Guitar Pickup Repair Archives - Mr Glyn's Pickups

Posted on April 17, 2023May 10, 2023 by mrglynspickups — Leave a comment

Dirty Jack – don’t blame your pickups

The season is changing, old guitars are coming out of cupboards, if your electrics are crackly it might just be a Dirty Jack – don’t blame your pickups.
It’s pretty simple really, if you’ve got a crackly guitar the jack may just need cleaning. Don’t blame your pickups straight away, jack sockets, switches and pots are more likely to cause problems than your pickups.

Of course, when you eliminate all the other possibilities you might be needing me:

https://mrglynspickups.com/contact/

Incidentally, it’s an “output” jack, not an “input” jack – just a pet hate of mine.

You can see the jack in this Les Paul is looking a tad fluffy. This one isn’t very bad but it’s worth a clean anyway as part of a set up.

I use 600 grade wet’n’dry paper used dry.

I simply tear a piece off, roll it up and clean the jack out with it. A squirt with some contact cleaner can help. It’s good to keep a piece in your guitar case in case your jack goes crackly at a gig.

You can see a fair bit of dirt can come off even this relatively clean jack. Just think what that was doing to your earth connection.

If a jack is really bad and you are gigging just replace it. It doesn’t cost much and it’s something you just can’t do without. If your jack stuffs up on stage it’s not a good look. I always have a small piece of 600 grade in my gig bag just in case.
Cheers
Glyn

Head to store…

Enjoy this? You may also like…

Integrity alnico 2 vintage voiced humbucker — Integrity -vintage humbucker

LP Jr from 1955 — Integrity -vintage humbucker

updated 3 April 2023

Dirty Jack – don’t blame your pickups

Posted on April 11, 2023April 24, 2023 by mrglynspickups — Leave a comment

Hofner Pickup – an interesting repair

I came across a blog I wrote in 2010 about a repair on an old Hofner pickup, thought you might be interested:

I had a visit from Paul Crowther the other day (always a pleasure to see him). He’s rather a legend for amongst other things his ‘Hotcake’ overdrive pedals and the ‘Prunes and Custard’ (my favorite for theremin).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emlyn_Crowther

He wanted to know if my coil winding machine was up and running – he had an interesting pickup for me to wind.

Its an old Hofner pickup which I guess is from the 50’s. The guitar has 3 of them and this one has a break in the windings so needs to be re-wound.
This would normally be a straight forward job except for the design of this pickup.

This is the inside of it. The windings (around the outside) are not wrapped around a bobbin. They are just sitting in the pickup and have been wrapped in tape to protect them. In the middle you can see the magnets sitting in a hard putty. There are incidentally only 5 magnets.
So the problem Paul left me with was how to wrap about 5000 turns of extremely thin wire into a coil and therefore make a pickup.
After a long brainstorming session with Sheena we came up with a plan.

We figured that the wire had to be wound around a bobbin and then somehow the bobbin removed.

So I made this bobbin. The sides are plastic from a Strat pickguard (white) and the centre has been carved from candle wax.

The bobbin bolts together and is attached to another plastic plate which in turn fits to the winding machine.
The idea is to wind the pickup on this and then warm the completed coil up and melt the wax. The wax should seep into the coil thus potting it as well. Then the sides can be unbolted and voila a copy of the original coil.

Winding the coil wasn’t any different from any other pickup – so now for the tricky bit.

I warm the coil ever so gently with a heat gun. I put my free hand next to the work to judge the temperature – if it gets too hot the plastic will melt and I’ll be starting again.

When I see some wax oozing out I ever so gently remove the top plate.

With the wax exposed I can apply more heat and watch it flow into the coil and as it cools becomes solid.

Then I wrap tape around it to hold everything in place. I cannot emphasize enough how fiddly this is. There are a few stray wires and if any of them break I’m starting again.

It may not be much to look at but its taken hours. The slight curve is to match the shape of the pickup casing. I’ve tested it and I’m pleased with it at 5.5Kohms.
In the background you can see the magnetic lugs – I had to dig them out of the putty.

I put the whole thing back together using ‘friendly plastic’ instead of putty then fill the casing with wax, solder the back on and its finished.

Its been quite a task but I’m happy with the result.

