About The Pickups

I wanted to take a design that's known and loved, retain the core elements of it and do something different with the rest, construct it in a slightly different way, with an unconventional material. I own and play Stratocaster style guitars so it made sense to me to start there.

In most cases Stratocaster pickups are made from fiberboard with plastic covers or plastic bobbins holding slugs of some sort. I use 304 stainless steel for top and base flatwork. It's magnetic permeability (it's ability to form a magnetic field within itself when subjected to a magnet) is very low. So low that it's basically not there as far as the magnets are concerned. It can be laser cut to high accuracy, is hard wearing and finishes well. Base plates made from magnetic stainless steel are available, as an option for chunking up your bridge pickup, or all of them.

An additional advantage of using metal for the flatwork is that I can earth a lot of the structure that surrounds the coil. This really helps reduce hum. I earth by extending the ground lead of the pickup to a small screw fixing on the base.

Wax is a great material for potting but dipping doesn't suit my design and coil varnish is simply a better insulator and gives moisture and chemical protection, as well as protecting against vibration. It also means I can partially pot coils by painting varnish onto the outer surface.

I wrap pickups in waxed thread for protection and vibration damping, it also comes in some really nice colours. All my pickups can be customised to combine different top and base plate finishes and wrap colours. All options are available at no extra cost.

I've spent a couple of years winding and re-winding, measuring and listening. I'm finally happy with the sound.

I'm currently working on humbucker, Telecaster neck and P90 designs and hope to have those available soon. I'm always interested in discussing pickup designs, wiring, guitars and hearing new sounds.