I thought it was impossible to repair the windings immersed in resin. You gave me back the light of hope! Very good! You always manage to make tutorials different from the usual replicas!
Wow, great job with those hard-to-replace original MB-Ie and MB-II Aria Pro II pickups! I think lot of SB-1000 owners (and SB-600, SB-700, SB-900, Elite I or Elite II as well as Black'n'Gold models (or even TSB) would rather had their pickups repaired by you than get a replacement ones. Thanks for this!
Don't forget the original RSB series! RSB 900, 800 and 600. They also have the same needs, and the original pickups seem to sound better than new replacements, unless you get some of the excellent aftermarket versions: Reed James, Rautia in Finland, or Mr. Armstrong.
Great video and yes, very much a known fault. I had to replace both MB-II pickups on my 1980 SB-900 (with new MB-IE's from Rautia Guitars, Finland). I've seen the MB-IE "autopsy" post on the TDPRI forum and I wouldn't have thought such a neat repair was possible.
What was the issue with your pickups? My 1980 TSB-400 has always been noisy so you have to face the quietest direction when recording to avoid the hum. I really need to fix it since I am recording again. I was on a bit of a hiatus since the early 90s, raising a family. 🙂
First of all let me say I really enjoyed watching this. The overall consensus in Aria pro ii 'world' is that these pickups are impossible to repair. I have the exact same bass that I have owned since I was 18, so for 32 years now. I am lucky the pups on mine are still OK, but I have had a few of these basses with faulty ones, and back in the day there were no exact replacements available, until Armstrong and Rautia began making them. I an trying to do the same job on one of the faulty ones I have here, and it's not easy. The inner part just won't come loose. Nevertheless you showed us all that it can be done, and that is very hopeful, absolutely awesome job, thanks, and greetings from Holland
Thanks for your kind words. With the other one that I didn't film, something I tried was to put a snug fitting allen key in the screw tubes then pull it like a lever in four directions. There was one or two of those cracking sounds, so I assume this also helped to loosen the epoxy around them. I have done this type of thing with one or two other pickups over the years and something I've done in the past was warming the cover slightly, perhaps 40-50 degrees C. Just hot water from the tap or perhaps leaving it in a car in the sun for an hour or two. This makes the cover a little more flexible and less likely to crack. Don't be tempted to put the whole pickup with cover in boiling water. ABS plastic will soften and distort at 100C. Best of luck with your's!
PS: Another thing I thought of, but didn't need to try in the end, was to drill out the plastic tubes from underneath. You'd need a drill press with vice, and you'd only take it just to say 2-3mm below the bolt shoulder so from the top, the cover is not effected. Then plug this with blue tack or wax or something when re-potting. Then redrill the bolt holes after the resin has cured.
Fun time! I’ve done this. I’ve also made a rubber mold from similar pickups and cast a new pickup in black epoxy in the mold. It ends up looking exactly like the real pickup. Surface scratches and all.
love the content Rob. A great deal of info, the testing of deflection with the screwdriver tibit is a good example of the wealth of knowledge you seem to possess. Peace
Great video Rob, thanks for taking the time to post. I bought my Aria Pro II TSB-400 bass new in 1980 and it's been noisy ever since. Not really an issue live but when recording, you have to stay laser-focused on standing in whatever direction is the quietest which is a major pain since I'd rather be focused on the groove I'm laying down. I have started recording again and would like to fix this issue. My son now builds his own guitars and had a look at it. He said that while they look like the pickups in your video, the ones in my bass are single coil. He showed me where the magnets are using a screwdriver. He tried to rewire it a couple different ways and tried changing out the tone pot but nothing worked. He tried to wire them so they would work together like a humbucker but he said they were both the same polarity so he couldn't make it work. I normally play in the middle switch position with the tone knob all the way up. If I turn the tone knob all the way down, it is quiet. Any suggestions on what to check? I am not against sending the pickups to you if it comes down to that. Could you build a humbucker to fit? I would have emailed you but didn't find any contact info in your About section. Thanks in advance! 😃
I’ve owned an Aria Pro ll Black ‘n’ Gold bass since 1983. Both pickups stopped working sometime during the 90s, so I had them replaced with EMGs. Now approaching it’s 40th birthday, the bass is still going strong and plays amazingly well. I also own a Stingray but… don’t laugh… I actually prefer gigging with my Aria. Its narrow neck with close string spacing makes it effortless to play and, tone-wise, it does everything I need it to do. Your video made me wonder if I should have made more effort to get the original pickups repaired, but I’m content with the sound of the EMGs. The Aria may not have the status of a Fender or a MusicMan etc, but it definitely is a great bass. I can’t see me ever parting with mine.
