Pickup Wind Designer program ...what would you like to see included ?

[Lyrebird Steve]

Hi All,

I'm starting work on a Pickup Wind designer program that will create winding pattern files that can be imported into a CNC type program based on the Phidgets stepper controllers. (See Jim's project)

The idea is to be able to design winding patterns for a fully automated setup and re-use and modify existing patterns.

Things I'm going to include are
(1) Bobbin geometry selections/customizing
(2) Layers / Turns Per Layer selectable
(3) Randomizing/Scatter functions - Ensure set TPL with scattering.
(4) Altering/Randomizing TPL between layers - Ability to set TPL for each layer or Random TPL between limits
(5) Auto-filling - ability to randomize wind but ensure even wire distribution (ie avoid clumping)

One of the things I'm really going to try and get working is a visualization tool with drag-and drop that will allow you to "shape" your wind visually.




Wish list for some features I'd like to add are

(A) DC resistance estimation / Meters or Ft of wire required

I'm sure there are lots more things I could add in ... suggestions are very welcome

[Joe Gwinn]

Wish list for some features I'd like to add are

(A) DC resistance estimation / Meters or Ft of wire required

I'm sure there are lots more things I could add in ... suggestions are very welcome

Bet people would like some notion of the inductance (without core).

If you get that far, I can provide the inductance formulas, most likely from Grover. This is the bible, but it can be heavy going at first.

I bought a copy of the Dover Phoenix hardbound edition when it was $12, now the hardbound prices are just crazy, but the paperback is reasonable: Amazon.com: Inductance Calculations (Dover Books on Electrical Engineering) (9780486474403): Frederick W Grover: Books

[big_teee]

Bet people would like some notion of the inductance (without core).

If you get that far, I can provide the inductance formulas, most likely from Grover. This is the bible, but it can be heavy going at first.

I bought a copy of the Dover Phoenix hardbound edition when it was $12, now the hardbound prices are just crazy, but the paperback is reasonable: Amazon.com: Inductance Calculations (Dover Books on Electrical Engineering) (9780486474403): Frederick W Grover: Books

Joe is always on a different level!
T

[David King]

I think a coil dimension calculator for different wire gauges at given number of turns would be handy but that may depend on tension settings as well.

[rhgwynn]

I think you are going to want to implement a coupling prevention slider (call it a scatter amount?). 100% would allow absolutely no two complete rotations to lay the wire side by side touching and parallel to each other (crossing is ok). This will help those who are scatter-winding to control just how much scatter is being implemented. Different levels of coupling will help to adjust the level of 'brightness' a scatter-wound pickup has.

-Robert

[Steve Conner]

Is that even possible? As far as I can see, for that definition of 100% scatter, the traverse would have to oscillate something like one cycle for each revolution of the bobbin. So either the traverse drive would need to be very capable, or the bobbin would need to be slowed down quite a bit.

[Lyrebird Steve]

... no two complete rotations to lay the wire side by side touching and parallel to each other (crossing is ok).

Robert ... by this do you mean that if you lay the wire on one traverse (ie going say left to right ) like this

------X--------X--------X--------X--------X---------X-------X---------X----X------

that on the next traverse (ie heading in the other direction, eg right to left) you would make sure that the wire is laid between each wire of the previous layer
like this

(X is previous, o is next layer)

--o---X----o--X----o---X----o---X------oX---o-----X---o---X---o----X--o-X---o--


This can be done

[Lyrebird Steve]

Is that even possible? As far as I can see, for that definition of 100% scatter, the traverse would have to oscillate something like one cycle for each revolution of the bobbin. So either the traverse drive would need to be very capable, or the bobbin would need to be slowed down quite a bit.

This depends on the mechanical resolution and speed of the Stepper controlling the Traverse. My set-up allows me to do 100 TPL at 2,200 reasonably accurately and 1 TPL at about 65 RPM.

At my normal winding speed of 600 RPM anythning more than 15 TPL works well.

