]

I am having trouble with the same wire! Two humbucker coils are just junk and at $.70 a bobbin not even worth fixing lol.

I have some Remington 42 Poly wire, exactly the same specs as the mojotone PE, and I wound 2 amazing P-90s (one was a dogear) and one humbucker with no troubles. I am so excited at how great they sound! I finally have the power I wanted in a humbucker, for a Tele neck, that has lots of clarity and balls.

Congratulations on the successful pickups.
You're smart using the Poly wire.
I have wound a Ton of pickups with it, and it winds great.
I have 3 different large rolls of 42 SP wire in different diameters.
I use the larger for neck pickups, for bell ringing tones, and use the mid sized one the most, for just general winding.
And the smaller one overwinds some for bridge pickups.
IMO the Wire is the main ingredient to great pickups.
You can do nearly any winding job if you have a roll of 42SP, 42 HP, and a roll of 43SP wire.
The 43 is a main ingredient for overwound Humbucker bridge pickups.
GL,
T

[GunbarrelCustom]

What is the best way to get the coating off of the wire so it is possible to get the best solder connection? I want to give this wire another chance with two Tele bridge pickups I want to wind soon.

Scrape with a razor or some 800 grit wet/dry sandpaper? Something else?

[big_teee]

For the PE, you can drag it through some folded fine wet or dry just a little bit.
then a good hot iron will quickly burn the rest off, when you solder it to an eyelet, or hookup wire.
The SP will not need any cleaning.
On the flash potting, you will just have to experiment and come up with your own technique, and degree of potting.
Most crockpots will get too hot for potting, but you can turn it on and off when you get it heated to temp.
T

[big_teee]

Another comment about PE.
It is usually rougher, less consistent, and harder to feed with fingers than Poly.
My biggest issue with PE, and hand feeding the wire, is the dark color is harder to see, even in good light.
I prefer the natural Poly with a dark back drop, because of the sight issue.
Heavy Poly in natural is even easier to see and wind.
I use the HP on most Strat SCs.
YMMV
T

[SonnyW]

What is the best way to get the coating off of the wire so it is possible to get the best solder connection? I want to give this wire another chance with two Tele bridge pickups I want to wind soon.

Scrape with a razor or some 800 grit wet/dry sandpaper? Something else?

Whatever you do, don't give up on PE too soon. There are plenty of good reasons that some people prefer it for specific pickups. If nothing else it is vintage accurate. I like SPN and HPN and use them a lot but there are some times when you are just going to want to use the PE, or HF or whatever was used originally on the pickup you are trying to re-create.

I do rewinds on vintage pickup types with PE fairly often. I have found that the Norton sandpaper marked 3X 320 grit is the most satisfactory for stripping the insulation off of PE. You can usually find it at Home Depot or Lowes. I cut a little strip about an inch wide and maybe two inches long, and fold it in half. One pack of the paper is virtually a lifetime supply. The 3X variety is MUCH superior to the normal 320 grit wet or dry kinds of sandpaper. It cuts very fast and gives a good solder connection. I give it at LEAST six or seven passes and often more and once you get used to doing it, the procedure takes little or no time to do the sanding, compared to the other problems that might arise. The last thing you want, is to wind a pickup and find that the buried start connection lead wire has a bad connection. Sometimes when sanding, the wire will break, but really it's no big deal just regroup and keep sanding. I have NEVER had a start connection failure with this method in over several hundred pickups wound or re-wound with 42 and 43 awg PE, Formvar, whatever they needed, you name it. Yes it is somewhat of a pain, but on the other hand, my rewind customers always will prefer the same wire that their pickups were originally wound with if I can get it. Just wrap the wire around your finger one time and sand away. After a few times of doing this it will become second nature. After a dozen pickups you won't even notice the effort of it at all. I promise. Total time of 20 seconds max once you get the hang of it. I'm so used to it by now that I will often even sand single poly sometimes just out of habit, or just if I am not feeling too brave on the start connections. I have a butane powered soldering iron that I use at my winder and I almost always use a soldered on bigger gauge lead wire for the starts. Usually that is 30 or 32 AWG milspec silver teflon, or just 30 AWG SPN magnet wire. BTW, on the 30 gauge SPN I find it easier to use a sharp X-acto knife to do the stripping vs. sanding. The little Bernz-o-matic butane powered portable soldering iron is cheap enough and available at most of the home improvement stores. I have a couple of them. That way I don't have to worry about power or a cord or anything. I solder a heavier lead wire to the start after the bobbin is mounted on the spindle of the winder. I do this on handwinds and machine winds alike. It just makes everything more reliable. All of this is IMO.

On handwinds, I wind with the wire spool on the floor between my feet and I have not noticed any significant issues with either 42 PE or 43 compared to SPN. I have experienced some times that the wire will seem to drag or catch on my fingers but it is sporadic and I'm not sure it isn't related to the moisture on my fingers as much as to the kind of wire. I have had it happen on every kind of wire, not just PE. Sometimes with the same spool of wire it will happen one time and not the next. On machine winds there is no issue at all with the PE, I use simple felt tensioners.

[big_teee]

Thanks SonnyW!
Some good detailed info there.
I use vintage wire on Rewinds on request.
I use Poly for everything else.
Not familiar with the propane soldering Iron, but I want to look into it.
I do everything pretty well in one location, and my Weller station heats up in about 30 seconds.
So I use it for most stuff.
I use the 28 gauge wire for hookup wire.
Usually cutoff pieces of 2 wire, and 4 wire hookup cable.
I prefer stranded over a solid wire for hookup.
I wind over the hookup start wire, some do that on the outside at the end.
I put a piece of paper tape over the hookup wire splice on the bottom of the bobbin, and then wind over it.
Most of the techniques come to you after doing it a while.
Sonny and I were both career techs, so some things come easier for some than others.
Keep Winding, and Keep Rocking!
T
**Sonny if you read this, can you give the model of the berz-o-matic soldering iron used!