@@musicmaestrodj sorry… the replacement pickups were fitted so long ago that I can’t remember the technical specs. All I can tell you is the replacement EMGs were slightly smaller than the original Aria pickups, so a piece of black plastic with a cutout was made to frame the pickup to hide the gap. The finish looks more professional than my description would suggest. The EMGs are plain black, rectangular, with EMG stamped in silver (although the silver letters have almost totally worn away over the past thirty years). The bass had a full rewire to accommodate the two new pickups. I’m really sorry I can’t be more helpful, and hope you manage to get your Aria fully functional again.
Hey, Rob. Found you by happenstance, and I'm glad that I did. YT is loaded with great content, but yours is among the most adept and informative that I've seen. I stayed up into the small hours watching your series about the Berocca bass (I chuckled at the Beroccabama joke). However, I was hoping to see more about it, including the refinishing ... but I haven't found anything. Are you still working on it, or did you consign it to the bin?
Great video. I'm just doing the same thing now but will have to use the silicon mould I made as i damaged the casing trying to get the epoxy out. How many turns did you wind? Also what was the mV reading with the screwdriver as i don't have a good one to compare it to?
I'm afraid i can't remember. This is not one of my basses and it went back its owner after the repair. If I can dig up the original footage I may see something in the extra footage. But really I would have just wound the coil to match the resistance of the others. It is almost certainly 42 gauge wire. As for the mV reading with the screwdriver, well the actual magnitude does not really matter. It's really just whether you get a positive or negative deflection. This way you can tell the phase of the signal. This video "How to Wire Humbuckers" has a bit more info. th-cam.com/video/Sj346vrq5h4/w-d-xo.html
Rob shows the MB-2 pickup. This is a pickup with an average sound with an incomplete number of poles... A victim of marketing... I'm winding a MB-1 pickup with top sound... Pickup MB 1E Windings #42 7500 /bobbin DC resistance 11.3 Kohms Inductance Henries L 8.7/9.8 Polepieces 16 Alnico 5 SB 1000, SB 600, SB R150 th-cam.com/video/TROjKgPz-Xg/w-d-xo.htmlsi=_BqleQGlj2tE1DAE
Fantastic job. These basses, I´ve had at least a dozen, is likely to get broken winding. What I heard it should be because of a little too high tension in the winding in the bottom of the coil. I have had 4 basses with broken coils, nand one with changed out pickup. I have one pickup laying that is broken, and actually I have done very much of what you did but I have not applied the pressure to the corners, so it is still in a box somewhere. I will try that. Thank you for a great video. Oh.. one question... why not just wax pot the coils and fix them to the casing with hot glue? I'm curious as this was what I thought about doing.
I used resin partly for originality, and partly just because I happened to have some resin and black tinter sitting around. (I ocassionally encapsulate electronics.) I have done similar stuff with just a handful of pickups over the years, and honestly the success has been varied. But I've tried to learn from my mistakes. These were OK, especially the bridge pickup which I didn't film. It really came apart very easily. It is a little strange that they were wrapped with tape TBH, because normally a slow cure resin would be used much the same way as hot wax; to penetrate the windings and reduce microphonics. Thanks for your comment Magnus. I'm glad you like my video!
Are these Pickups the MB-I or MB-II? Wish I knew about this 10 years ago. IIRC my SB R60's pickup worked in series but only E & A work at the normal volume in Parallel. I'm wondering now if it could have been a not so complicated fix rather than a write off. I ended up getting a custom wound from Reed James, of which I don't remember if he based it off the MB-I, MB-II or MB-IE, or if it uses alnico or ceramic (pretty sure the latter).
Hi mate. I used fibre glass resin which is actually polyester, not epoxy. The black tinter is known as "universal tinter". It is glycol based and is what they use to tint regular water and oil based house paints. Around here, you can buy small anounts from paint shops. FWIW, you can also tint resin with spirit stains and acrylic craft paints.
