Good stuff. I think this is extremely important for prototyping where you can objectively influence the tonal characteristics of a design assuming all prototypes are using the same magnet, wire and pole pieces, etc. That said, it only addresses the inductive properties of the pickup. As we know, the transductive tonal properties are influenced by magnet strength and coil geometry to some extent affecting output, brightness, etc. But, back to the inductive properties, I feel q-factor is one of the most overlooked and under documented measurements that impacts both the tone and the feel of the pickup. A pickup with a lower resonant peak but higher q factor can easily be perceived as brighter than the pickup with a higher resonant peak and lower q factor because there's a less aggressive slope of the bump or peak at the given frequency. I have been documenting this with various vendors pickups and hope to eventually post the comparison in some sort of graphical format to help people compare both the resonant peak AND Q factor. I'll probably chart it by output, wire type, and magnet type, as to make the graphs more apples to apples and minimize the transductive impacts to the tone.
Resonance happens when the value of inductive reactance equals the self capacitance of the coil. The peak is dampened by the dc resistance of the coil /circuit. The ratio between the two is known as Q. Higher the Q the sharper the peak. Lower resistance, the lower the Q and broader the resonant peak.
Coils have what is known as Self Resonance, a product of their Inductance and inter winding Capacitance. The finer the wire the more turns can be fitted on the bobbin thus higher Inductance and higher inter winding capacitance and therefor lower frequency of resonance. However with the finer wire and more turns comes more DC resistance which lowers the Q broadening the peak. With more turns you get more output voltage at the lower frequencies but the highs are reduced due to being bled off by the interwinding capacitance.
its like the co-efficiency of a speaker. Each size speaker and design have a different co-efficiency, or its frequency it operates the loudest and easiest.
Hey Dylan so would a large pot like a 2 meg with a large cap value like .047 or .056 end up with a higher frequency ceiling but lower resonant peak than a 250k pot and a higher value cap like a .015, which would be a lower frequency ceiling but a higher resonant peak?
I came here thinking that maybe a shorter length of wire on s pickup made it more sensitive to higher frequencies and weaker, in a way that shorter things resonate with higher pitched sounds, or in the way that a tiny hole in a pinhole camera gives sharper detail but less light.
Only the inductance or capacitance change the actual resonance frequeny of a pickup. The resistive component as well as external resistive load reduce the height of the resonance peak. External capacitors/incutors (like cables and amplifiers) change the resonance frequency of the system and in most cases the resonance peak value. All these changes modify the sound of the guitar. It is possible to remove most of the external influencers by introducing a very high input impedance buffer directly after the pickup (before the pickup selector). Such modified guitars are practically immune to changes in external conditions like pots, cables and alike.
In the 50s, do you believe that gibson had any idea what they wanted a p-90 to sound like other that loud and clear? Compared to all the differences today ? I dont think so . I think if you know the basics,wire size and type of wire and a basic winding machine and even winds per turn ,you could fill a p-90 bobbin and have a great sounding pickup. Sometime i feel technology gets in the way on the simplist of devices. Having said that i do enjoy listening to everyones expertise on the subject.after ive wound 50 then my conclusion may be different.
Hi Dylan. What if I wire a low value (let's say, a couple of KOhms) resistor in SERIES with my pickup (i.e. wiring a resistor in between the pickup's hot wire and 3-way pickup selector - for example, it was 16K and now it's 18K (2 kOhms extra))? In this case we increase the pickup DC resistance on its own, without increasing inductance and capacitance. How would that change the pickup sound?
my Gibson Dirty fingers on blower switch + 10ft fender cable =16.2Kohm . without the blower system, going thru normal circuit, 15.57Kohm. But after going into buffered tuner pedal, the resonant peak is 10K constant
@@DylanTalksTone Sir, you should update and re-post this video as a player myself I find it is a fantastic resource. Pickup Impedance and Resonant Peak can be very important to the sound/tone a Guitarist is looking/searching for. Great content Sir, shocking that this has so few views. Thank You
So it sounds like the best thing to do is put the highest pots you can in and the highest capacitor in you can to give you the widest tonal range available. That being said would you use 1mil k pots and higher than a .47 cap to get the most range available and then use your tone knob to dial in what you want for sound?