Glyn

Hofner Pickup – an interesting repair

Enjoy this? You may also like…

updated 3 April 2023

Posted on September 10, 2022November 17, 2022 by mrglynspickups — Leave a comment

Les Paul Jr P90 from 1955

When I was contacted about repairing a Les Paul Jr P90 from 1955 I was naturally very keen.

P90’s are very interesting pickups. They have a single wide flat coil usually of around 10,000 turns of AWG 42 wire but the really fascinating aspect is the magnets. They have 2 bar magnets underneath the pickup (a PAF just has one) causing a much wider magnetic field than other single coil pickups.

To put it simply – P90’s hear more string than other pickups. Hearing more string gives a fuller, fatter sound and that distinctive woody P90 tone. Not everyone likes them but those of us that do absolutely love them.

I make my own version of the P90 called the ‘Sassy’. It’s a full fat version of the P90 with alnico 5 magnets with all the warmth and plenty of grunt that you find in the old Gibsons.

So I’m always interested to have a good look at a genuine vintage pickup especially from a Les Paul Jr P90 from 1955. I’m a big fan of the Juniors.

The pickup was sent to me because it wasn’t working and both the customer and myself suspected it might need a re-wind but I never jump to conclusions. It could be just a dry joint on one of the hookup wires – always worth checking.

As you can see the hook up wires look a bit scruffy so I re-solder and test, remove the wires and test, remove the tape and test – still nothing. The next step is to start removing a few layers of the winding wire just in case there’s a break. There was no obvious break. The problem was deeper inside the pickup – this one is a re-wind.

Now, I talked about magnets earlier, take a look at these two. Firstly they’re wonky. Some amazing Gibson vintage tonal secret or just being a bit sloppy in the factory? Probably the latter.

But for me the most interesting part is they’re rough cast alnico 2. For this era I was expecting Alnico 5.

Alnico 2 have a smoother, purer sound than the more powerful rougher sounding alnico 5’s.

So after I re-wound this lovely old pickup I started experimenting. I started winding P90’s with Alnico 2 magnets and from that was born a new pickup set in my range – the “Cool 90″.

It’s cleaner than the Sassy, less grunty but still full and fat sounding.

Ideas can come from anywhere. It reminds me of the quote from Picasso – “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working”

Here’s the ‘Sassy” – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcspPYHKE_c

Posted on October 27, 2021October 11, 2022 by mrglynspickups — Leave a comment

‘68 Telecaster Bridge Pickup

Fender Telecasterbridge pickup from 1968

I repair quite a few old pickups and thought you might be interested in this ‘68 Telecaster Bridge Pickup.

As you can see it’s looking pretty tired. I quite like seeing pickups like this – it’s clearly given great service for decades. This is just wear and tear and the sign of a happy life and although it isn’t working now there’s no reason why it can’t be made good for a few more decades.

One of the first things I noticed is the black tape. Underneath it is the original waxed protective string. I’m not sure why someone added that.

The plate underneath has aged fantastically but as you can see the earth wire is missing from it. I re-solder the connections just in case there is a dry joint but the pickup is still dead.

I suspect this is the fault- the top plate has warped over time and the corrosion has got in and damaged the windings. That top plate looks like a skateboard deck – it should be flat! This pickup is going to need a re-wind.

With the back plate off you can clearly see the date.

And here it is, this is the problem. With the windings cut away you can clearly see that the corrosion on the pole piece has spread into the winding. There’s a bit of wax in there too from when it was potted originally.

So here’s the plan. I need to flatten that top plate back. Then clean up the pole pieces. I need to do something about the corrosion. And finally re-wind the pickup to original spec. And most importantly make it look like nothing ever happened.

Cleaning the poles is easy, then I flatten the top plate and glue it in place with super glue. Originally it was just a push fit. Then I treat the rust with some anti rust stuff. Here you can see it masked off so I can give the poles a couple of coats of lacquer.

Next I wrap the poles with thin tape. I want to protect the windings from future corrosion. I want this pickup to play hard for another 50 years.

Then it’s re-winding and wax potting and finally replacing the original string.

Of course, I forget to take a photo of it with the string on.