How did you take the PU off from the bass? I have an Aria Pro II Deluxe fron the 80s and the pickup is sticked to the foam, no way how to pull out after removing the screws. Thanks
Perfect job! Thanks for sharing it! The only question I always have is about the similarities between the original alloy and yours. Are they the same, for example both Alnico? How much the final sound is similar to the original according to this rewinding? For example, if I buy a cheap pickup, is it similar to original Fender? What's the difference between cheap and original pickups? I appreciate your time and reply.
I have an ibanez btb bass with a bad pickup (epoxy sealed). Someone over tightened it adjusting the height and the screw underneath for ground must have flexed the pickup. I took it out and if i squeeze the center vertically with my fingers it starts working/ shows resistance on my meter. I'm going to give this a try. Thanks
I guess so Blaine, but it's a nice challenge to keep quirky original stuff going. I forgot to mention that these are 4" x 1 5/8". So replacement nords, barts, emgs etc would be just a bit too skinny for the routes. They look a lot like the covers on the early 80s ibanez musician bass pickups too...
Hi Rob. I have an SB elite with a single pick up. It has a split coil but doesn't work properly when both coils engaged. Could you help repair it if I sent it to you? Thanks
Hey, thanks for the video. I recently got Ibanez RB 851 from similar era and with exact same pickup design and exact same problem. In my case both pickups have one coil inactive which I find very odd. I will definitely attempt to de-pot them and rewind if necessary. I am hoping mine will be as compliant as yours :D
You know why becuase you already mentioned earlier, Its resin shrinkage. Also if to much catalyst was used to speed up curing times the shrinkage cause movement which caused strain on the windings. I remember making my own resin casts that too much catalyst would heat the resin and it would buckle, so i think that is the answer, so you knew it already !!!!
Pickups can fail from being wound with low quality wire, where the insulation falls apart over time. But in that case, it usually results in partially or completely shorted coils, not open circuit like in your case.
I have an identical problem with the pickup of my 1980 Aria Pro RSB600 and was wondering if you would consider performing this task as this is beyond my skill level.... Thank you for the video.
Thank you for great video. I have this model and the pickup looks slightly different. And not gold hardware. The wires are disconnected from the switch and I don't know how to connect. Anyway this bass guitar sounds really cool. xD
In this case, the epoxy was not really for potting the coils, otherwise they wouldn't have wrapped them in tape, so really, you are right. There's no real reason to re-pot them. I just did it because that's the way they were from the factory and I guess it's nice to replicate that. Plus I wanted to show it on the video as I've not seen this type of thing on youtube before. Cheers!
I have one of those, an Aria Pro II SB Elite II. Both pickups were dead when I found it at a garage sale. I tried to remove the epoxy myself but didn't have your skill or patience at the time and eventually binned them, thinking I'll just find something close enough, or buy some of the replicas offered online. I did ask around a few guitar shops for solutions and no-one had any other good ideas. Wish I had known you were out there. Don't suppose you're interested in making up or adapting some pickups for it? or if you're in Melbourne, fixing the whole thing up?
Do you have a wiring diagram you could share? I have this same bass that needs to be rewired. I also need to test each pickup, it hasn't been playable in almost 10 years.
I'm sorry, I don't have a diagram. It was wired as an old les paul, but with a series-parallel switches on each pickup. (With the switch in the middle position, either volume pot acts as a master.) The pots were A500K and the rotary switch is a standard MBB 4P3T. I can't remember the tone caps, probably 47nF. The owner is a mate of mine, and I'm pretty sure there's a FB user group for Aria Pro ii. Perhaps asking over there or on talkbass pickups forum might help. Best of luck mate.
I have an SB1000 and wondered why you re-epoxied the pickups? Is there a reason they were epoxied in the first place? (i.e. noise reduction or protection). Im not an expert, just wondering if there was a reason for it
Yep, I think mainly for protection. Although I have since found out these are are well known as prone to failure, so clearly there was a QC problem with soldering the leads wires. When wax or resin potting is allowed to permeate the windings this will stop the coils from becoming microphonic, but of course these were wrapped, so that doesn't seem to be a reason. OTOH of course, it is what made it possible to save those three coils! As for why I repotted them, well, you are right, I didn't really need to, but thought it would be a nice thing as that's the way they were originally. Oh and I used polyester resin, not epoxy. Cheers!
