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Re: Its a damn close to official as possible

5/18/2006 12:55 PM

David Schwab

Re: Its a damn close to official as possible

On 5/18/2006 2:59 PM, moocow said:

quote:
"I've posted this before, but here's a lab rig designed to measure impedance of guitar pickups: ..."

Hey, cool! Everyone, check out the spreadsheet...

http://wug.physics.uiuc.edu/courses/phys398emi/Experimental_Results/Pickup_Data/Guitar_Bass_Pickup_Data.xls

just about every pickup you can think of! Even magnet types.

Interestingly, I see A-II, A-III, and A-V, but no A-IV.

5/18/2006 4:29 PM
moocow	Be careful with that spreadsheet! They may be using the same internet sources we are to determine magnet type. The rest of the information should be good. There is even some impedance and gauss level data for vintage Fender pickups. I think there is some very useful data here for someone who uses an Extech meter to guide their pickup design process.

5/18/2006 4:19 AM
Hummer	I find the "sloppy manufacturing" PAF theories rather strange. It seems that the 50s were the Golden Era of Gibson electrics. They were making superb guitars with incredible tolerance and superb neck joints, and superb fretting, inlay and binding. The Kalamazoo production from that Era is now the basis for 50% of the world's collectable guitar stock by value. What's the chances that procurement, production and QC were just a bunch of airheads sitting around drinking brews and saying "Whatever, dude, Its a magnet!"

5/18/2006 4:19 AM

Hummer

I find the "sloppy manufacturing" PAF theories rather strange. It seems that the 50s were the Golden Era of Gibson electrics. They were making superb guitars with incredible tolerance and superb neck joints, and superb fretting, inlay and binding. The Kalamazoo production from that Era is now the basis for 50% of the world's collectable guitar stock by value.

What's the chances that procurement, production and QC were just a bunch of airheads sitting around drinking brews and saying "Whatever, dude, Its a magnet!"

5/18/2006 6:41 AM
Dave Stephens	Hummy, so what pickup did they use A4 in, still curious about that. Judging by BB King's guitar tone for the last 25 years I'd bet it was in that style guitar, his guitar screams A4 to me By the way I just read a whole book on Gibson Les Pauls and the history from the beginning. So when they went to reissue them they found that all those golden era LPs weren't consistently made in any way. Necks were all hand shaped, head stock logos position randomly by hand, this frustrated Gibson in the 80s because they wanted ONE official vintage '59 style LP to copy and they couldn't find any that were the same. Heh, to me thats a good thing, artist made guitars not CNC robo guitars. Similar findings on pickups, not standardized, some not so good ones, some great ones. Wish we could get some of these old Gibson guys at the local bar and listen to their stories.......

5/18/2006 6:41 AM

Dave Stephens

Hummy, so what pickup did they use A4 in, still curious about that. Judging by BB King's guitar tone for the last 25 years I'd bet it was in that style guitar, his guitar screams A4 to me :-)

By the way I just read a whole book on Gibson Les Pauls and the history from the beginning. So when they went to reissue them they found that all those golden era LPs weren't consistently made in any way. Necks were all hand shaped, head stock logos position randomly by hand, this frustrated Gibson in the 80s because they wanted ONE official vintage '59 style LP to copy and they couldn't find any that were the same. Heh, to me thats a good thing, artist made guitars not CNC robo guitars. Similar findings on pickups, not standardized, some not so good ones, some great ones. Wish we could get some of these old Gibson guys at the local bar and listen to their stories.......

5/18/2006 11:49 AM
Zhangliqun	The chances of "sloppy manufacturing" of the PAF's are actually pretty good. Even in the 50's, woodworking in general and making musical instruments out of wood in particular was a well-established art and science and had been for at least 100 years, centuries if you look at violins, etc. But it's sloppy logic to assume that because woodworking was an established science, electronics was too. Hardly. It was a relatively new science -- and electric guitar pickups in particular were VERY new, humbuckers even more so. By the time the last burst was made, Gibson had only 3-4 years experience in mass-manufacturing humbuckers, and they were the only ones in the world who knew how to make them. Nobody knew the differences in tone the various Alnico grades could make and Alnico 5 had just been invented in 1955. This is because the newness of the electric guitar in general was so overwhelming that no-one would have noticed the relatively subtle tonal differences between Alnico 2, 3 and 4. The very sound of an electric guitar was still culture shock for most people in the 50's, even guitar players. Sort of like if I moved to Korea or a Korean moved here -- at first everybody looks alike because you're overwhelmed by the starkly different basic physical appearance of the natives. Only after you've lived in the new place for a good while do you begin to notice the individual differences in the locals' faces. For this same reason it wasn't until much later that people noticed differences between Alnico grades. So it's not at all surprising that the PAF making was a little sloppy by modern standards, like using Alnico grades interchangeably and coils that varied pretty widely in numbers of turns. There was also no such thing as bridge-spaced or neck-spaced pickups -- or pu's wound for neck or bridge. You could get a Les Paul or L5 with a 7.5k bridge and an 8.4k neck pickup. So it wasn't really "sloppy" at all -- at the time it was actually state-of-the-art.