If you need any pickup repairs please contact me through the website http://www.mrglynspickups.com or give me a call 021912678

‘68 Telecaster Bridge Pickup

https://mrglynspickups.com/2020/03/29/silver-lady-vintage-telecaster/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0b3oNSRvP0

Posted on September 13, 2021December 12, 2022 by mrglynspickups — Leave a comment

Gretsch FilterTron – a look inside

The Gretsch FilterTron is something rather special. Originally designed in 1954/5 by Ray Butts for guitarist Chet Atkins who wasn’t satisfied by the DynaSonic pickup he was using. It has become a classic but often misunderstood pickup.

It has left a distinct mark on the sound of Rock’n’Roll. It’s the sound of Malcolm Young, Brian Setzer, Billy Duffy and plenty more. That unmistakable ‘Clank’ on the attack of the note is the essence of the FilterTron.

I started playing guitar because of the sound of A FilterTron. Listen to Malcolm Young on the intro to “Jailbreak” – that’s what I’m talking about. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRo2m6RYJpI

But you don’t only find FilterTrons in Gretches, there’s the rather cool Fender Cabronita Telecaster.

So how does it make that distinctive sound? What makes it so different from a PAF?

Here’s a vintage Gretsch FilterTron from 1961, let’s take a look under the hood.

With the cover off it looks quite different from a PAF. There are 2 rows of adjustable poles and they’re bigger than on a Gibson. The top of the bobbins are rather neatly hidden by a thin plate.

Here’s where it gets really interesting. Those are very narrow bobbins and this one measures only 4.2KOhms. Not a lot of coil strength there but look what they’re sitting on. That is one fat magnet. It’s an Alnico V and literally twice the thickness of the Alnico 2 (usually) that you’d find in a PAF. So not only more powerful magnetic material but double the amount of it compared to a Gibson.

So that FilterTron sound consists of a weaker, thin sounding coil so lots of highs and twang from the windings and getting the aggression, attack and ‘clank’ from the powerful magnet.

This is the original FilterTron, the design didn’t change much through to the late 60’s although there are plenty of inconsistencies. They can have a dc resistance from 4KOhms up to 5KOhms.

By the 1970’s they had changed the design and really they just didn’t sound like Gretsch’s any more.

A lot of the modern ones are simply small humbuckers with cool looking covers and just miss the whole point of the FilterTron sound.

It’s all about those weak coils and that monster magnet.

My own version of the FilterTron is now available:

TheTron

Feel free to get in touch for pickup repairs or new pickups mrglynspickups@gmail.com. 021 912 678 https://mrglynspickups.com/

Posted on August 11, 2021October 11, 2022 by mrglynspickups — Leave a comment

Yamaha SA30 pickup

This Yamaha SA30 pickup came to me for repair the other day and I decided to take some photos and share my thoughts on it with you.

The Yamaha SA30 is becoming a bit of a legend and getting rather sought after. Gone are the days you could pick one up cheap – the word is out. Thank you internet 🥴.

If you don’t know about them here’s some info: https://tymguitars.com.au/blogs/blog/1966-yamaha-sa-30t

This pickup was sent to me with an intermittent fault. It would work if you tapped it but stop a minute later. That pointed towards it being an internal wiring fault rather than a broken coil, I needed to investigate.

With the cover off you can see the hook up wires – these were my number one suspects. Sure enough, there was a dry joint where one of them was soldered to the connectors on the base plate. Just to make sure I re- soldered all the joints and the pickup is fixed.

But that’s not the interesting part – look at those bobbins. They’re different sizes. They each measure in the 4.5 K Ohms range but they’re clearly wound with different gauge wire on each coil. These pickups are renowned for their clarity – so what’s going on?

The smaller coil on the left must be wound with thinner gauge wire and less of it than the one on the right. Thinner wire have a greater resistance for the same length.

The coil on the right looks like a conventional humbucker coil like an overwound PAF but the coil on the left would have a less full sound. It will have less bottom and lower mids and a lot less power. But that’s just the windings.

Turn the pickup over and you can see a ceramic bar magnet but it’s how it connects to the poles that’s interesting. The bigger coil has a larger piece of steel coupling the poles to the magnet than the smaller coil. Measuring the strength of the magnetic field on the top of the poles the smaller coil is about 20% weaker. So this again gives the big coil an overwound PAF sound and the smaller coil still thinner.