Actually this video help me to mod the Aguilar AG-4M , because it came with some silicon seal, it just allows to use two wires, I remove the silicone with a knife and re wired the pickup, now it have the humbucker with four wires and allow me to use a dpdt on on on with parallel single series configuration
Craftsmanship! Loved how you teased it out the casing, patience and care much!
Thanks mate.
I thought it was impossible to repair the windings immersed in resin. You gave me back the light of hope! Very good! You always manage to make tutorials different from the usual replicas!
Wow, great job with those hard-to-replace original MB-Ie and MB-II Aria Pro II pickups!
I think lot of SB-1000 owners (and SB-600, SB-700, SB-900, Elite I or Elite II as well as Black'n'Gold models (or even TSB) would rather had their pickups repaired by you than get a replacement ones.
Thanks for this!
Don't forget the original RSB series! RSB 900, 800 and 600. They also have the same needs, and the original pickups seem to sound better than new replacements, unless you get some of the excellent aftermarket versions: Reed James, Rautia in Finland, or Mr. Armstrong.
@@rudylutz2085 And also the SB-R80 I have one with a half dead neck pickup .
@@BASSVIOLATOR Me too the bridge.......wish Rob would offer this as a service.....hint hint.....?!!
Great video and yes, very much a known fault. I had to replace both MB-II pickups on my 1980 SB-900 (with new MB-IE's from Rautia Guitars, Finland). I've seen the MB-IE "autopsy" post on the TDPRI forum and I wouldn't have thought such a neat repair was possible.
Thanks mate. I'll have to check out that forum.
What was the issue with your pickups? My 1980 TSB-400 has always been noisy so you have to face the quietest direction when recording to avoid the hum. I really need to fix it since I am recording again. I was on a bit of a hiatus since the early 90s, raising a family. 🙂
@@musicmaestrodjvery quiet output on both pickups. Half the volume of the single pickup of my Aria Pro II CSB-380 of the same era.
First of all let me say I really enjoyed watching this. The overall consensus in Aria pro ii 'world' is that these pickups are impossible to repair. I have the exact same bass that I have owned since I was 18, so for 32 years now. I am lucky the pups on mine are still OK, but I have had a few of these basses with faulty ones, and back in the day there were no exact replacements available, until Armstrong and Rautia began making them. I an trying to do the same job on one of the faulty ones I have here, and it's not easy. The inner part just won't come loose. Nevertheless you showed us all that it can be done, and that is very hopeful, absolutely awesome job, thanks, and greetings from Holland
Thanks for your kind words. With the other one that I didn't film, something I tried was to put a snug fitting allen key in the screw tubes then pull it like a lever in four directions. There was one or two of those cracking sounds, so I assume this also helped to loosen the epoxy around them.
I have done this type of thing with one or two other pickups over the years and something I've done in the past was warming the cover slightly, perhaps 40-50 degrees C. Just hot water from the tap or perhaps leaving it in a car in the sun for an hour or two. This makes the cover a little more flexible and less likely to crack.
Don't be tempted to put the whole pickup with cover in boiling water. ABS plastic will soften and distort at 100C.
Best of luck with your's!
PS: Another thing I thought of, but didn't need to try in the end, was to drill out the plastic tubes from underneath. You'd need a drill press with vice, and you'd only take it just to say 2-3mm below the bolt shoulder so from the top, the cover is not effected. Then plug this with blue tack or wax or something when re-potting. Then redrill the bolt holes after the resin has cured.
Rob, thanks very much indeed for your time to answer me, I will try out your suggestions, and keep at it.
Hi Rob, can I contact you in a personal message?
Fun time! I’ve done this. I’ve also made a rubber mold from similar pickups and cast a new pickup in black epoxy in the mold. It ends up looking exactly like the real pickup. Surface scratches and all.
love the content Rob. A great deal of info, the testing of deflection with the screwdriver tibit is a good example of the wealth of knowledge you seem to possess. Peace
what a clever man you are sir this is one of the best pickup repair I ever seen ! thank for doing this
Thanks for the kind words mate. Glad you liked the video!