[rhgwynn]

What I mean is, think about machine winding - it's perfect; each turn, lays the wire parallel and right next to the previous turn. Back and forth, until you have a lovely shiny picture perfect coil. This might be ok for some applications. But for winding guitar pickups, (supposedly) the signal in the wire will interact with whatever is in the wire running right along next to it. And supposedly, this is not great for our use of the coil. So we scatterwind, to varying degrees. My idea, was to be able to control just how much of this will be allowed. Maybe it can be a separate winding style within the program; instead of choosing the amount of "randomness" for a scatter wind - you could use a slider to choose just how much "coupling" to allow, and based on the number of turns, the program could pre-calculate the wind start to finish - giving you a somewhat precise control of the brightness of your scatterwound.

Watch this, he's a little bad at this (talking) but give him a few minutes and he'll get to what I am talking about and you will understand what I am trying to get at here. I set the start time for the right part. Fred Stuart discusses the art of hand-winding pickups - YouTube

-Robert

[Lyrebird Steve]

Geometric Layering ?

I'm thinking that it would be possible to also programs where the bobbin is filled out in sections and built up in a stagger ...

something like this ...



.. not sure how it would sound, but it's programable

[Lyrebird Steve]

... and based on the number of turns, the program could pre-calculate the wind start to finish

this is exactly how the current code works. We create an array(list) of traverse positions ... this is a 1-to-1 match to the turns of the rotational stepper.

By programing in this way, all we need to track is how many turns have we completed because the next traverse position is given by accessing the array element that corresponds to the turn count.

The Phidgets stepper motor controller works by moving the stepper from the current (known to the controller) position to the next desired position. You just need to tell it where to move to.


So ... we can pre-calculate the wind in any manner we chose.

[RedHouse]

What I mean is, think about machine winding - it's perfect; each turn, lays the wire parallel and right next to the previous turn. Back and forth, until you have a lovely shiny picture perfect coil.

That almost never happens, you'd have to wind extreeeeeemly slow (RPM) to get that kind of thing to occur with the wire gauges used in pickup winding.

When winding round bobbins you can get the winds layed down in near-perfect rows, and spaces between, as you see in a spool of solder or speaker wire, but when winding eliptical bobbins (ie; pickup bobbins) and with very small gauge wire, the wire isn't really "wound" on as much as tugged/jerked on which causes some oscillations in the feed of the wire, and effects the wire enough so it doesn't really go down in neat little rows like you imagine.

Look closely at your machine when you're winding, you (should) notice the wire actually jumps around, by itelf it rarely lays down side-by-side, specially after the first layer or two.

FOr what it's worth, Fred seems to use the word "scatter" for "random TPL" (watch his hands), normally scatter imply's the degree of TPL, and the randomness is the "recipie", but that may just be my view.

[David King]

I think scatter really comes down to how much air you can build into the coil. More air = less capacitative coupling between adjacent turns and layers. Simple as that. Again that's going to depend somewhat on tension. You can do mixed low TPL winds until the cows come home but if the tension is tight that coil is going to have less air and more coupling. Might was well just wind in perfect rows using heavy insulation and get that same result.

[Lyrebird Steve]

Ok ... just finished the very first version .

Able to create wind pattern based on Turns & Layers & Turns per Layer & Bobbin Height .... factors in Stepper motor as well.

Coil Winding Pattern Generator - YouTube (watch full-screen)

Here I demo it creating patterns with fixed TPL with scattering, and TPL within a range also scattered

[RedHouse]

...Simple as that...

Yeah, as is so common 'round here we either oversimplify or overcomplicate, luckily at the end of the day (story) the magic is in the wind not the wind. LOL
(pun intended)

Tension is an issue relative to wind speed above all else, so many (impatient) winders use way too much tension likely because they want to wind coils fast. Tension isn't a major factor in scatter effects until you start stretching the wire as is so common in higher tensions, and of course the way each wind can pinch a past one at the bobbin ends with higher tension leading to more issues.

Using high TPL and heavy build has a much different sound than low TPL, but there goes another difference between pickup builders and applications (guitar or bass pickups). Speaking personally I know when I do my bass pickups I have to use a different set of parameters than doing guitar (Strat/Tele or HB) coils.

YMMV