So with the Yamaha SA30 pickup they’ve created that clarity by having one coil doing most of the work – 4.5k Ohms with a ceramic magnet has a bit more grunt than one half of a PAF. But the other coil on it’s own would have more of a weedy gold foil type sound. Then they’ve been combined in series as a humbucker. Smart stuff eh!

Feel free to contact me for pickup repairs or for a chat about my range of new pickups. mrglynspickups@gmail.com

And here’s a great site for all things Yamaha SA, heaps of information here https://www.thesupposedstringmeister.net/?page_id=644

https://mrglynspickups.com/

https://www.youtube.com/c/MrGlynsPickups/videos

Posted on June 16, 2021April 14, 2023 by mrglynspickups — Leave a comment

Gibson T-Top repair

I’ve been repairing a few broken old pickups recently so thought I’d share some pictures and thoughts on this classic old Gibson T-Top.

The T-Top is a fairly common pickup on my workbench. Not because there’s and common fault with them but simply there were so many made and they’re all getting quite old now.

The “T-Top” simply refers to the molding on the top of the bobbin. They were Gibson’s standard humbucker from 67/8 until around 1980 replacing the legendary PAF.

Mr Glyns Pickups Gibson t top — Gibson T-Top Mr Glyn’s Pickups

There were a few subtle changes from the PAF but enough to make a difference.

Although the bobbins look different the important dimensions were unchanged and they are still made of butyrate making it impractical to wax pot them. Butyrate distorts with heat.

The wire is poly insulated instead of the plain enamel used on PAF’s. Pretty much all T-Tops have a dc resistance of around 7.5 KOhms, neck and bridge the same. The coils are wound symmetrically and are unpotted so beware of squealing with high gain.

The magnets varied, often Alnico III, V or even Ceramic so not all T Tops sound the same.

T Top repair — Gibson T-Top Mr Glyn’s Pickups

This one came to me with a dead coil in need of a re-wind. the magnet is a rough cast Alnico V and from the good coil the finished dc reading I was after was 7.4 KOhms.

Gibson T-Top repair — Gibson T-Top Mr Glyn’s Pickups

After the re-wind I gave it some new cloth tape so it looked the part and it was ready to ROCK.

Gibson T Top humbucker — Processed with Focos

Get in touch if you have any old pickups in need of repair. Although most of my day is spent making new pickups I do enjoy repairing classic old pickups.

www.mrglynspickups.com

Head to store…

Enjoy this? You may also like…

Attitude humbucker — Integrity -vintage humbucker

updated 3 April 2023

Posted on April 16, 2021October 12, 2022 by mrglynspickups — 1 Comment

‘78 Musicman Stingray Bass pickup re-wind

The Musicman Stingray bass is for me one of the top 3 basses ever – the Precision, the Jazz and the Stingray cover pretty much everything between them. A big part of what makes the Stingray so good is the Musicman Stingray Bass pickup.

It has such a distinctive sound. Once you’re tuned into it you can hear it on so many recordings.

This pickup is from 1978 (they started in 1976) and was sent to me from a customer in Christchurch. I thought I’d show you around inside it – these are really interesting pickups.

The Musicman Stingray Bass pickup is by the look of it a big fat humbucker but there’s more to it.

The magnets are big alnicoV’s, 3/8” diameter and 5/8” deep so a lot of the power and grunt comes from them. The 2 coils are wound with awg 42 wire and are around 4KOhms each (they vary). The poles on each coil have opposite polarity and the coils are wired out of phase electrically so they act as a humbucker. The really interesting part is the coils are wired in parallel, not in series like most humbuckers.

The sound of 2 coils in parallel is the sound of a Jazz bass with both pickups on or a Strat on switch position 2 or 4. It’s a very distinctive, clear tone with a very clear midrange and chimney bass.

So the distinctive Stingray sound comprises of fairly low powered coils in parallel to give plenty of clarity but with exceptionally fat magnets to give bass and grunty mids.

I haven’t mentioned the active circuit the signal goes through yet but that’s another story.

Music Man Stingray bass pickup, cover off — ‘78 Musicman Stingray Bass pickup

As you can see, under the cover it looks very similar to ‘Fender’ pickups.