+jasonbloxham Not always. Hi capacitance can make some guitars sound dark and then the tone knob is not really of use because you have already loss so much treble. Too much resistance and you can lose some of the pickup color as the peak get down.
I tried 1meg pots in my strat and had to go back to250k so my answer is no, not for single coils, 500k for humbuckers, 250k s.c. maybe1meg for P90s IMHOP.
I respect what you are doing and it sounds like there is some schooling in your background. But how you are presenting the issue is that you suggest that the resistance is added in series to the pickup....and that's not how a volume pot is wired in to control the pickup. The pickup as a transducer does it thing and makes signal......that how it should be viewed. That signal, just like in an amplifier is subjected to bleed off to ground with a variable resistance known as a volume pot. The further you put the signal from ground the less the signal gets bled to ground and the stronger the signal that gets put out to drive the front end of an amplifier. The tone pot and tone capacitor circuit and whether its the 50's scheme or the modern scheme is a possible question.....as the variable resistance in the tone circuit also separates the cap from ground and at some point would render the cap's effects useless. Forget about any math or complexed science, its the practicality. The ultimate separation from ground would be a 1 meg pot, but its about the sweep of the pot at that resistance value. The smaller value pots have a broader sweep variation as opposed to trying to fit the similarity of that sweep in a 1 meg value. The physical size of the pot is really the issue.....never use the miniature pots....always use the full size as the resistive trace is a longer pathway in the full size pot even though its the same value. So reasoning, a 1 meg pot should be even physically larger than a standard size pot to be properly effective......it needs a longer pathway for the resistive trace. You really wouldn't want to use a 50 turn trim pot as a guitar pot...…..
If you look at a parallel scenario with the resistance......the coil is grounded and the winding itself has resistance....so if its an 8K humbucker, an 8K pot would be parallel and the result is a 4K to ground situation. If you go with a larger value pot than 8K, then the electricity situation comes into play and it would be the path of least resistance so it would be reflected back to the coil as the coil is static and doesn't change......and the pot would ramp itself up into non existence in the circuit as the flow would go to the lower resistance of the coil and its grounded situation. BUT WHO THINKS ABOUT THAT ???? The action of the pickup as a transducer is to produce signal.....measured in millivolts...…..
The main thing to keep in mind is the signal, you want to largest signal to hit the front end of an amplifier, and use the amplifier preamp controls to deal with the volume. Hence your guitar volume knob should be wide open and play the guitar properly with touch.....variable touch.....light or medium or heavy as this will result in the output of the signal via the strings & pickup....what comes out. Hitting hard will produce a big signal, hitting light will produce a light signal. Worst case, you back the guitar volume knob down by 1 or 2 notches......in controlling the amplifier, wide open for leads and backed off a notch or 2 for rhythm. You really shouldn't be all over the guitar volume pot messing with its full sweep. You want the pure signal and maximum signal which will be the true tonality of the pickup. The way a typical volume pot is wired in a guitar, at maximum sweep, the wiper of the pot and the non grounded leg connected to the hot wire of the pickup....separate the signal from ground by what ever the pots value is, they connect internally at maximum sweep. When you sweep less than the wide open max.....you introduce a series resistance because the pot becomes a voltage divider situation because the wiper in the pot has resistance between it and the leg of the pot connected to the hot wire of the pickup......and the other direction is still resistance to ground but less than the maximum value of the pot......and that's where the dynamic of the pickup gets affected......as put forth in the presentation by Dylan.
VERY interesting and informative! And very well presented! Thank you!
Good stuff.
I think this is extremely important for prototyping where you can objectively influence the tonal characteristics of a design assuming all prototypes are using the same magnet, wire and pole pieces, etc. That said, it only addresses the inductive properties of the pickup. As we know, the transductive tonal properties are influenced by magnet strength and coil geometry to some extent affecting output, brightness, etc.
