Myth-busting Magnets

[JMP/HBE]

[DavidRavenMoon]

I have a bag of those pole screws. Like Dave said, you can hear a slight difference. It’s just the amount of carbon in the screws.


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[eclecticsynergy]

Surprised to hear a pickup maker say that A2 and A4 sound the same.

Admittedly it makes more difference in some pickups than others, but IME they did not sound or feel identical.

[freefrog]

Surprised to hear a pickup maker say that A2 and A4 sound the same.

Admittedly it makes more difference in some pickups than others, but IME they did not sound or feel identical.

IMHO, most myth busting videos done by Dave are implicitely oriented by his commercial competition with the concurrence -mostly another boutique winder who sells magnets supposedly made in original foundries with original recipes. Dave replies to the related advertising because he uses himself a broader choice of magnets.

I won't comment his refutation: IMHO, each artisan winder has his own logics, based on his own experience and always right for the products that he builds.

Now and when it comes to magnets, there's an interesting comment in those done by Dave Stephens below his vid:

There is no such thing as an "alnico 4" tone. Why? Because every magnet company uses their own recipes.

I came to the same conclusion a while back.

He also makes a statement allowing to understand why he detected no difference:

Actually I made sure both magnets were equally charged as measured by my DC gaussmeter from Alpha Labs.

What he doesn't say is that magnets of different alloys (and/or from different foundries) don't tend to hold the same charge, precisely because of their composition and conditions of production...

So, his sentence should probably be reworded as following: "An A4 charged exactly like an A2 doesn't give a different tone... but they are rarely charged like each other".

FWIW (= two cents of mine).

[hamerfan]

Thanks freefrog for
'Myth-busting Dave'

[eclecticsynergy]

...and when it comes to magnets, there's an interesting comment in those done by Dave Stephens below his vid:

There is no such thing as an "alnico 4" tone. Why? Because every magnet company uses their own recipes.


I came to the same conclusion a while back.

A4 still doesn't have an official formulation in the MMPA spec sheet, so I guess how it's made is kind of up to the individual foundries.
I have no doubt there can be significant differences. Especially since apparently even A5s (which are made to spec) can vary in tone depending on the foundry.

I can't claim to have used A4s from a broad range of sources. But the ones I got from AddictionFX seemed very unlike A2, as were the A4s that came stock in the PRS McCarty humbuckers and my Wizz PAF set. (Full disclosure; the Wizz are great and I haven't felt any inclination to swap the mags.)

He also makes a statement allowing to understand why he detected no difference:

Actually I made sure both magnets were equally charged as measured by my DC gaussmeter from Alpha Labs.

What he doesn't say is that magnets of different alloys (and/or from different foundries) don't tend to hold the same charge, precisely because of their composition and conditions of production...

So, his sentence should probably be reworded as following: "An A4 charged exactly like an A2 doesn't give a different tone... but they are rarely charged like each other".

FWIW (= two cents of mine).

If you compared a fully charged A2 with an A4 that was partly charged to match it exactly, I could see them sounding similar.
Maybe. I can't argue against that since I've never tried it myself.

I still have reservations though.

I encountered someone with a strong science & engineering background on another forum, who claims very authoritatively that field strength is the only difference between any of the alnicos when it comes to pickups. According to him an A8 or A5 degaussed to the right degree will be indistinguishable from an A2 or A3. He says his lab tests prove this conclusively.

I believe there are aspects of pickup and magnet behavior - particularly related to dynamic character and looseness vs tightness - that won't necessarily show up in a frequency trace.

For the sake of consistency, a lab test needs to employ uniform mechanical plucking and a clinically clean preamp. But you can't get an accurate evaluation of a magnet swap playing through a dead-clean amp with no variations in dynamics. At least I don't think I could.

IMO certain characteristics only really become apparent in the response to changes in picking & touch, and in a pickup's interactions with amps.

[freefrog]

A4 still doesn't have an official formulation in the MMPA spec sheet, so I guess how it's made is kind of up to the individual foundries.
I have no doubt there can be significant differences. Especially since apparently even A5s (which are made to spec) can vary in tone depending on the foundry.

I can't claim to have used A4s from a broad range of sources. But the ones I got from AddictionFX seemed very unlike A2, as were the A4s that came stock in the PRS McCarty humbuckers and my Wizz PAF set. (Full disclosure; the Wizz are great and I haven't felt any inclination to swap the mags.)

I've also noticed a clear difference between A2 and A4 coming from AddictionFX...

That said, clear differences are present sometimes with two A5 mags coming from different sources, for example. That's really all I was trying to share (without arguing: not enough time for that and no argumentative tendency in my old peaceful mind). :-)

If you compared a fully charged A2 with an A4 that was partly charged to match it exactly, I could see them sounding similar.
Maybe. I can't argue against that since I've never tried it myself.

I still have reservations though.

I encountered someone with a strong science & engineering background on another forum, who claims very authoritatively that field strength is the only difference between any of the alnicos when it comes to pickups. According to him an A8 or A5 degaussed to the right degree will be indistinguishable from an A2 or A3. He says his lab tests prove this conclusively.

I believe there are aspects of pickup and magnet behavior - particularly related to dynamic character and looseness vs tightness - that won't necessarily show up in a frequency trace.

For the sake of consistency, a lab test needs to employ uniform mechanical plucking and a clinically clean preamp. But you can't get an accurate evaluation of a magnet swap playing through a dead-clean amp with no variations in dynamics. At least I don't think I could.

IMO certain characteristics only really become apparent in the response to changes in picking & touch, and in a pickup's interactions with amps.

My personal and humble opinion is close to yours, for two reasons:

-Even with a strictly identical charge, two magnets made of different alloys wouldn't give a strictly identical inductance to a same pickup. It's a question of iron content. And a different inductance necessarily affects the tone, all other factors being equal.

-A few "dynamic" lab tests have been done here with magnets of different alloys. The results show a slight difference of "impulse response" with a same pickup hosting various AlNi(Co)'s [EDIT - difference noticed under electrical stimulation, BTW: no plucked strings nor electromechanical interface in this case. So, the impulse response measurements that I evoke really show how fast the magnetic circuit reacts with each AlNi(Co) mag].


FWIW. :-)