Great video Rob, thanks for taking the time to post. I bought my Aria Pro II TSB-400 bass new in 1980 and it's been noisy ever since. Not really an issue live but when recording, you have to stay laser-focused on standing in whatever direction is the quietest which is a major pain since I'd rather be focused on the groove I'm laying down. I have started recording again and would like to fix this issue. My son now builds his own guitars and had a look at it. He said that while they look like the pickups in your video, the ones in my bass are single coil. He showed me where the magnets are using a screwdriver. He tried to rewire it a couple different ways and tried changing out the tone pot but nothing worked. He tried to wire them so they would work together like a humbucker but he said they were both the same polarity so he couldn't make it work. I normally play in the middle switch position with the tone knob all the way up. If I turn the tone knob all the way down, it is quiet. Any suggestions on what to check? I am not against sending the pickups to you if it comes down to that. Could you build a humbucker to fit? I would have emailed you but didn't find any contact info in your About section. Thanks in advance! 😃
Bump 🙂
Fantastic content; beyond all expectations. Very pleasantly surprised!
Thanks for your kind words John. I'm glad you like my channel!
I’ve owned an Aria Pro ll Black ‘n’ Gold bass since 1983.
Both pickups stopped working sometime during the 90s, so I had them replaced with EMGs.
Now approaching it’s 40th birthday, the bass is still going strong and plays amazingly well.
I also own a Stingray but… don’t laugh… I actually prefer gigging with my Aria. Its narrow neck with close string spacing makes it effortless to play and, tone-wise, it does everything I need it to do.
Your video made me wonder if I should have made more effort to get the original pickups repaired, but I’m content with the sound of the EMGs.
The Aria may not have the status of a Fender or a MusicMan etc, but it definitely is a great bass. I can’t see me ever parting with mine.
Stan, just wondering which EMG's fit your bass as my bridge pickup is toast and I need to fix it. Any info would be appreciated. Thanks!
@@musicmaestrodj sorry… the replacement pickups were fitted so long ago that I can’t remember the technical specs. All I can tell you is the replacement EMGs were slightly smaller than the original Aria pickups, so a piece of black plastic with a cutout was made to frame the pickup to hide the gap. The finish looks more professional than my description would suggest. The EMGs are plain black, rectangular, with EMG stamped in silver (although the silver letters have almost totally worn away over the past thirty years). The bass had a full rewire to accommodate the two new pickups. I’m really sorry I can’t be more helpful, and hope you manage to get your Aria fully functional again.
I didn’t think you could do this. Thanks for showing how. 🙏❤️🙏
My pleasure Mary. Glad you liked the video.
Hey, Rob. Found you by happenstance, and I'm glad that I did. YT is loaded with great content, but yours is among the most adept and informative that I've seen. I stayed up into the small hours watching your series about the Berocca bass (I chuckled at the Beroccabama joke). However, I was hoping to see more about it, including the refinishing ... but I haven't found anything. Are you still working on it, or did you consign it to the bin?
Thanks mate. Project Berocca is still happening. I've just been busy with some other things lately. Cheers.
Amazing job! Thank you for keeping these old beasts running! Your intro music is quite nice too. 😎🎸
Thanks mate. I did a special "metalish" version for this video with heavier drums, and more fuzz on the guitar...
@@RobMods You've got chops! That's for sure.
@@zumazmusic Ha ha. Thanks mate. I had to play a few Master of Puppets riffs at the end there...
@@RobMods Rob Mods - Master of Pickups 😏
@@zumazmusic :) Excellent!
Good job! I have one of these in the workshop with half the pickup not working. I’ll give repairing it a shot!
This is amazing content! I love all you do man! quite inspirational for me. Keep it up!
Great! Have just bought a Pro 2 RSB Deluxe. Good to know, in case the pickups malfunction 👍
Excellent work as always. I have a question.
Is there a special brand of epoxy resin for electronics or which one is ideal for this type of work?
Yes, there are. Most electronics suppliers will sell epoxy potting compounds.
Absolute gold! Thank you!
Cheers mate.
Great video. I'm just doing the same thing now but will have to use the silicon mould I made as i damaged the casing trying to get the epoxy out. How many turns did you wind? Also what was the mV reading with the screwdriver as i don't have a good one to compare it to?
I'm afraid i can't remember. This is not one of my basses and it went back its owner after the repair. If I can dig up the original footage I may see something in the extra footage. But really I would have just wound the coil to match the resistance of the others. It is almost certainly 42 gauge wire. As for the mV reading with the screwdriver, well the actual magnitude does not really matter. It's really just whether you get a positive or negative deflection. This way you can tell the phase of the signal. This video "How to Wire Humbuckers" has a bit more info. th-cam.com/video/Sj346vrq5h4/w-d-xo.html
Rob shows the MB-2 pickup. This is a pickup with an average sound with an incomplete number of poles... A victim of marketing...