One coil was open circuit so I cut the windings out. There was tape wrapped around the magnets to protect the coil. I left that in. I love the way they staggered the pole pieces but kept the magnets the same size.

Music Man Stingray bass pickup repair — pickup re-wind

The original winding wire is insulated with red poly. Unfortunately I only had Poly insulation in the natural colour – that’s my coil on the right.

And there she is, all ready to go back in to the bass. https://mrglynspickups.com/

If anyone has a faulty pickup just give me a call 021912678 or email mrglynspickups@gmail.com

Take a look at my YouTube series “Mr Glyn Meets Your Maker” where I have chat with manufacturers of musical gear from around New Zealand https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcDggiRTQyFec5KAVHsC2xA

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcDggiRTQyFec5KAVHsC2xA

Posted on March 17, 2021April 14, 2023 by mrglynspickups — Leave a comment

Gold Foil Pickup re-wind

A Gold Foil Pickup is not for everyone or for every situation. They are low powered with no shortage of high end.

This Gold Foil Pickup came to me with the coil reading ‘open circuit’ on the meter so it was likely it would need re-winding. It’s a Tokai from the 1960’s

You never know what you’ll find inside these.

Under all that gold and chrome there is a very scruffy little coil wound directly around a ceramic magnet. There isn’t a bobbin which makes it rather tricky to work with.

I never just re-wind a pickup without testing all the connections first just in case it was just a dry joint. This time it paid off, one of the connections had failed. The repair turned out to be fairly simple.

Pickup Repairs

Pickup re-winds are a big part of what I do.

In the early days back in the 1990’s I re-wound a lot of pickups. It was an invaluable introduction into the inner workings of electric guitar pickups.

Back then there were a lot of 60’s and 70’s quality pickups around to practice on, they weren’t as valuable or sought after as they are now. Because of that I got to see how pickups were put together in the old days, the construction, the potting material…

There wasn’t much information available so experimentation was the only way to learn. I made so many bad pickups back then but made a note of every single one, how I’d wound it and what the result was. By using that method I got closer and closer to what I wanted. I also made a note of all the re-winds I did and the original spec if I could get it. I’m still writing in that note book to this day and it’s becoming a fantastic reference tool when I receive an unusual pickup repair from a customer.

I still really enjoy re-winding pickups, I think I have a strong instinct to fix things. I would much rather repair a faulty old pickup than sell a customer a new one. Sometimes, of course, the customer wants a different sound that the old pickup can’t give them and a new pickup is the way to go.

Please feel free to contact me about any faulty pickup by email (mrglynspickups@gmail.com) or by phone (021 912 678).

https://mrglynspickups.com/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcDggiRTQyFec5KAVHsC2xA

Enjoy this? You might also be interested in…

The Tron, filtertron guitar pickup — Jazzmaster Vintage

Jazzmaster vintage pickup from Mr Glyns Pickups NZ — Jazzmaster Vintage

Posted on October 2, 2020December 20, 2022 by mrglynspickups — Leave a comment

Seymour Duncan JB Re-Wind

Seymour Duncan JB humbuckers are such a classic pickup, loud and aggressive with no shortage of high end attack. This particular one has had a hard life and finally gave up so it arrived at my workshop for repair. It’s not the first Duncan JB Re-Wind if had to do but this time I’ve taken some pics.

This one had stopped working altogether. With the tape off the hook up wires are exposed and it’s possible to identify which coil has the problem. It’s usually just one coil.

It turned out to be the coil with the screws in this case.

The coil with the lugs in fine and showing 8.42KOhms and from that I can figure out what size wire they used and calculate the number of turns needed to re-wind the duff coil.

Pretty routine stuff this Duncan JB Re-Wind but always nice to have a look inside a classic pickup. https://mrglynspickups.com/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcDggiRTQyFec5KAVHsC2xA

Pickup re-winds are a big part of what I do.

In the early days back in the 1990’s I re-wound a lot of pickups. It was an invaluable introduction into the inner workings of electric guitar pickups.

Please feel free to contact me about any faulty pickup by email (mrglynspickups@gmail.com) or by phone (021 912 678).

Enjoy this? You may also be interested in…