5/18/2006 11:49 AM

Zhangliqun

The chances of "sloppy manufacturing" of the PAF's are actually pretty good. Even in the 50's, woodworking in general and making musical instruments out of wood in particular was a well-established art and science and had been for at least 100 years, centuries if you look at violins, etc.

But it's sloppy logic to assume that because woodworking was an established science, electronics was too. Hardly. It was a relatively new science -- and electric guitar pickups in particular were VERY new, humbuckers even more so. By the time the last burst was made, Gibson had only 3-4 years experience in mass-manufacturing humbuckers, and they were the only ones in the world who knew how to make them.

Nobody knew the differences in tone the various Alnico grades could make and Alnico 5 had just been invented in 1955. This is because the newness of the electric guitar in general was so overwhelming that no-one would have noticed the relatively subtle tonal differences between Alnico 2, 3 and 4. The very sound of an electric guitar was still culture shock for most people in the 50's, even guitar players. Sort of like if I moved to Korea or a Korean moved here -- at first everybody looks alike because you're overwhelmed by the starkly different basic physical appearance of the natives. Only after you've lived in the new place for a good while do you begin to notice the individual differences in the locals' faces. For this same reason it wasn't until much later that people noticed differences between Alnico grades.

So it's not at all surprising that the PAF making was a little sloppy by modern standards, like using Alnico grades interchangeably and coils that varied pretty widely in numbers of turns. There was also no such thing as bridge-spaced or neck-spaced pickups -- or pu's wound for neck or bridge. You could get a Les Paul or L5 with a 7.5k bridge and an 8.4k neck pickup.

So it wasn't really "sloppy" at all -- at the time it was actually state-of-the-art.

5/18/2006 1:15 PM
Spence	You'd better do some more reading such as : http://www.provide.net/~cfh/paf.html and : http://www.arnoldmagnetics.com/mtc/pdf/pm_manual_chap_1.pdf otherwise someone may flame you as seems to be the recent trend on this forum. You just can't say that people wouldn't have known the differences in tone because electric guitarists have always been tonehounds and Gibson would have been fools not to listen to customer feedback at a time when that upstart Fender was trying to take over the World. They would have investigated. I suspect that the Gibson employees were winding pickups to a specification but it's inevitable that corners would be cut and individuals would develop their own methods. They probably didn't have any idea what the magnets were called or what grade they were. I'm getting pretty tired of all the 'ex-employees' coming out of the woodwork.....it's bollocks. Magnet availability would have been as it is today. The magnet companies will try to sell you what they're making the most of currently. If A5 is all the rage, they will tell you that A4 is hellishly expensive to make. That's just how it works; no mystery.

5/18/2006 1:15 PM

Spence

You'd better do some more reading such as :

http://www.provide.net/~cfh/paf.html

and :

http://www.arnoldmagnetics.com/mtc/pdf/pm_manual_chap_1.pdf

otherwise someone may flame you as seems to be the recent trend on this forum.

You just can't say that people wouldn't have known the differences in tone because electric guitarists have always been tonehounds and Gibson would have been fools not to listen to customer feedback at a time when that upstart Fender was trying to take over the World. They would have investigated.

I suspect that the Gibson employees were winding pickups to a specification but it's inevitable that corners would be cut and individuals would develop their own methods. They probably didn't have any idea what the magnets were called or what grade they were. I'm getting pretty tired of all the 'ex-employees' coming out of the woodwork.....it's bollocks.

Magnet availability would have been as it is today. The magnet companies will try to sell you what they're making the most of currently. If A5 is all the rage, they will tell you that A4 is hellishly expensive to make. That's just how it works; no mystery.

5/18/2006 5:31 PM
Wolfe Macleod	[quote]You'd better do some more reading such as : http://www.provide.net/~cfh/paf.html [/quote] Spence, that guy is wrong on at least one point. PAF covers were not made of brass as he claims. The nickel silver was brass plated, and then nickel plated according to a conversation I had with Seymour awhile back.

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