The market for new, replacement pickups has absolutely gone through the roof over the last 10 years and the biggest segment of demand is pickups that offer the hard to get beauty of that classic,vintage tone. To provide your students with some of the basic information they need to know about vintage pickups, the best bet is to keep it simple.
There was definitely some differences to the way some of the most popular classic pickups, specifically the Gibson P 90s, PAF humbuckers, and the Fender single coils were conceived. The influx of randomness is hailed as part of the reason for their delicious tones. To illustrate, unevenly wound coils on the Gibson PAF's tend to give bite, and add a lot of treble to the end result, however the resulting grit is hard to deny. The Telecaster bridge pickup and single coil offerings in the Stratocaster also provide a lot of edginess that is well documented. Again to re-emphasize, this is one of the contributing factors to the desirability of these vintage pickups. So the question could be asked, being the fact that mass manufacturing of these pickups was in its infancy, these had to be hand wound, right?
The answer is no.
All of the main manufacturers, used actual machines to do this tedious work, and they still do. The misconception of the term, "hand wound", came into creation because of the extensive human element involved in the process. For instance, Single coil pickups were wound only one coil at a time, with an experienced employee working the supply spool and guiding the wire, making up the coils into place. Because of the obvious inconsistencies having any sort of human element involved in such a tedious process, the end result was pickups that were all a little different. This is because of the discrepancies in the wire guiding, and how full they were with wire when they were done. Obviously, today the process is much more streamlined and a lot of effort has been put into learning which inconsistencies reproduce that ever so sought after tone. This is one of the reasons why today's reproductions of these vintage beauties is so much more on a level basis. Back in the day, it was not uncommon to find a dud in the mix, or pickups of varying strength due to one having more coils on it then another.
Finding that perfect tone, is something that all guitar students need to be educated on, whether it's through online guitar classes, or in person lessons with a qualified teacher. Tone and achieving a good playing sound for whatever specific type of music an aspiring guitar student is interested in, is something that should be emphasized! Exposing your students to the beauty and richness of these classic guitar pickups will open their minds to all kinds of possibilities.
There was definitely some differences to the way some of the most popular classic pickups, specifically the Gibson P 90s, PAF humbuckers, and the Fender single coils were conceived. The influx of randomness is hailed as part of the reason for their delicious tones. To illustrate, unevenly wound coils on the Gibson PAF's tend to give bite, and add a lot of treble to the end result, however the resulting grit is hard to deny. The Telecaster bridge pickup and single coil offerings in the Stratocaster also provide a lot of edginess that is well documented. Again to re-emphasize, this is one of the contributing factors to the desirability of these vintage pickups. So the question could be asked, being the fact that mass manufacturing of these pickups was in its infancy, these had to be hand wound, right?
The answer is no.
All of the main manufacturers, used actual machines to do this tedious work, and they still do. The misconception of the term, "hand wound", came into creation because of the extensive human element involved in the process. For instance, Single coil pickups were wound only one coil at a time, with an experienced employee working the supply spool and guiding the wire, making up the coils into place. Because of the obvious inconsistencies having any sort of human element involved in such a tedious process, the end result was pickups that were all a little different. This is because of the discrepancies in the wire guiding, and how full they were with wire when they were done. Obviously, today the process is much more streamlined and a lot of effort has been put into learning which inconsistencies reproduce that ever so sought after tone. This is one of the reasons why today's reproductions of these vintage beauties is so much more on a level basis. Back in the day, it was not uncommon to find a dud in the mix, or pickups of varying strength due to one having more coils on it then another.
Finding that perfect tone, is something that all guitar students need to be educated on, whether it's through online guitar classes, or in person lessons with a qualified teacher. Tone and achieving a good playing sound for whatever specific type of music an aspiring guitar student is interested in, is something that should be emphasized! Exposing your students to the beauty and richness of these classic guitar pickups will open their minds to all kinds of possibilities.
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