I'm winding a MB-1 pickup with top sound...
Pickup MB 1E
Windings #42 7500 /bobbin
DC resistance 11.3 Kohms
Inductance Henries L 8.7/9.8
Polepieces 16 Alnico 5
SB 1000, SB 600, SB R150
th-cam.com/video/TROjKgPz-Xg/w-d-xo.htmlsi=_BqleQGlj2tE1DAE
Wish you live in my neighbourhood! Great video!
Fantastic job. These basses, I´ve had at least a dozen, is likely to get broken winding. What I heard it should be because of a little too high tension in the winding in the bottom of the coil. I have had 4 basses with broken coils, nand one with changed out pickup. I have one pickup laying that is broken, and actually I have done very much of what you did but I have not applied the pressure to the corners, so it is still in a box somewhere. I will try that. Thank you for a great video. Oh.. one question... why not just wax pot the coils and fix them to the casing with hot glue? I'm curious as this was what I thought about doing.
I used resin partly for originality, and partly just because I happened to have some resin and black tinter sitting around. (I ocassionally encapsulate electronics.)
I have done similar stuff with just a handful of pickups over the years, and honestly the success has been varied. But I've tried to learn from my mistakes.
These were OK, especially the bridge pickup which I didn't film. It really came apart very easily.
It is a little strange that they were wrapped with tape TBH, because normally a slow cure resin would be used much the same way as hot wax; to penetrate the windings and reduce microphonics.
Thanks for your comment Magnus. I'm glad you like my video!
@@RobMods it was also great to get the tip of cooking the epoxy. Thank you.
You Sir, are a magician. Great job! A little 'puppets' at the end even, ha.
Thanks mate.
Are these Pickups the MB-I or MB-II?
Wish I knew about this 10 years ago. IIRC my SB R60's pickup worked in series but only E & A work at the normal volume in Parallel. I'm wondering now if it could have been a not so complicated fix rather than a write off. I ended up getting a custom wound from Reed James, of which I don't remember if he based it off the MB-I, MB-II or MB-IE, or if it uses alnico or ceramic (pretty sure the latter).
Hi Rob!
Can you share the epoxy material and black tinter you used? Or a link to where to buy them? I'm trying to fix a similar issue. Thank you!
Hi mate. I used fibre glass resin which is actually polyester, not epoxy. The black tinter is known as "universal tinter". It is glycol based and is what they use to tint regular water and oil based house paints. Around here, you can buy small anounts from paint shops. FWIW, you can also tint resin with spirit stains and acrylic craft paints.
How did you take the PU off from the bass? I have an Aria Pro II Deluxe fron the 80s and the pickup is sticked to the foam, no way how to pull out after removing the screws. Thanks
you are a pro.. (and a great player too) Thanks for sharing.
Perfect job! Thanks for sharing it! The only question I always have is about the similarities between the original alloy and yours. Are they the same, for example both Alnico? How much the final sound is similar to the original according to this rewinding? For example, if I buy a cheap pickup, is it similar to original Fender? What's the difference between cheap and original pickups? I appreciate your time and reply.
I have an ibanez btb bass with a bad pickup (epoxy sealed). Someone over tightened it adjusting the height and the screw underneath for ground must have flexed the pickup. I took it out and if i squeeze the center vertically with my fingers it starts working/ shows resistance on my meter. I'm going to give this a try. Thanks
It doesn't always work, but you've kinda got nothing to lose in these situations. Best of luck with the repair!
Nice one again Rob. I imagine it wouldn’t be worth the trouble if they weren’t odd shaped casings.
I guess so Blaine, but it's a nice challenge to keep quirky original stuff going. I forgot to mention that these are 4" x 1 5/8". So replacement nords, barts, emgs etc would be just a bit too skinny for the routes. They look a lot like the covers on the early 80s ibanez musician bass pickups too...
Hi Rob. I have an SB elite with a single pick up. It has a split coil but doesn't work properly when both coils engaged. Could you help repair it if I sent it to you? Thanks
Hey, thanks for the video. I recently got Ibanez RB 851 from similar era and with exact same pickup design and exact same problem. In my case both pickups have one coil inactive which I find very odd. I will definitely attempt to de-pot them and rewind if necessary. I am hoping mine will be as compliant as yours :D
You know why becuase you already mentioned earlier, Its resin shrinkage. Also if to much catalyst was used to speed up curing times the shrinkage cause movement which caused strain on the windings. I remember making my own resin casts that too much catalyst would heat the resin and it would buckle, so i think that is the answer, so you knew it already !!!!
