# rewinding pickups



## ezcomes (Jul 28, 2008)

has anyone done this before?

i have my dad's old guitar that was given to him...i would say its hand-made...its probably pushing 50...doesn't sound the greatest and the neck has twisted a bit...gonna play around with the neck to see if i can straighten it...

but..the pickup...is it hard to rewind? how would i know if i should replace the magnets?


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## greco (Jul 15, 2007)

Any chance of some pics of the guitar? Someone else is bound to ask...thought I would be the first in line.

As far as rewinding pickups are concerned, I'm going to bet that you will be told that it is not easy, requires a machine/equipment (for winding and counting the number of turns/winds) and that connecting the ends of the coil wire (to interface with the wires going to the switches/pots) is a challenge, just based on how fine they are. 

I suspect that this will be among many other things that I have no clue about.

J. S. Moore winds pickups and is a member of this forum. He is well respected as a custom pickup munufacturer. Hopefully, he will post a response.

Cheers

Dave


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## ezcomes (Jul 28, 2008)

one way i thought of doing the winds is to use my record player...set up a counter...set the player to 45 rpm...and use that to figure out how long it needs to sit and wind to get the right number of turns


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## greco (Jul 15, 2007)

I have seen winders (on the internet) made from sewing machine motors and record players* (*IIRC). There are many ways to make counters...I'm not sure as to the best/easiest approach for this.

What about establishing the correct/necessary tension on the wire and distributing the wire "equally" on the bobbin? Any thoughts?

Dave


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

I've been making my own pickups for almost 30 years. Some turn out great, some merely meh. While I suppose it would be faster if I had a winder, I only make them for me, so speed is not critical. What I do is this:

1) Get a decent hand drill. Note the number of chuck turns you get per turn of the handle.
2) Clamp the drill securely to a bench or desk so that the chuck sticks out from the desk/counter-top and the handle can be rotated without smashing your hand into the counter.
3) Place the wire spool on the ground below the chuck. preferably on a solid dark background that will allow you to see the wire when you look down as the coil is furiously spinning.
4) Secure the coil to the chuck in some manner that lets it spin symmetrically and smoothly. That could be a bolt through the hole in the middle, or double sided tape or whatever. Make sure the edges of the bobbin/coilform are smooth so that the wire doesn't catch on the edge.
5) Note which direction the bobbin turns in and wrap a few winds in the direction you expect it to go in. Pinch the wire between the thumb and index finger of your non-winding hand to adjust the tension and slowly turn the drill handle, gradually picking up speed once you have a feel for how easily the wire comes off the spool and how much tension to apply.
6) Keep you eye on the coil as it spins around and try to move the wire back and forth from one side of the coil to the other. As you look down at the spinning coil, it's easy to see the gleaming wire against the dark backdrop.
7) Figure out some way to count. My drill gives me about 4.25 chuck turns per turn of the handle, so I tend to crank in 200-turn spurts: one, two, three, four, five....then take a breather, shake my hand to unstiffen it, and get back at it.

When you get on a roll, you can crank the handle about 80 times a minute, which is 360 turns. A spurt of 200 cranks gets you 850 turns. Do that 9 times (making sure you note how many spurts you've done) and there's your typical Strat pickup. Once you get the hang of it, you can whip up a 7600 turn pickup in well under 45 minutes. That's more time than you'd like to spend if it was your business and sole source of income, but is a very reasonable expenditure of effort if you're trying to save $50.

Since I don't feel like making a big production out of potting, I wind the pickup halfway, lie the coil on its side and melt candle wax over it with a heat gun, letting the wax seep into the windings. When the coil is fully wound I repeat and apply some continued gentle heat to the coil to make sure the wax spreads around.

The hard part is getting properly magnetized polepieces, and learning how to wind smoothly enough that you don't get tears. Trust me, you do NOT want to try soldering two loose ends of #42 wire to each other.


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## J S Moore (Feb 18, 2006)

I've seen the hand drill idea a few places and I think it's a great idea for a home rewind. Truth be told you don't have to be all that precise with the number of turns. If it's a humbucker you need to wind both coils the same direction. There are a few tutorials out there on the web that will show you how to do it.


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## greco (Jul 15, 2007)

Thanks mhammer...enjoyed and appreciated your post.

