various strat pickups - are they really that different?

OilCityPickups

gringopig said:

You know what would be cool? (and possibly expensive)...

A video of the manufacturing process!

With detail about the components and the function of each with commentary about the effect on the perceived sound of variables within the construction. Myth-busting whilst advertising!

(and I could glean all your secret tricks and start my own pickup manufacturing company. I have a Metcal solder station and a big roll of 60/40!) he he

I've thought about videos very carefully ... and even blown a fair sized wedge on pro quality video gear and sound equipment.
The only difficulty that I see is that videos these days have to be of such high production standards that anything that falls short for any reason is simply held up as an object of derision. This can be as problematic as someone not liking the presenter ... problematic for me as the presenter would be myself ... and if you don't like my style (or my haircut), I'm f--ked! Videos seem to cause more controversy than articles, so I have been very loath to jump into that particular shark filled pond. :-)

'(and I could glean all your secret tricks and start my own pickup manufacturing company. I have a Metcal solder station and a big roll of 60/40!) he he'

Or I could sell them to you and retire to South America ... my preferred option :-)

gringopig

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gringopig

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Voxman

There are so many different pup options nowadays its just mindblowing and you can drive yourself nuts trying to research it all. And the problem is that not only will response and tone be different clean and distorted, home and live, tube and ss/modelling, but its an expensive business to experiment. And there's the reality-check that after the honeymoon period will you think they still sound as good? 

I've only ever changed pups on two guitars. My old Shaftesbury LP copy where I put in a Dimarzio super distortion on the bridge to replace the stock pup with hb lookalike cover but single coil inside, and my 1989 Epi Sheraton where the stock pups went microphonic and I put in a set of Seymour Duncan SH1 59ers based on 335 PAF pups. 

On everything else I like the tone which is why I bought the guitar in the first place hence no need or desire to change anything.

OilCityPickups

gringopig said:

TheGuitarWeasel said:

gringopig said:

You know what would be cool? (and possibly expensive)...

A video of the manufacturing process!

With detail about the components and the function of each with commentary about the effect on the perceived sound of variables within the construction. Myth-busting whilst advertising!

(and I could glean all your secret tricks and start my own pickup manufacturing company. I have a Metcal solder station and a big roll of 60/40!) he he

I've thought about videos very carefully ... and even blown a fair sized wedge on pro quality video gear and sound equipment.
The only difficulty that I see is that videos these days have to be of such high production standards that anything that falls short for any reason is simply held up as an object of derision. This can be as problematic as someone not liking the presenter ... problematic for me as the presenter would be myself ... and if you don't like my style (or my haircut), I'm f--ked! Videos seem to cause more controversy than articles, so I have been very loath to jump into that particular shark filled pond. :-)

'(and I could glean all your secret tricks and start my own pickup manufacturing company. I have a Metcal solder station and a big roll of 60/40!) he he'

Or I could sell them to you and retire to South America ... my preferred option :-)

Aye indeed. You can't use a presenter with lovely teeth as they wouldn't have the voice of the 'author'. I do think that a straight talking relaxed presentation would draw in those with real interest in purchasing or learning. Made more like a tutorial might serve to inform and to advertise without inducing adverse reaction?
I realise the predicament though.

Buying from you, I would move production to Belarus and immediately retire to Botswana!

About the same number of my pickups are exported these days as sell on the home market, so what the hell language would I make a video in? For my American customers I'd have to say 'sodder' instead of solder ... :-)

On a serious note Crimson Guitars make probably the best production value videos I've seen on the 'how to' info-advert video scene ... I figure if I can't equal or beat that ... I'll keep my head below the parapet. 

Funkfingers

TheGuitarWeasel said:
On a serious note Crimson Guitars make probably the best production value videos I've seen on the 'how to' info-advert video scene ... I figure if I can't equal or beat that ... I'll keep my head below the parapet. 

The aspect that I respect most about those Crimson Guitars How To ... presentations is that they bring the realisation that, for some tasks, I am out of my depth. On those occasions, the work is handed over to a time-served luthier. I do the Hancock/James thing - "pay up and try to look big."

In the case of pickup making video presentations, I suspect that some details of the process would need to be pixelated over to protect hard-earned knowledge. 

Henrytwang

The short answer is yes. I’ve noticed a huge difference in Stratocaster pickups made by Fender alone. I have a couple of USA Strats, a 1979 and a 2002, a Mexican Stratocaster fitted with Fender custom shop 54s and a Fender MIJ Stratocaster with Custom Shop 57/62s. They all have very different tonal qualities, I think that wire gauges, insulation type,turns, magnet type, diameter and length all have a bearing on the tonality of a pickup. Not all great sounding pickups need to be expensive however, I’ve had some great sounding pickups from several cheaper brands such as Vanson, Ironstone and Tonerider.

Funkfingers

The bobbin materials and dimensions have an effect too.

earwighoney

TheGuitarWeasel said:

During the Strat pickup's production run till the late 60s the turn count of the windings varied by year from a maximum of 8350 to a minimum of 7625 ... now 725 turns difference is a hell of a lot, and will change the pickups response considerably. Add to this The Strat Pickup started out being wound by hand with heavy Formvar, and ended up (in the time period of those winding variations) wound by machine with plain enamel wire (like Gibson humbuckers) and wire with different insulations build up on a bobbin differently ... this also caused minor (but noticeable) sound differences. 
All Strat pickups wound to traditional specs will sound broadly 'Stratty' but some will have more hollow mids, or more present bass etc etc. Why would pickup makers deny the choice of the different sound palettes to customers? 
As to the expense of pickups wound to those specs, just one major factor is the cost of vintage specification wire ... a roll of 5 kilos of 42awg modern poly wire cots around £130 ... a 2.5 kilo roll of vintage spec plain enamel wire costs nearly £300!