Amazing work!
What is that screen with iron filings(?) to see what magnets are present?
Definitely want one..........great tool indeed!
It’s call magic paper = steel wool into oil sealed between 2 sheets of plastic , you can do it .
Great job! 👍👏
Thanks mate.
Would you be up for trying to fix a pickup from my Kawai F2B bass it is an active pickup within expoxy as well thanks Daryl
Pickups can fail from being wound with low quality wire, where the insulation falls apart over time. But in that case, it usually results in partially or completely shorted coils, not open circuit like in your case.
I have an identical problem with the pickup of my 1980 Aria Pro RSB600 and was wondering if you would consider performing this task as this is beyond my skill level.... Thank you for the video.
Thank you for great video. I have this model and the pickup looks slightly different. And not gold hardware. The wires are disconnected from the switch and I don't know how to connect. Anyway this bass guitar sounds really cool. xD
6:34 pickup soup! Yum my favorite!😋
I never saw a coil repair, it's impressive. Do you absolutely need to put expoxy again after rewiring ? Very nice job anyway !
In this case, the epoxy was not really for potting the coils, otherwise they wouldn't have wrapped them in tape, so really, you are right. There's no real reason to re-pot them. I just did it because that's the way they were from the factory and I guess it's nice to replicate that. Plus I wanted to show it on the video as I've not seen this type of thing on youtube before. Cheers!
@@RobMods Ok, thank you for your answer Rob ;-)
I have one of those, an Aria Pro II SB Elite II. Both pickups were dead when I found it at a garage sale. I tried to remove the epoxy myself but didn't have your skill or patience at the time and eventually binned them, thinking I'll just find something close enough, or buy some of the replicas offered online. I did ask around a few guitar shops for solutions and no-one had any other good ideas. Wish I had known you were out there. Don't suppose you're interested in making up or adapting some pickups for it? or if you're in Melbourne, fixing the whole thing up?
Here is someone that can make these pickups. The reverse p style is called the MB-II. www.rautiaguitars.net/aria-pro-ii.html
Do you have a wiring diagram you could share? I have this same bass that needs to be rewired. I also need to test each pickup, it hasn't been playable in almost 10 years.
I'm sorry, I don't have a diagram. It was wired as an old les paul, but with a series-parallel switches on each pickup. (With the switch in the middle position, either volume pot acts as a master.) The pots were A500K and the rotary switch is a standard MBB 4P3T. I can't remember the tone caps, probably 47nF. The owner is a mate of mine, and I'm pretty sure there's a FB user group for Aria Pro ii. Perhaps asking over there or on talkbass pickups forum might help. Best of luck mate.
@@RobMods Thanks for the reply. I'll be replacing all the pots as well so that's very useful info. I'll check out those FB groups as well.
I have an SB1000 and wondered why you re-epoxied the pickups? Is there a reason they were epoxied in the first place? (i.e. noise reduction or protection). Im not an expert, just wondering if there was a reason for it
Yep, I think mainly for protection. Although I have since found out these are are well known as prone to failure, so clearly there was a QC problem with soldering the leads wires.
When wax or resin potting is allowed to permeate the windings this will stop the coils from becoming microphonic, but of course these were wrapped, so that doesn't seem to be a reason. OTOH of course, it is what made it possible to save those three coils!
As for why I repotted them, well, you are right, I didn't really need to, but thought it would be a nice thing as that's the way they were originally. Oh and I used polyester resin, not epoxy. Cheers!
@@RobMods Would you consider doing a repair on another one for a fee?
I recently got a 1980 Aria Pro II SB700 and it's noisy as hell (60 cycle hum). The MB-1 humbucker isn't humbucking...
Amazing work! Next time throw a chicken leg and an onion into that pickup soup.
He is like a chiropractor for pickups!
Actually this video help me to mod the Aguilar AG-4M , because it came with some silicon seal, it just allows to use two wires, I remove the silicone with a knife and re wired the pickup, now it have the humbucker with four wires and allow me to use a dpdt on on on with parallel single series configuration
Impressive! Nice work mate.
Awesome
Thanks mate.