why do pickups go dead?

[pcola_rhodes]

hello all,

i recently replaced 2 dead pickups with ones from vintage vibe...problem solved.  about a week later, another pickup died.  got a new pickup from vintage vibe - works fine now.  now, a couple weeks later, i have another dead pickup!  

is there a particular cause for this?  i'm not adjusting the pickup or touching it.  it seems that my pickups are dying one by one, and it's getting a bit expensive to replace a pickup every few weeks.

[pianotuner steveo]

old age is the best guess I have. Anyone else have an answer?

[4kinga]

I want to know why the hair thin wire lead always breaks at the start of the wind, not the end!

I have had success (although limited) scraping the wire, put a bend on it and make a short jumper to the post.  Can be done on a Hammond too.  Its just really tough.  But if its already gone, nothing lost.

[jim]

yeah always at the start of the wind!!

also breaking pickups seems to be more common on the white tape models, I've worked on several rhodes's where as many as 45 and up can just die, and as soon as you have the piano ready to go again, another bunch will go. (this is ALWAYS on white tape models)
a dude told me once that this era of pickup is made from two materials, one of which kills the other.

i've rarely successfully done the hook method,
i have built a mixer rig, works a treat (variable speed) and i have gotten quite fast...my most hated rhodes job though, winding pickups.

[ZeroGravity]

How do you unwind the dead pick up?
And do you use the same wire to rewire the pick up?

I have also tried to rewire a few recently, using an electric drill at slow speed, but I had to do the unwinding manually(!), or the wire would break or get stuck.
Is there any info on how much windings there are? Or the length of the entire wire?
All I know is the DC resistance of a good pick up...

Greetz,
ZeroGravity

[jim]

it took me a very very very long time to get good at the mixer technique.

i have fashioned bits of metal and odds and ends to hold the pickup in the right place and attach it to the mixer.

to wind the wire off:
i have a door stop connected to the mixer, and the pickup connected to a pencil with two roller skate bearings around it. i hold the bearings, tape the wire to the door stop and start. The pickup spins freely. i keep tension with a finger on the wire as it passes from the pickup to the door knob.
it's very important to keep the off winding even, for when you wind it back on.

when you get to the end:
remove door stop from mixer,
the pickup is attached to a bit of metal and then to mixer, with all effort put into centering it.
the door stop then goes around a paintbrush, i hold the paintbrush, turn on the mixer which makes the pickup pull the wire onto itself.
and the door stop spins freely.
again i keep tension with a finger.

i guess this is "scatter winding" like all the 60's fender pickups, but not by choice.

you'd be surprised how strong the wire is,
you'd also be annoyed when it breaks.

how many winds, i have no idea but it will be the same or close to what it was because the wire is the same length.

i think i got lucky with the shape of the mixer, it's connections and the variable speed, it all seemed to come together as a really good machine for rhodes pickups.
also sometimes i make pizza bases.

[Rob A]

Yeah but you can't beat the tone you get out of the pizza bases from the early 70s.

[ZeroGravity]

Thanks for the info!
If I can find a way to spin the pick up freely and without any tension, then I might be able to unwind the wire without any problems. Rewinding the pick up isn't really a problem. You just have to guide the wire a bit, so it gets evenly distributed on the core.
I'll keep searching for a method, I have 30+ dead pick ups still lying around to experiment with.
And on a side note: I never encountered dead pick ups on mark I piano's. It's always the mark II ...


Greetz,
ZeroGravity

[jim]

Rob,

pizza :lol:


also, the first time i unwound a pickup i unwound it onto nothing, just pulled and pulled, it was a mess. and kinda funny. what did i expect to happen?!