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Re: Ibanez ES-335 copy pickup suggestions

Posted: Sun 12/05/21 6:42 pm
by NickF
I've wound a few pickups in my time.
It sounds to me that what you're after more than anything is mismatched coils. Why not get an old sewing machine and hit Mojotone for a kit to build. It's really rewarding. The day you hit an amp with the first pickup you made is utter bliss. If you made the amp yourself too it's even better, probably, I dunno. It's a once in a lifetime experience so you don't get to assess that initial feeling twice.

Mismatching coils is pretty much the secret to the PAF's that actually sounded good.
You're going for around 5000 winds of 42g copper around each bobbin on a balanced pickup. So to mismatch that, I'd be looking at a 15% difference in the number of winds. Say 5500 on your polepiece bobbin and 4800 on the slug bobbin (just to take you over a bit) It seems to edge a humbucker towards what they lose from the single coil sound. Much more than 15-20% and you start introducing noticeable amounts of noise. While that ain't the end of the world. Cos lets face it, single coils sound great, it's enough to make you question the pickup. Dimarzio do this a lot, though they have some mystical way of working it out based on the inductance of the coil. And use the mismatching to shape sounds/character of their pickups to a degree that's beyond me.

Re: Ibanez ES-335 copy pickup suggestions

Posted: Tue 12/07/21 9:30 pm
by cuffers65240
Just what I need, one more guitar based hobby! It is actually very interesting that the humbucker windings can be unbalanced. I have been wondering what all the variables were that make up the sound of a pickup lately and wondered if there were more variables than magnet type and total number of windings. I wonder if Dimarzio is adding some shielding to the pickups to reduce hum when they are very unbalanced. After all, the pickup itself is not the source of the noise but rather the EMI that it picks up.

I haven't actually changed out the Ibanez pickups yet but rather took on another project. I bought a Squier bullet strat a set of Fender locking tuners (word to the wise, the fender tuners do not fit without modifications) and a set of Fender Tex Mex pickups. I got all of that rebuilt last night and holy $%&# is the tone better. These pickups have a lot less hum in the 1, 3 and 5 switch positions and sound so much clearer and more dynamic. My doubts about the tone from my 18watt are gone, it is amazing with a strat tied to it.

This has strengthened my resolve to rebuild the Ibanez now with some new goodies, namely new pickups. I will definitely replace the nut (strings are getting held up in it) and add a set of locking tuners to go with it (it is very hard to tune compared to my Taylor acoustic and my franken-strat). Now that I have heard the clarity that comes with better pickups I now am convinced that the stock pickup set is garbage.

Re: Ibanez ES-335 copy pickup suggestions

Posted: Wed 12/08/21 6:53 am
by JMPGuitars
cuffers65240 wrote:
Tue 12/07/21 9:30 pm
This has strengthened my resolve to rebuild the Ibanez now with some new goodies, namely new pickups. I will definitely replace the nut (strings are getting held up in it) and add a set of locking tuners to go with it (it is very hard to tune compared to my Taylor acoustic and my franken-strat). Now that I have heard the clarity that comes with better pickups I now am convinced that the stock pickup set is garbage.
I can't tell you whether the nut is bad or not, but if the strings are getting caught in it, that means the slots need to be filed better. I'd also use some nut lubricant in there after filing (careful not to file down the slot height if the action is good). Of course, a new nut costs less than nut files. I'd take a look at GraphTech and make sure you measure the nut well.