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Chiliachki-style dummy coils use a lower gauge magnet wire like 38GA or 39GA with enough wraps to bring it up to ~250 to 330 ohms to match typical strat pickups.
I measured the circumference where the dummy coil is to be installed and subtracted a smidgen before dividing by two, which is the distance between the two fixed clamp hooks for the rig I made from two of the $1.99 12" clamps at Harbor Freight.
I just checked and 1000' of 38GA solid wire has a maximum resistance of 682 ohms which would work out to something like 340 ohms for 500 turns with a circumference of 12". I am already up to 500 turns for this project with a circumference of 14" but I might keep winding since I am close to the end of the 1/4 lb roll. I can always partially bypass the coil with a trim pot or fixed resistor if the ohms are too high. But if the ohms are too low for my project I will be up Spit Creek! BTW it took me about an hour to do 500 turns.
Before loosening the clamp I will put a coat of polyurethane lacquer on the coil to keep it from falling apart and use heat shrink when soldering to 28GA wire leads. With a coil like this you have a 50-50 chance of having the winding direction correct- if it increases hum then either flip the coil over or reverse the leads.
How to wire it in? I am adding this to an Aria Diamond J style bass with both pickups NW/NP with respect to each other so I am going to wire the dummy coil w/ trim pot or fixed resistor between the black leads from the pickup and ground. (If your two pickups are RWRP it gets more complicated and for a strat guitar you might want to get one of the 4P5T super switches. Or to make it simpler add the dummy coil between the ground and the black wires from neck and bridge pickups.)
Steve Ahola
P.S. I posted this in the "Tools and Coil Winding Gear" section because it is a winder, albeit very low tech! For the dummy coil that Ilitch uses for strats the circumference is ~22 inches which might be difficult to wind on a real pickup winding machine. However if room allows you might be able adapt a Harbor Freight 12" clamp to accommodate larger circumferences.
I measured the circumference where the dummy coil is to be installed and subtracted a smidgen before dividing by two, which is the distance between the two fixed clamp hooks for the rig I made from two of the $1.99 12" clamps at Harbor Freight.
I just checked and 1000' of 38GA solid wire has a maximum resistance of 682 ohms which would work out to something like 340 ohms for 500 turns with a circumference of 12". I am already up to 500 turns for this project with a circumference of 14" but I might keep winding since I am close to the end of the 1/4 lb roll. I can always partially bypass the coil with a trim pot or fixed resistor if the ohms are too high. But if the ohms are too low for my project I will be up Spit Creek! BTW it took me about an hour to do 500 turns.
Before loosening the clamp I will put a coat of polyurethane lacquer on the coil to keep it from falling apart and use heat shrink when soldering to 28GA wire leads. With a coil like this you have a 50-50 chance of having the winding direction correct- if it increases hum then either flip the coil over or reverse the leads.
How to wire it in? I am adding this to an Aria Diamond J style bass with both pickups NW/NP with respect to each other so I am going to wire the dummy coil w/ trim pot or fixed resistor between the black leads from the pickup and ground. (If your two pickups are RWRP it gets more complicated and for a strat guitar you might want to get one of the 4P5T super switches. Or to make it simpler add the dummy coil between the ground and the black wires from neck and bridge pickups.)
Steve Ahola
P.S. I posted this in the "Tools and Coil Winding Gear" section because it is a winder, albeit very low tech! For the dummy coil that Ilitch uses for strats the circumference is ~22 inches which might be difficult to wind on a real pickup winding machine. However if room allows you might be able adapt a Harbor Freight 12" clamp to accommodate larger circumferences.
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