vintage Dimarzio info

[yanyan]

Interesting old Dimarzio info i found. This is a catalog from 1978, when they'd begun to add more models to their product line.




















I'm surprised at how much of a drop in inductance the Super Distortion (as the Dual Sound) gets when switched to parallel.

[stratotarts]

Dec 21, 2019 22:44:48 GMT -5 yanyan said:

I'm surprised at how much of a drop in inductance the Super Distortion (as the Dual Sound) gets when switched to parallel.

Inductance is doubled with coils in series, halved with coils in parallel. So the ratio between the two configurations is 4:1.

[antigua]

Thanks a lot for these scans, it's interesting historical information. I've read/heard Larry DiMarzio talk in a couple interviews, and the product copy reads how he talks. 

It goes to show how at one time they were more forthcoming with technical details than they are now. Seymour Duncan has also reduced the amount of information they're willing to share about their pickups. Some pickup makers claimed the information confused customers, who instead want to be told what the pickup should sound like. The ad copy is also relatively honest about the technical merits of these pickups, much less poetic and flowery than the ad copy of today. 

The way they tried to express the technical information is interesting, too, with the AC resistance and waveform. You can see from those waveforms that taking the mV output from precisely 3.5 seconds after strumming would be unreliable, since the rate of decay is anything but smooth. 

[yanyan]

I asked for inductance and resonant peak specifications for other Dimarzio pickups that interest me and they graciously provided them:

Fast Track 1	2.37H	5.65kHz
The Chopper	5.74H	3.62kHz
Fast Track 2	9.26H	2.15kHz
HS-3	3.2H	5.67kHz
HS-4	3.2H	5.67kHz
True Velvet	2.65H	5.15kHz
Super 3	7.74H	3.78kHz
Liquifire	6.38H	3.87kHz
Crunch Lab	7.23H	3.36kHz
Illuminator neck	6.31H	3.88kHz
Illuminator bridge	6.81H	3.81kHz
Evolution neck	6.28H	4.78kHz
Evolution bridge	6.34H	4.63kHz

Kudos to the fine folk at Dimarzio for their great pickups.

EDIT: Added Fast Track 1, Chopper, and Fast Track 2 specs.

[antigua]

Jan 8, 2020 21:30:13 GMT -5 yanyan said:

I asked for inductance and resonant peak specifications for other Dimarzio pickups that interest me and they graciously provided them:

HS-3	3.2H	5.67kHz
HS-4	3.2H	5.67kHz
True Velvet	2.65H	5.15kHz
Super 3	7.74H	3.78kHz
Liquifire	6.38H	3.87kHz
Crunch Lab	7.23H	3.36kHz
Illuminator neck	6.31H	3.88kHz
Illuminator bridge	6.81H	3.81kHz
Evolution neck	6.28H	4.78kHz
Evolution bridge	6.34H	4.63kHz

Kudos to the fine folk at Dimarzio for their great pickups.

Thanks for sharing. The inductance values are good info to have, being a bit more reliable than resonant peak figures. 

[yanyan]

Jan 9, 2020 1:13:36 GMT -5 antigua said:

Jan 8, 2020 21:30:13 GMT -5 yanyan said:

I asked for inductance and resonant peak specifications for other Dimarzio pickups that interest me and they graciously provided them:

HS-3	3.2H	5.67kHz
HS-4	3.2H	5.67kHz
True Velvet	2.65H	5.15kHz
Super 3	7.74H	3.78kHz
Liquifire	6.38H	3.87kHz
Crunch Lab	7.23H	3.36kHz
Illuminator neck	6.31H	3.88kHz
Illuminator bridge	6.81H	3.81kHz
Evolution neck	6.28H	4.78kHz
Evolution bridge	6.34H	4.63kHz

Kudos to the fine folk at Dimarzio for their great pickups.

Thanks for sharing. The inductance values are good info to have, being a bit more reliable than resonant peak figures. 

My pleasure antigua. I'm just contributing whatever i can to the forum.

It's interesting to note the differences between pickups arising from varying construction. For example, the HS-3 has a higher inductance than the Fast Track 1, yet is advertised to put out only 93 mV as opposed to the Fast Track 1's 191 mV. My takeaway from this is that a lot of the power of the HS-3 is wasted due to the stacked design.

One thing i can't figure out is why the True Velvet, a true single coil advertised as being bright and sparkly, has a lower resonant peak than the HS-3, which many people have found to be duller-sounding than a typical single coil.

Also, looking at the Evolutions one might be inclined to say that their resonant peaks are close to that of single coils. If my understanding is correct, the comb filtering effect in a double-coil pickup would attenuate treble, so the Evolutions would sound less bright than their resonant peaks might suggest.

[antigua]

Jan 9, 2020 9:11:55 GMT -5 yanyan said:

Jan 9, 2020 1:13:36 GMT -5 antigua said:

Thanks for sharing. The inductance values are good info to have, being a bit more reliable than resonant peak figures. 

My pleasure antigua . I'm just contributing whatever i can to the forum.

It's interesting to note the differences between pickups arising from varying construction. For example, the HS-3 has a higher inductance than the Fast Track 1, yet is advertised to put out only 93 mV as opposed to the Fast Track 1's 191 mV. My takeaway from this is that a lot of the power of the HS-3 is wasted due to the stacked design.

One thing i can't figure out is why the True Velvet, a true single coil advertised as being bright and sparkly, has a lower resonant peak than the HS-3, which many people have found to be duller-sounding than a typical single coil.

Also, looking at the Evolutions one might be inclined to say that their resonant peaks are close to that of single coils. If my understanding is correct, the comb filtering effect in a double-coil pickup would attenuate treble, so the Evolutions would sound less bright than their resonant peaks might suggest. For the sake of making a purchase decision, I might trust them enough for that purpose. 

I can't be sure the data is reliable enough to draw conjecture from. I'd never say "pickups are X when Y is Z; the data from DiMarzio proves it".  If I was really curious I'd buy the sets, preferably used or cheap, and measure them directly. 

[straylight]

Jan 8, 2020 21:30:13 GMT -5 yanyan said:

I asked for inductance and resonant peak specifications for other Dimarzio pickups that interest me and they graciously provided them:

Evolution neck	6.28H	4.78kHz
Evolution bridge	6.34H	4.63kHz

These may not be accurate. I have a few sets of evolutions and they all come in with individual coils reading 3.00H ("screw") and 3.15H ("slug") 9to the nearest 0.05H and 7.50H overall. They may have changed spec over the years. I'm getting different values for unloaded resonant frequency, but when th eload is effectively my scope and propbe it's maybe not as originally was.