Just two basic questions...

1) How do you solder the pickup lead wire to the ends of the #42 wire? (given that the #42 wire is so fine). I have always been curious about this step of the process.

2) How do you determine the amount of tension you need to apply to the windings...trial and error?

Thanks

Dave


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

JS Moore said:


> I've seen the hand drill idea a few places and I think it's a great idea for a home rewind. Truth be told you don't have to be all that precise with the number of turns.


Quite true. One of the delights of homebrew pickups is that you can treat each one like an adventure or a what-if experiment. Personally, I have no tonal goals in mind. I just try out different things, and sometimes they sound great. When you think of all the weird and wonderful pickups there are out there, from highly underwound to highly overwound, all with their own special charm, you can't really go wrong. I'm also lucky that a scrap place near me was selling off spools of magnet wire for $8/lb. I've got just about every gauge from #36 to #44 in my garage right now.



greco said:


> Thanks mhammer...enjoyed and appreciated your post.


My pleasure.



> Just two basic questions...
> 
> 1) How do you solder the pickup lead wire to the ends of the #42 wire? (given that the #42 wire is so fine). I have always been curious about this step of the process.
> 
> ...


1) With NO CAFFEINE IN YOUR SYSTEM!:smile: It *is* tricky job, and if you thought #42 was bad, try #44!. Stripping the magnet wire for tinning is done by taking a piece of 220 grit emery cloth, or similar, folding it over and pinching the end of the magnet wire gently while you pull it through a few times. I used to use a small X-acto blade and scrape the coating off but I find the pull-n-grind technique works best for me. Wipe a bit of liquid flux on the exposed wire end and tin it. If you have flatwork for a Fender-type pickup, there will be a brass rivet for the coil/leads junction. Fill that sucker up with solder, and while its molten, slip the free end through. For attaching to wires that lead from the pickup bobbin itself (like PAF style), I use those connector cables that are supposed to go from your CD/DVD drive to your motherboard or soundcard. The wire in there (once you strip the outer insulation off) is a nice gauge; probably around #28 stranded. So it's strong enough but slender and pliable enough. The other nice thing about those connector cables is that they have 3 conductors and an outer shield, so you can strip the outer insulation off the last few inches for connecting to the dual coils of a humbucker for coil-cancelling or PRS-style combos, and leave the rest intact for running to the pots or pickup switch. 

One of the things I like to use for finishing a coil is teflon plumbers' tape, the kind you get at Home Depot or Princess Auto for 50 cents a roll. Its thin, fits snugly and has no adhesive. I lay down a couple of turns around the coil to insulate it and secure the covering, then place the soldered coil to wire joints over the outside and put some more winds of the tape around it to hold it in place. What's nice is that it holds the wire firmly, and can even pack the coil in a little tighter for anti-microphonic insurance. Plus, if you want an authentic look with tape on the outside of the coil, whatever tape you put down will not have any of its adhesive contaminating the coil. You can simply unwrap without fear of coil damage.

2) The tension is something you simply learn to feel. When you start out, you'll likely tear the wire many times over. But over time, you'll start to get a sense of how easily the wire slips off the spool, and a sense of how much tension you can apply before it snaps. That's one of the things I like about the hand-drill method; it lets you gradually adjust speed in both upwards and downwards fashion. If I sense a little reluctance from the spool I simply stop, and there is no momentum that keeps the coil spinning. I can then see if it IS as resistant to slipping off the coil as it felt to my fingers, and if not, I just pick up where I left off. I suppose in some ways it is why a lot of seamstresses and dressmakers like those old foot-pedal Singer sewing machines; there's a lot of tactile feedback that permits very fine and nuanced control.


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## greco (Jul 15, 2007)

Once again..many thanks for the detailed response to my questions :bow:

You are fortunate to be able to get the various gauges of wire for such a reasonable price. 

This is a great thread. Hope several others are reading it.


The Seymour Duncan (SD) forum (where I spent many hours ...before finding this forum) had many discussions about winding pickups (understandably so kqoct). Also, some of the forum members would come up with ideas/designs for pickups and the SD factory would wind a few dozen and sell them to forum members at a decent price. 

*ezcomes*...I feel like I have hijacked your thread a bit. Sorry. It wasn't intended.

Cheers

Dave


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