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Standard humbuckers have two coils that normally pick up two areas of the string. When you split a pickup you cut out one coil and eliminate the current generated from that area of the string. The split pickup now uses one coil and 1/2 of the total turns when combined with the other coil in…

An electric guitar or bass pickup is an electromechanical device for tracking the vibration of a moving string made of ferrous material. The string attracts the magnetic field from within the pickup and when plucked the movement of the magnetic field through the coil(s) causes an electrical current to be generated. The signal is connected…

Passive pickups used for guitar and bass are in general a musical instrument pickup consisting of a permanent magnet material such as Alnico, Ceramic or other specified material such as Rare Earth. A coil form or bobbin of a certain length, width and height needed to hold the wound coil. Magnet wire can be wound…

You can make your pickup have two different outputs with different frequencies. A tapped pickup can’t give you each string to different channels or amplifier. You would need to have six individual coils for left-right-left etc. A tapped pickup is wound to a desired number of turns or to a desired frequency. The frequency will…

A Patent is a government grant that allows the inventor to make, use and sell for a certain amount of time. It gives the inventor exclusive right to an invention or discovery. To be eligible for a patent, an invention must be new, useful or improvement of an existing patent. All patents other than design…

Jazz players that I’ve talked to usually use heavier gauge strings and often roll off the high end using their tone control. Jazz players often use the neck pickup alone and play through a cleaner sounding amplification. Using heavier strings will make the pickup sound fatter with more output. As the string diameter increases, an…

It is another term used for a “pickup.” It converts the mechanical vibration of a string when plucked through a magnetic field within a pickup. As the moving magnetic field moves back and forth through the coil, an alternating current or signal is produced. As the signal travels through a volume and tone control or…

a. Magnet type, b. Magnet wire gauge, c. Bobbin shape, d. Number of turns, e. Polepiece type The type of magnet that is used. Ceramic magnets are used for their magnetic strength and generally cost less than cast alnico magnets and ceramics are more fragile and can chip and break easily. Cast Alnico rod and…

There are many places you can look for old pickups. I’d start with the local music store and ask them if you can look through some junk parts and tell them that your experimenting on some new pickup idea. Many times they have old pickups thrown in a box especially old humbuckers where one of…

The small ID label usually found on the bottom of the pickups is a quick reference to the model and final assembler. Each model has several procedures with a few or many production workers making each pickup. The ID label usually has the initial of the final assembler with prior quality control inspections.