But, back to the inductive properties, I feel q-factor is one of the most overlooked and under documented measurements that impacts both the tone and the feel of the pickup. A pickup with a lower resonant peak but higher q factor can easily be perceived as brighter than the pickup with a higher resonant peak and lower q factor because there's a less aggressive slope of the bump or peak at the given frequency. I have been documenting this with various vendors pickups and hope to eventually post the comparison in some sort of graphical format to help people compare both the resonant peak AND Q factor. I'll probably chart it by output, wire type, and magnet type, as to make the graphs more apples to apples and minimize the transductive impacts to the tone.
Great video, and VERY informative. Thank you very much!
Resonance happens when the value of inductive reactance equals the self capacitance of the coil. The peak is dampened by the dc resistance of the coil /circuit. The ratio between the two is known as Q. Higher the Q the sharper the peak. Lower resistance, the lower the Q and broader the resonant peak.
Coils have what is known as Self Resonance, a product of their Inductance and inter winding Capacitance. The finer the wire the more turns can be fitted on the bobbin thus higher Inductance and higher inter winding capacitance and therefor lower frequency of resonance. However with the finer wire and more turns comes more DC resistance which lowers the Q broadening the peak. With more turns you get more output voltage at the lower frequencies but the highs are reduced due to being bled off by the interwinding capacitance.
So it comes to the point how to match the right pickup to the right guitar, body response, etc... is there a way to find it?
its like the co-efficiency of a speaker. Each size speaker and design have a different co-efficiency, or its frequency it operates the loudest and easiest.
resonate peak and peak frequency it's same? please help me 🙃😫😫
Hey Dylan so would a large pot like a 2 meg with a large cap value like .047 or .056 end up with a higher frequency ceiling but lower resonant peak than a 250k pot and a higher value cap like a .015, which would be a lower frequency ceiling but a higher resonant peak?
Hi Dylan! Top! One more question.. how can i measure the resonant peak?
I came here thinking that maybe a shorter length of wire on s pickup made it more sensitive to higher frequencies and weaker, in a way that shorter things resonate with higher pitched sounds, or in the way that a tiny hole in a pinhole camera gives sharper detail but less light.
Only the inductance or capacitance change the actual resonance frequeny of a pickup. The resistive component as well as external resistive load reduce the height of the resonance peak. External capacitors/incutors (like cables and amplifiers) change the resonance frequency of the system and in most cases the resonance peak value. All these changes modify the sound of the guitar.
It is possible to remove most of the external influencers by introducing a very high input impedance buffer directly after the pickup (before the pickup selector). Such modified guitars are practically immune to changes in external conditions like pots, cables and alike.
Many thanks for this useful videos. How is it possibile to measure the capacitance of a pickup considering that it in the range of 50-200 pF? Thanks
What happens to the resonant peak when degauss the pickup magnet?
Degaussing is removing residual magnetism. Remove the magnetism and you have no induction and no output.
just wonderin do you have an opinion on why the epi pickups of old were so muddy, it appears they have corrected it, what might have they changed?
In the 50s, do you believe that gibson had any idea what they wanted a p-90 to sound like other that loud and clear? Compared to all the differences today ? I dont think so . I think if you know the basics,wire size and type of wire and a basic winding machine and even winds per turn ,you could fill a p-90 bobbin and have a great sounding pickup.
Sometime i feel technology gets in the way on the simplist of devices.
Having said that i do enjoy listening to everyones expertise on the subject.after ive wound 50 then my conclusion may be different.
Hi Dylan. What if I wire a low value (let's say, a couple of KOhms) resistor in SERIES with my pickup (i.e. wiring a resistor in between the pickup's hot wire and 3-way pickup selector - for example, it was 16K and now it's 18K (2 kOhms extra))? In this case we increase the pickup DC resistance on its own, without increasing inductance and capacitance. How would that change the pickup sound?
It will just turn down the volume....
my Gibson Dirty fingers on blower switch + 10ft fender cable =16.2Kohm . without the blower system, going thru normal circuit, 15.57Kohm. But after going into buffered tuner pedal, the resonant peak is 10K constant
03:33 if you just want the answer
Dylan, I have a doubt. When I increase the pot (250 K to 500 K) I1ll have more treble?
Ruy Mortari correct
@@DylanTalksTone Sir, you should update and re-post this video as a player myself I find it is a fantastic resource.
