PAF Pickups & Effects of TPL

[the great waldo]

I have requested that this thread be deleted, as it seems to only be an annoyance and waste of people's time, for which I am sorry. Since it is still here I may as well share some things I have learnt, in case they are of any use to anyone. Leesona wound coils I have unwound have had about 50 TPL, with a slightly sloppy wind and extra winds at the edge of the bobbin. I have experimented with various TPLs and have found that higher TPLs give a more constricted compressed sound, whereas lower TPLs sound more open and dynamic. Warmth or brightness doesn't seem to have a linear relation to TPL, I imagine because Q and the frequency of the resonant peak changes, causing an accentuation of certain frequencies not entirely dependent on the total frequency range of the pickup. I don't think that the machines Gibson used are necessary to make good sounding pickups, but it would be interesting to know what they did to see how this result works with modern materials.

I have had the best results with 5,000 - 5,150 turns, offsets of less than 50 turns, TPLs of 33 and 42, various combinations of 1010, 1018 and 1215 slugs and screws, 1018 keeper bars, and alnico IV magnets. The best sounding ones have used polyurethane coated wire, but this may be just a coincidence.

Hi Winder

I think all this PAF desirability comes from the fact that a lot of good guitar players used guitars with them from the early 60's onwards and made good music wrote good songs etc. The players and the guitars (wood) seem to have been taken out of the equation. So I have a paf hence my epiphone or whatever chinese guitar will turn me into instant Eric Clapton/Jimmy Page etc. Most of the good music was made by people with talent (occasionally some without) and or a lot of hard work good engineers etc. I have been making paf style pickups using modern parts and most of my customers seem very happy with them. I think the trick is to make the pickups sound good (also a matter of taste and player) Wire and magnets seem to make a lot more difference than keepers slugs and screws, which can be a bit problematic as they both seem to vary to some extent from batch to batch. This is where experience comes in for the maker to try and adjust accordingly. Good luck anyway.

Cheers

Andrew

[copperheadroads]

[QUOTE=A. Winder;395277 Leesona wound coils I have unwound have had about 50 TPL, with a slightly sloppy wind and extra winds at the edge of the bobbin. [/QUOTE] What type of pickup was it to have a 50 tpl & roughly what year ?

[A. Winder]

Hi Winder

I think all this PAF desirability comes from the fact that a lot of good guitar players used guitars with them from the early 60's onwards and made good music wrote good songs etc. The players and the guitars (wood) seem to have been taken out of the equation. So I have a paf hence my epiphone or whatever chinese guitar will turn me into instant Eric Clapton/Jimmy Page etc. Most of the good music was made by people with talent (occasionally some without) and or a lot of hard work good engineers etc. I have been making paf style pickups using modern parts and most of my customers seem very happy with them. I think the trick is to make the pickups sound good (also a matter of taste and player) Wire and magnets seem to make a lot more difference than keepers slugs and screws, which can be a bit problematic as they both seem to vary to some extent from batch to batch. This is where experience comes in for the maker to try and adjust accordingly. Good luck anyway.

Cheers

Andrew

Thanks, I thoroughly agree for the most part. Until the recent boutique pickup explosion, however, the majority of available humbuckers did not have the clear single-coil like quality that some PAFs exhibit. I think this is another factor in their desirability, and is what makes me interested in them.

[the great waldo]

Hi Winder

Put an alnico 3 magnet in a humbucker and you'll get a fairly thin sound. Hand winding will also give you some opennes although not vintage correct. Used to only wind by hand but it was a bit of a lottery as to how the pickups sounded, great for single coils. I did invest with a cnc winder from cnc dudez to make humbuckers which helps to keep consistency. I am still surprised as to how much difference changes in wire gauge from different batches make, you can see it in the size of the coil for a given amount of turns and differing resistance readings. Trying to find the time to be methodical in testing wire tends to defeat me. I'm still trying to figure out the secret of making a late 70S early 80's mudbucker I still can't figure out how Gibson managed to make them so muddy sounding?

Cheers
Andrew

[soundmasterg]

Hi Winder

Put an alnico 3 magnet in a humbucker and you'll get a fairly thin sound. Hand winding will also give you some opennes although not vintage correct. Used to only wind by hand but it was a bit of a lottery as to how the pickups sounded, great for single coils. I did invest with a cnc winder from cnc dudez to make humbuckers which helps to keep consistency. I am still surprised as to how much difference changes in wire gauge from different batches make, you can see it in the size of the coil for a given amount of turns and differing resistance readings. Trying to find the time to be methodical in testing wire tends to defeat me. I'm still trying to figure out the secret of making a late 70S early 80's mudbucker I still can't figure out how Gibson managed to make them so muddy sounding?

