Help me eliminate pickup squeal

TopJimmy

New member
The other day I was going to pull apart my 59/Custom hybrid to check the magnet. By the way, it sounds awesome. Anyway, I changed my mind and put it back together but now it has developed a squeal when it didn't used to before. I guess I must of loosened up some of the wax for this to happen. Does anyone here have a step by step procedure to wax it up again? Can I use epoxy instead of wax (I have epoxy readily available). What exactly needs to be waxed? Is it a delicate process? Help me kill my squeal.
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

TopJimmy said:
The other day I was going to pull apart my 59/Custom hybrid to check the magnet. By the way, it sounds awesome. Anyway, I changed my mind and put it back together but now it has developed a squeal when it didn't used to before. I guess I must of loosened up some of the wax for this to happen. Does anyone here have a step by step procedure to wax it up again? Can I use epoxy instead of wax (I have epoxy readily available). What exactly needs to be waxed? Is it a delicate process? Help me kill my squeal.

Uncovered pickups don't tend to be overly squeely...if there are nickel covers on your pickups tho, they could be the source of the squeeling.

If your pickups don't have covers, examine them closely and tighten them up. Look around for something not seated tightly or something like that.

If they have covers, you could remove the covers and leave them off....or remove the covers and place a piece of 1/2" masking tape inside the cover on the side that the slug polepieces would be under.

Then clamp those covers on very tight with a clamp before resoldering.

If that fails melt some canning wax in a pot big enough to submerge them until no more air bubbles bubble out of the pickup. Keep the heat as low as possible and use an electric heating element...not a gas burner. Don't leave the pickup sitting on the bottem of the pot...figure out a way to hang the pickup inside the pot but submerged in wax.

Lew
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

As usual, Lew provided a full-coverage of the topic... :22: :rolleyes:

:wink:
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

Thames said:
As usual, Lew provided a full-coverage of the topic... :22: :rolleyes:

:wink:

Thanks Sacha...now if I could just get a little respect over on the Weber boards I'd be set. :laugh2: :laugh2: :laugh2: Lew
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

Thanks for the info. I will have to double check the four screws under the pickup used to screw in the base. BTW, my pickup is uncovered. If I were to dip it in the wax, how much of the pickup is submerged in the wax? Not the whole thing. On my other pickups I've noticed that just the base of the pickup seems to have wax on it. My guess the wax is used to seal up the wires that connect the bobbins together, not the actual bobbins.
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

dip the whole pup, one of the things that might be causing the feedback is a loose winding, when ya dip the coils it seals the wire in place
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

How long should the pickup sit in wax before you pull it out? How long after pulling it out can you tape it back up and reconnect it?
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

you want it to sit in the wax till there are no more bubbles coming up, 30-40 seconds or so?
once the wax is dry you should be good
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

Lewguitar said:
Thanks Sacha...now if I could just get a little respect over on the Weber boards I'd be set. :laugh2: :laugh2: :laugh2: Lew


:laugh2: :laugh2:

Yeah... I remember, wasnt involved but... :dot:

Well.. no prob here for sure ! :beerchug:
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

I apologize for all the questions, I just want to do it right. The 59/Custom hybrid pickup sounds great and I don't want to mess it up more than it is. What can I use to melt the wax? Can I use a small pot? Someone earlier said not to use a gas burner. What if I put the pot over a very low flame on my stove?
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

Did you try just hitting it with a hairdryer for a few minutes... that'll generally get the wax'a'flowin so it'll reset itself...
 
Re: Help me eliminate pickup squeal

Thanks. I didn't even think of that. Just heat up what's already on the pickup and let it dry again. I was thinking I should heat up a pot of wax and dip the thing in.
 
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