Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

[Nostalgic Distortion]

I just acquired a very nice smoked nickel Trembucker cover from Duncan and I'm either going to be putting it on a TB-14 or a TB-16 sometime over the next few days.

Here's the deal, this cover was quite expensive, well the cover was only $25 but there was an additional $15 shipping and handling fee so it actually cost me a little over $40 just for the cover. I've covered a few of them in the past & have ended up with mixed results, some of them have sounded exactly the same afterwards but in other cases I can hear the cover?

So I'm wondering if getting some wax in between the pickup & cover may help to keep the pickup sounding the same with the cover on it? If so, what method should I use to do this? Basically I guess I'm asking is, what would be the best way of covering this pup so it looks pretty but sounds the same as it does now? (Within reason of course)

 

[Chad]

Re: Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

I pretty much follow this method:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJqIK93MC9Q

 

[jeremy]

Re: Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

ive put covers on a few pups and never wax pot them, i dont play high gain stuff but i sure aint quiet and ive never had an issue with feedback

 

[Nostalgic Distortion]

Re: Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

Yeah, I've covered a few without putting anything but a piece of tape over the slug coil before, they were a set of PAF-ish pup's. I could hear the cover after which was actually really nice when it came to the bridge pup because it took on this cool airy quality but that same airy sound didn't translate well in the neck...

Riddle me this, if I had the ability to put the cover on first & then submerge the then covered & already soldered humbucker in melted wax for an extended period of time (15-20 minutes) would the end result be better than just melting some wax inside the cover & working fast like the video suggested?

My girl has one of those wax crockpot things for your feet. Luckily it has never been used so my pickup shouldn't smell like feet afterwards!!! It gets hot enough to melt the paraffin wax but not straight on the burner hot? Obviously it's designed for you to put your foot in after so I don't think it can get all too hot? Anyway, the heat is also adjustable so I can control it to some extent. Is there a target temperature that I should be looking for?

I swear I watched a tutorial video on this once? I vaguely recall the guy putting in some wood spacers inside wax boiler so the pickup didn't sit directly on the heat source & him saying that you don't want it too hot, just hot enough for the new wax to go in and melt then mix with the wax already in the pickup essentially completely repotting it. I don't mind going this route if it's worth the all effort, I just don't want to get into all that unless it's going to make some kind of difference? Doing it the way it's done in the video would be substantially easier....

 

[Chad]

Re: Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

Totally re-wax-potting is overkill IMO. With the cover on, it'd be hard to see how much wax is going in.......good chance it'd be overloaded (unnecessarily) with too much wax. Plus, it'd be a pain cleaning all the wax off the cover. Pretty sure I've read that Duncan takes already potted pickups, then installs covers very similar to the way the guy does in the vids. IOW, I don't think Duncan submerges covered pickups in wax. If that method is good enough for SD, then it's good enough for me.

 

[Nostalgic Distortion]

Re: Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

Totally re-wax-potting is overkill IMO. With the cover on, it'd be hard to see how much wax is going in.......good chance it'd be overloaded (unnecessarily) with too much wax. Plus, it'd be a pain cleaning all the wax off the cover. Pretty sure I've read that Duncan takes already potted pickups, then installs covers very similar to the way the guy does in the vids. IOW, I don't think Duncan submerges covered pickups in wax. If that method is good enough for SD, then it's good enough for me.

Thanks!!! It does seem like a bit much? I'll try this guy's method out & see what happens. At least if it doesn't turn out the way I planned I can remove it without having a ton of extra wax to remove as well....

 

[darthphineas]

Re: Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

I pretty much follow this method:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJqIK93MC9Q

David is a good guy. He knows his stuff and is easy to deal with.


I came across one of those wax heaters, like you find at a beauty supply to heat was for manicures. I have a mix of paraffin and beeswax. I heat it up to suggested temp and dip it for 5 or maybe 10 seconds.

 

[C-Martin]

Re: Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

I just acquired a very nice smoked nickel Trembucker cover from Duncan

What do you mean by smoked?


Very interesting thread by the way. I always thought they just dunked the whole pickup, with the cover on, in wax. Makes me less nervous about removing them now, when i want to try magnet swaps.

 

[darthphineas]

Re: Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

I always thought they just dunked the whole pickup, with the cover on, in wax.

They do.

What's in that video is David showing a do it yourself at home MacGyver method of applying a cover without a wax dipping pot.

 

[Nostalgic Distortion]

Re: Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

I basically used his method with my own twist & honestly this is by far the best I've ever had one come out! I got about 1/8in (maybe a tiny bit more) of wax at the very top of the cover, put a bit of masking tape over the slugs, pushed the humbucker into the cover until it made contact with the wax. I then I used a hairdryer to heat the cover up, by doing that it allowed me to push the pickup into the cover where it belonged & any excess wax ran out the top as I pushed it in place leaving me with absolutely no air between the cover & the pup!

The TB-14 under the cover sounds just as good as it did before, it's just much more aesthetically pleasing now! I can pair it up with a neck pickup in any color and it's going to look great because as my girl always says "black goes great with everything" LOL!!!

Oh, BTW, a "SMOKED NICKLE TREMBUCKER COVER" is just a nickel cover with a black tint to it? It kinda looks like blued gun metal??? Still shinny, just a little different from the typical nickel and golden covers that Duncan puts on their humbuckers. You can buy regular spaced smoked covers on eBay but if it's a Tremspaced pup you'll have to order it from Duncan...

View attachment 72439

They're hard to photograph, in most cases they end up looking like a regular old nickel cover so I put a old covered P.A.F. next to it so you can see the difference between the two....

 

[Mincer]

Re: Covering Trembuckers, To Pot or Not to Pot???

I kinda like that color. It is a cool idea, and it looks great.