For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

^ If you have a recipe, then this is precisely how you do get a consistent result.....as all of your components have a certain spec. The consistency/purity of parts is one of the benefits of modern manufacturing for the most part. But old pickups didn't have this, which is why it is harder to mimic the tone of vintage pickups.

But its sourcing parts so you can get or tweak to a specific tonal outcome that gets tricky.
 
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Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

There is a reason why pickups wound by MJ, Odie and The Man Himself are so sought after.

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Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

There is a reason why pickups wound by MJ, Odie and The Man Himself are so sought after.

That might just be the idea though... a little power of suggestion. I've never seen an A-B that could pick them out.

Thanks all, great input!
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

There is a reason why pickups wound by MJ, Odie and The Man Himself are so sought after.

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But its pure snake oil. Particularly for machine wound ones. If they follow the formula there is no room for their "hands" "knowledge" or "experience" to make any difference in the tone. The only time this can come into play is if something is hand guided and very few of the pickups are. Hell even the old original PAF"s were not hand guided and for good reason with hand guiding consistency is much harder. Same with scatter winding its much harder to make a consistent product.

The reason over the years people think that the JB has changes is because it has. But not how its wound. The parts have and they do make tiny tonal shifts. People who pay big bucks for MJ stickers on the back of standard pickups are fooling themselves. Even more so its an affront to the skill of the less famous winders who do their job just as well.
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

I've made coil-mismatch prototypes up to 25% turns of the same wire gauge with no significant hum increase.

HTH,

Sometimes the missmatch can add overtones that get cancelled out with symmetrical winds that some people perceive as "depth" or "harmonic complexity"
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

I'm trying to understand the difference between winding asymmetrically with equal gauge wire, and wiring different gauge wire to the same resistance.

What would be the sonic difference between:
1) A pickup with one 8k coil and one 6k coil with one wire gauge

2) Same pup if it were wound to 7k per coil with different gauge wires

3) Same pup if it were wound with the same number of turns but different gauges?

Which of the above three, if any, would be truly hum-canceling like a symmetrical wind? Particularly, which out of the last two?

And... What would be the obvious sonic differences?


How its wound plays as much if not more of a role in the sound than what its wound with. Keep things in mind like the difference in tone between a F spaced and non F spaced Dimarzio. Same number of turns of wire wound in the same way but the bobbin shapes are different and so is the tone. Not radically but they are different.
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

If Edgecrusher says so, then it must be true.
I'm guilty of spreading baseless hearsay yet again.
Mea culpa, mea magna culpa.

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Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

The OP's questions are hard to answer without knowing which coil is the strong coil and whether it's a neck or bridge bucker.
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

If Edgecrusher says so, then it must be true.
I'm guilty of spreading baseless hearsay yet again.
Mea culpa, mea magna culpa.

Sent from my MotoE2(4G-LTE) using Tapatalk

Sorry dude it wasnt meant to be a pop at you wasnt what i intended at all. I do stand by what I said though, MJ is a fantastic winder but so are all the others. I cant imagine in what way a winder could impart "tone" just by mounting a bobbin on a spindle, threading a wire though and hitting start. Hand guided stuff is a different matter but if memory serves only singles are hand guided.
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

I look at it the way I do cooking. The machine might be doing all the work, but sometimes you might interact with it in ways that you're not even aware of doing, that a different person wouldn't do. It can impart something to the final product that can be difficult to quantity.
Not to completely rule out the placebo effect.

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Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

I've been making chocolate chip cookies for over 30 years. Over the past few years we've gotten one of them automatic mixers. Dump in the ingredients in a certain order, mix, done.

The cookies are the same as when I mixed them by hand. Everyone eats them and compliments me on how amazing they are. It's because I do things that aren't related to the machine. I choose the right cookie size, I back off the temperature, and at least 5 other secrets. The machine just makes me less tired.
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

The machine will make the result more consistent and repeatable... so no issue there!
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

I've been making chocolate chip cookies for over 30 years. Over the past few years we've gotten one of them automatic mixers. Dump in the ingredients in a certain order, mix, done.

The cookies are the same as when I mixed them by hand. Everyone eats them and compliments me on how amazing they are. It's because I do things that aren't related to the machine. I choose the right cookie size, I back off the temperature, and at least 5 other secrets. The machine just makes me less tired.
Exactly. And, you can program all of the secrets if it was CNC machine. That's why the operator's knowledge and experience still is the most important variable controlling the outcome. But, as you can't measure knowledge and experience with colorful graphs and spectrometers, it's always going to be snake-oil for the less-knowledgeable. Oh, well. It comes with the territory, I suppose. ;)

Got some great quotes:

"There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know.
There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know.
But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know."
- Donald Rumsfeld

"I hear and I forget.
I see and I remember.
I do and I understand."
- Confucius

"Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's ignorance."
- Confucius

“The ultimate ignorance is the rejection of something you know nothing about and refuse to investigate.”
- Dr. Wayne Dyer

Enjoy! ;)
 
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Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

But, as you can't measure knowledge and experience with colorful graphs and spectrometers, it's always going to be snake-oil for the less-knowledgeable.

I humbly but firmly think that the tonal benefit of knowledge and experience can be measured with colorful graphs and spectrometers when it comes to guitar transducers. All is in the way to do and to read the measurements (with an open-mind, some epistemological prudence and an ability to practice self-criticism... or not).

I wish you all a nice day. :)
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

I've been making chocolate chip cookies for over 30 years. Over the past few years we've gotten one of them automatic mixers. Dump in the ingredients in a certain order, mix, done.

The cookies are the same as when I mixed them by hand. Everyone eats them and compliments me on how amazing they are. It's because I do things that aren't related to the machine. I choose the right cookie size, I back off the temperature, and at least 5 other secrets. The machine just makes me less tired.

Great. Now I want cookies.
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

I too now want cookies. Who else thinks Frank should rustle some up? :p
 
Re: For the gurus... Trying to understand winding principles

I just had some cookies, so I'm good. The cookies weren't as good as Frank's. They were prepackaged from Mexico. But tasted better than the ones shipped from the Philippines that were overheated in the shipping container.
 
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