Pickup Impedance and Resonant Peak can be very important to the sound/tone a Guitarist is looking/searching for.
Great content Sir, shocking that this has so few views.
Thank You
So it sounds like the best thing to do is put the highest pots you can in and the highest capacitor in you can to give you the widest tonal range available. That being said would you use 1mil k pots and higher than a .47 cap to get the most range available and then use your tone knob to dial in what you want for sound?
+DylanPickups, does it make sense what jasonbloxham says ?
+jasonbloxham Not always. Hi capacitance can make some guitars sound dark and then the tone knob is not really of use because you have already loss so much treble. Too much resistance and you can lose some of the pickup color as the peak get down.
I tried 1meg pots in my strat and had to go back to250k so my answer is
no, not for single coils, 500k for humbuckers, 250k s.c. maybe1meg for P90s IMHOP.
Bf I watch this I say 8.5 k.is the best sound in my opinion..using a high gain amp but idk much else about how to pick a pick up help me lol
RMS 4 LYF
I respect what you are doing and it sounds like there is some schooling in your background.
But how you are presenting the issue is that you suggest that the resistance is added in series to the pickup....and that's not how a volume pot is wired in to control the pickup. The pickup as a transducer does it thing and makes signal......that how it should be viewed. That signal, just like in an amplifier is subjected to bleed off to ground with a variable resistance known as a volume pot. The further you put the signal from ground the less the signal gets bled to ground and the stronger the signal that gets put out to drive the front end of an amplifier. The tone pot and tone capacitor circuit and whether its the 50's scheme or the modern scheme is a possible question.....as the variable resistance in the tone circuit also separates the cap from ground and at some point would render the cap's effects useless. Forget about any math or complexed science, its the practicality. The ultimate separation from ground would be a 1 meg pot, but its about the sweep of the pot at that resistance value. The smaller value pots have a broader sweep variation as opposed to trying to fit the similarity of that sweep in a 1 meg value. The physical size of the pot is really the issue.....never use the miniature pots....always use the full size as the resistive trace is a longer pathway in the full size pot even though its the same value. So reasoning, a 1 meg pot should be even physically larger than a standard size pot to be properly effective......it needs a longer pathway for the resistive trace.
You really wouldn't want to use a 50 turn trim pot as a guitar pot...…..
If you look at a parallel scenario with the resistance......the coil is grounded and the winding itself has resistance....so if its an 8K humbucker, an 8K pot would be parallel and the result is a 4K to ground situation. If you go with a larger value pot than 8K, then the electricity situation comes into play and it would be the path of least resistance so it would be reflected back to the coil as the coil is static and doesn't change......and the pot would ramp itself up into non existence in the circuit as the flow would go to the lower resistance of the coil and its grounded situation.
BUT WHO THINKS ABOUT THAT ????
The action of the pickup as a transducer is to produce signal.....measured in millivolts...…..
The main thing to keep in mind is the signal, you want to largest signal to hit the front end of an amplifier, and use the amplifier preamp controls to deal with the volume. Hence your guitar volume knob should be wide open and play the guitar properly with touch.....variable touch.....light or medium or heavy as this will result in the output of the signal via the strings & pickup....what comes out. Hitting hard will produce a big signal, hitting light will produce a light signal. Worst case, you back the guitar volume knob down by 1 or 2 notches......in controlling the amplifier, wide open for leads and backed off a notch or 2 for rhythm. You really shouldn't be all over the guitar volume pot messing with its full sweep. You want the pure signal and maximum signal which will be the true tonality of the pickup. The way a typical volume pot is wired in a guitar, at maximum sweep, the wiper of the pot and the non grounded leg connected to the hot wire of the pickup....separate the signal from ground by what ever the pots value is, they connect internally at maximum sweep. When you sweep less than the wide open max.....you introduce a series resistance because the pot becomes a voltage divider situation because the wiper in the pot has resistance between it and the leg of the pot connected to the hot wire of the pickup......and the other direction is still resistance to ground but less than the maximum value of the pot......and that's where the dynamic of the pickup gets affected......as put forth in the presentation by Dylan.