Post by 4real on Jun 25, 2012 19:45:33 GMT -5
The title of this thread is...pickups to buy or diy
The thing to remember is that the concept is simple and any coil of wire around a magnetized core will create a signal.
The "art" though is having the experience to be able to mix the elements of a design to get the results you are after. There is certainly a bit of 'craft' in their too. This can take years to learn and understand what you are doing.
But, we live in a world where marketing and mojo and branding rule...that's where the money is as we live in a world of sheeple really and marketing and bragging rights overcome commonsense.
If you divorce yourself from the BS and have some actual aims and goals and can think of ways to achieve that you might be on to something. Far cheaper and more effective to buy pickups from people that have already done all that and far, far cheaper!
...
To me, I am thinking a broad range pickup that can sense a broad range of frequencies and give the string the greatest freedom to physically vibrate seems to be a more 'sensible' strategy in many ways.
With such a design of course, one can filter out elements that you want to accentuate. But, with an inherently powerful hi-z pup with magnets damping the string and thin wire windings overwinding and creating a huge resonant peak in the 'mud zone'...everything else is filtered out and can not be returned.
...
So annoying as it might be to mention these things, but the tenant of all design, you need to have aims and goals.
Now, if the aim is to make the 'most powerful' 'loudest' meanest looking...etc...well, get the thinnest wire, wind the most coil, shove magnets in their till the strings are pulled out of tune and hardly vibrates...and mojo market the hell out of it...will sound like crap, but more likely to sell!
...
Reality is, that to really 'design' something you need to work with knowledge and experience and with intention. This takes 'years' and is not in a 'formula' that much. Everyone is making the same kind of thing in the same formats as a rule and guitar players are a conservative bunch.
Most of this can not be found on the internet but by actually doing it and with informed real world comparisons and judgement and good gear to test it on to really gauge whether you have been successful in your aims. It needs to be 'peer reviewed', no one can judge their own ears alone.
The reality of the marketplace is though, that there are so many pups about these days, everyone is doing it and with the same variations on a theme. Some are better than others, though a subjective taste thing really, because the builder has experience and skill and an aim they have learned how to achieve.
There seems little point (except for the experience and fun of it) to build one's own pickups...unless...your aims are not catered for by what is available (the exercise will surely be more expensive than buying what you want). That's my opinion of course.
And then, that is a matter of aims and working out strategies through some study and experimentation and going back to principles and see around the saturation of marketing BS in this subject.
There are a few really clever designs out there that does offer some cool features and sound...I particularly like those that have an accent on a quiet signal.
I would not want to suggest that the traditional sounds are bad or inferior though, the 'sound' of the electric guitar has largely shaped by the pickups that were developed back in the 1950s and so the aim for most.
The thing to remember is that the concept is simple and any coil of wire around a magnetized core will create a signal.
The "art" though is having the experience to be able to mix the elements of a design to get the results you are after. There is certainly a bit of 'craft' in their too. This can take years to learn and understand what you are doing.
But, we live in a world where marketing and mojo and branding rule...that's where the money is as we live in a world of sheeple really and marketing and bragging rights overcome commonsense.
If you divorce yourself from the BS and have some actual aims and goals and can think of ways to achieve that you might be on to something. Far cheaper and more effective to buy pickups from people that have already done all that and far, far cheaper!
...
To me, I am thinking a broad range pickup that can sense a broad range of frequencies and give the string the greatest freedom to physically vibrate seems to be a more 'sensible' strategy in many ways.
With such a design of course, one can filter out elements that you want to accentuate. But, with an inherently powerful hi-z pup with magnets damping the string and thin wire windings overwinding and creating a huge resonant peak in the 'mud zone'...everything else is filtered out and can not be returned.
...
So annoying as it might be to mention these things, but the tenant of all design, you need to have aims and goals.
Now, if the aim is to make the 'most powerful' 'loudest' meanest looking...etc...well, get the thinnest wire, wind the most coil, shove magnets in their till the strings are pulled out of tune and hardly vibrates...and mojo market the hell out of it...will sound like crap, but more likely to sell!
...
Reality is, that to really 'design' something you need to work with knowledge and experience and with intention. This takes 'years' and is not in a 'formula' that much. Everyone is making the same kind of thing in the same formats as a rule and guitar players are a conservative bunch.
Most of this can not be found on the internet but by actually doing it and with informed real world comparisons and judgement and good gear to test it on to really gauge whether you have been successful in your aims. It needs to be 'peer reviewed', no one can judge their own ears alone.
The reality of the marketplace is though, that there are so many pups about these days, everyone is doing it and with the same variations on a theme. Some are better than others, though a subjective taste thing really, because the builder has experience and skill and an aim they have learned how to achieve.
There seems little point (except for the experience and fun of it) to build one's own pickups...unless...your aims are not catered for by what is available (the exercise will surely be more expensive than buying what you want). That's my opinion of course.
And then, that is a matter of aims and working out strategies through some study and experimentation and going back to principles and see around the saturation of marketing BS in this subject.
There are a few really clever designs out there that does offer some cool features and sound...I particularly like those that have an accent on a quiet signal.
I would not want to suggest that the traditional sounds are bad or inferior though, the 'sound' of the electric guitar has largely shaped by the pickups that were developed back in the 1950s and so the aim for most.