Cheers
Andrew

Are you winding your mudbucker clones like Gibson did with like 22k on a Sidewinder style pickup?

Greg

[mr fab]

I'm still trying to figure out the secret of making a late 70S early 80's mudbucker I still can't figure out how Gibson managed to make them so muddy sounding?

which late 70's Gibson pickups are you referring to? there were quite a few released in that period. you know which model guitars they were fitted into?

[big_teee]

Originals had 30k ohms of 42awg wire.
That computes to at least 20,000 turns of wire per bobbin.
The steel bobbin core is only wide enough to cover the two middle strings, even thogh the keeper covers 4 strings.
This makes the two middle strings sound stronger, & louder.
That IMO is some of the reasons why it's muddy.
I rebuilt a Artec replica mudbucker, I scrapped the steel core, bobbins and the magnets.
I replaced it with cut down emg 35 bobbins, 7,000 turns per bobbin, and it sounded great.
IMO the original mudbucker has many design flaws.
T

Oops!
I thought we were talking bass Mudbuckers!

[the great waldo]

which late 70's Gibson pickups are you referring to? there were quite a few released in that period. you know which model guitars they were fitted into?

I was referring to the humbuckers from the late 70's which were very fat sounding with virtually no highs. I was working in the Rose Morris shop in Shaftesbury Avenue London who were the uk distributors for DiMarzio at the time. I swapped out a lot of Gibson pups for Dimarzio pafs which were much brighter.

Cheers

Andrew

[A. Winder]

Hello Andrew, interesting about the mudbuckers - are these just the standard T-top humbuckers Gibson was making at that time, or a special model? Have you tried a high TPL, as in over 100? If the wire overlaps itself a lot in the coil it will bleed off most of the highs, at least in my experience.

I have tried Alnico III and it does have some pleasant qualities, but I have had difficulty making a pickup which suits it. I find Alnico IV to give the clearest bass of all the grades. There is a bit more to it than just a single-coil like sound really. Scatter winding by hand and a large offset between coils does give a clear sound, but I have found that it lacks a certain metallic "krang" or hollowness that I have heard in PAFs.

Even large manufacturers often can't supply a consistent product due to variations in wire thickness, but some makers try to use this variation to their advantage.

[big_teee]

We had another thread a while back about old gibson pickups.
http://music-electronics-forum.com/t39111/
T
**Edit
Anyone got anything to add on PAF Type pickups ?
Effects of TPL, and different winding machine patterns?
Discuss away!

[A. Winder]

Thanks, T! Since this thread is still here, I'll ask some more questions.

Lower TPL seems to give a more dynamic response than higher TPL - can anyone explain why this is in scientific terms?

Another question: As TPL increases closer to a perfect coil with no space between windings, my understanding is that the inductance also increases, raising Q. What happens when the TPL goes over this point and the wire starts to overlap itself, other than increased capacitance?

In a way these are general questions but they still apply to PAFs.

Edit:

One more question: some PAFs have a sort of "cluck" sound to the attack of the notes. Typical hand-wound coils tend to have a softer attack. Does anyone know what properties of the coil affect the quality of the pick attack?

[big_teee]

Here is some Seth Lover Data I Contrived.
Hopefully the Data should wind out pretty close.
My Interpretation of the Seymour Data.
It should sound like a bright low wound PAF set, if proper components are used.
You can apply some offset to the coils, if you want them asymmetrical, instead of symmetrical wound coils?
Symmetrically equal wound coils, have the most humbucking capability.
T
**Edit
If you use larger PE Nom/Max wire it will take more turns of wire to equal these Ohms values.
I use Min/Nom values, because most Elektrisola PE, and SP wire is close to this size.
You can mic your wire if you're not sure about the size of your wire.

[the great waldo]

Here is some Seth Lover Data I Contrived.
Hopefully the Data should wind out pretty close.
My Interpretation of the Seymour Data.
It should sound like a bright low wound PAF set, if proper components are used.
You can apply some offset to the coils, if you want them asymmetrical, instead of symmetrical wound coils?
Symmetrically equal wound coils, have the most humbucking capability.
T
**Edit
If you use larger PE Nom/Max wire it will take more turns of wire to equal these Ohms values.
I use Min/Nom values, because most Elektrisola PE, and SP wire is close to this size.
You can mic your wire if you're not sure about the size of your wire.

Hi T

How just out of interest did you edit your coil estimator ? and if so how ?

Cheers

Andrew

[big_teee]

I did a lot of trial and error editing with a linux web edit tool.
I wanted to be able to list hypothetical data here, for the B/H Group.
Gives us another tool to do that with.
T

[the great waldo]

I did a lot of trial and error editing with a linux web edit tool.
I wanted to be able to list hypothetical data here, for the B/H Group.
Gives us another tool for that.
T

Hi T

Thanks

Andrew