With the  arrival of our interchangeable sliding pickup compartment demo Feline Strat I can A/B Strat sets in the same guitar, through the same amp within about 30 seconds of each other ... thus removing the variables of different body, neck, strings etc ... it's interesting stuff, and shows up bigger differences between sets than even I had thought. 

Interesting info, thanks for posting. 

***

 IMO good pickup makers are able to provide suggestions for which of their products will suit your needs the best.  If in doubt, ask them a few questions and they'll point you in the right direction be it for a number of different Strat style pickups or HB sized ones.  Again from my experience it is important thing to know what you are after so you are able to ask the right questions (if that makes sense) 

OilCityPickups

earwighoney said:

TheGuitarWeasel said:

During the Strat pickup's production run till the late 60s the turn count of the windings varied by year from a maximum of 8350 to a minimum of 7625 ... now 725 turns difference is a hell of a lot, and will change the pickups response considerably. Add to this The Strat Pickup started out being wound by hand with heavy Formvar, and ended up (in the time period of those winding variations) wound by machine with plain enamel wire (like Gibson humbuckers) and wire with different insulations build up on a bobbin differently ... this also caused minor (but noticeable) sound differences. 
All Strat pickups wound to traditional specs will sound broadly 'Stratty' but some will have more hollow mids, or more present bass etc etc. Why would pickup makers deny the choice of the different sound palettes to customers? 
As to the expense of pickups wound to those specs, just one major factor is the cost of vintage specification wire ... a roll of 5 kilos of 42awg modern poly wire cots around £130 ... a 2.5 kilo roll of vintage spec plain enamel wire costs nearly £300!

With the  arrival of our interchangeable sliding pickup compartment demo Feline Strat I can A/B Strat sets in the same guitar, through the same amp within about 30 seconds of each other ... thus removing the variables of different body, neck, strings etc ... it's interesting stuff, and shows up bigger differences between sets than even I had thought. 

Interesting info, thanks for posting. 

***

 IMO good pickup makers are able to provide suggestions for which of their products will suit your needs the best.  If in doubt, ask them a few questions and they'll point you in the right direction be it for a number of different Strat style pickups or HB sized ones.  Again from my experience it is important thing to know what you are after so you are able to ask the right questions (if that makes sense) 

Just don't ask what solder I use!!!!

DannyP

gringopig said:

When it comes down to it there is only a magnetic field with a field distribution pattern and wire to induce a current into. 

When it comes down to it, there is only matter and energy, and yet people INSIST on referring to 'toasters' and 'Belgium' and 'hydrogen' and 'love' and 'Claudia Winkleman'... honestly!

Funkfingers

Anderz

You can mess with strat pickups to the cows come home.

How many 69 pickups are there and which is the truest?

I quickly sorted this out that as long as I knew what tone area I wanted for my partscaster Blackie then that would be sort of settled and I put Fender CS69 in it around 1998. Blackie always sounds great just different with different pickups.

So yes there is a difference but you have to decide where you want to go with your quest for tone.

thegummy

DannyP said:

gringopig said:

When it comes down to it there is only a magnetic field with a field distribution pattern and wire to induce a current into. 

When it comes down to it, there is only matter and energy, and yet people INSIST on referring to 'toasters' and 'Belgium' and 'hydrogen' and 'love' and 'Claudia Winkleman'... honestly!

Gave you an lol cause that was funny but also deserves a wis because it's a great answer 

OilCityPickups

Anderz said:

You can mess with strat pickups to the cows come home.

How many 69 pickups are there and which is the truest?

I quickly sorted this out that as long as I knew what tone area I wanted for my partscaster Blackie then that would be sort of settled and I put Fender CS69 in it around 1998. Blackie always sounds great just different with different pickups.

So yes there is a difference but you have to decide where you want to go with your quest for tone.

By 1969 all Strat pickups were machine wound with auto traverse and auto shutoff, so they should be amongst the most consistent Strat pickups out there. I've rewound an awful lot of late 60s Fender pickups and that's indeed what I've found. 

As a matter of interest, A Strat pickup is a lot easier to replicate accurately than say a PAF ... a Strat pickup has nine components, excluding the wire and brass eyelets the wire's soldered to ... a PAF has eighteen excluding wire and screws ... many of which can affect the tone.  Fender have always used alnico 5 for Strats ... whereas Gibson have used 2,3,and 4 for PAFs.
It's much, much easier to nail a year-specific vintage Strat tone.

CountryDave

A few weeks ago @CasperCaster and I had an evening of experimenting with different Strat bridge pickups. He set up one of his strats with a cutaway pickguard with volumes & tone pot. All wired up to a connector block for quick changes without the need to even remove the strings. About as much consistency as can be achieved was attained by using a cable straight into a nice amp, which was then set up to sound how we liked it with a control guitar we were both familiar with.
Between us we had about 10 different pickups from 3 manufacturers - Fender, Dimarzio & Seymour Duncan.
The differences were much more obvious and greater than either of us expected. All sounded good and ‘stratty’, with some more ‘glassy’ and others ‘fatter’ & ‘warmer’. (Apologies for using the well used terminology).
In the end we had a list that went from glassy through to P90-ish.