Building a custom hybrid 7 string set

OilCityPickups

@DefaultM has ordered a lovely set of hybrid magnet 7 string pickups to fit his Ibanez, so I thought I'd show you how the design and production process works within Oily Towers :-)
The issue is that most off the shelf seven string sets don't actually fit Ibanez guitars properly ... so our job is to fix that. I got him to send me the old pickups so that careful measurements could be made ... and then 

OilCityPickups

Hummmm having some issues getting the video to play ... sorry ... ha got it! More to come on this build shortly

4string

Works for me.

OilCityPickups

For those interested ... the opening riff in the video is played on an Oil City Masterwound Route 66 Strat neck pickup :-)

OilCityPickups

The pickups whose form factor I had to copy.  The eagle eyed among you may notice that the middle pickup is not really a conventional single coil, it's simply one humbucker coil sat on top of two ceramic magnets: not enough coil height for proper single coil treble response .... Hummmm I think we can do better than that. 

The two new baseplates ans the bobbins I will use ... one spare plate in case I cock up lol.

DefaultM

Ah I was hoping you'd do a thread like this 

OilCityPickups

DefaultM said:

Ah I was hoping you'd do a thread like this 

I like people to see for themselves the care work that goes into their pickups ... the technology we have invested in , and also just the good, old fashioned engineering :-)
This may run to several parts as it's quite a 'big' build :-)

DefaultM

My aim is to have your pickups in all my guitars. Only 3 to go after this I think.

OilCityPickups

Next part: I apologise to @DefaultM for the time this is taking, but these are complex pickups, with only the bobbins being a standard part ... and, as we shall see even those are modified in the middle, single coil unit!


The custom 3mm thick baseplate uses a slotted hole for the four conductor hook-up wire to exit ... a small touch, but this allows the wire to exit the pickup base at an angle rather than going straight down.  What's wrong with straight down you may ask? Well cavity depth is limited on many 7 strings, and the bend needed on the relatively thick four conductor 4mm cable to go through 90 degrees soaks around 6mm of clearance ... making your pickup essentially 2mm taller. With a slot you only use the 4mm of actual cable diameter.

You see in the pic the copper ground plane attached ... and next

The 'magnet pack' is added ... this 7 string uses our 'Tapered Magnet Grade' system and the assembly is protected from prying eyes of competitors by tape and gunk for this pic ... sorry :-) As far as I know I am the only winder using this technology  ... which allows the benefits of using alnico and ceramic magnets in the same pickup BUT specifically applied to certain strings.

Next the bobbins are mounted. The gloop you see on top is potting wax, as the bobbins have already been potted 'naked' for maximum penetration (oooer missus) but will be potted again with the whole pickup once fully assembled. Double potting ensures lack of nasties in the high-gain environments most 7 strings inhabit. 

Again, little touches ... we custom cut bobbin spacers from maple that create snug pockets for the pigtail wires to sit in, leading to nice, neat wire runs and snug fitting final tape wrapping.


Next: on to the middle pickup. This was a special challenge, as the Ibanez unit fitted wasn't really a proper single coil, just being one half of a humbucker (normal shallow bobbin) sat on top of two ceramic magnets. The key to a 'Fender like' tone is a tall bobbin and this most certainly didn't have that!  I am limited to 17.3mm of overall pickup height by the Ibanez routing but actually that is plenty to fit in a heavily customised 7 string version of my Materwound Lizzy-Belle P90/Strat hybrid.

To be continued :-) 

DefaultM

Awesome. You don't have to apologise for the time, they're obviously a lot of effort and work.
I'm glad that they'll be the same height as a regular pickup after the hell I've had with the bareknuckles!

OilCityPickups

DefaultM said:

Awesome. You don't have to apologise for the time, they're obviously a lot of effort and work.
I'm glad that they'll be the same height as a regular pickup after the hell I've had with the bareknuckles!

It's always difficult for manufacturers where there are multiple standards at work for mounting pickups, especially body mounting 7 strings.
I decided a while ago to go for the low profile fibre baseplates as standard on my 7 strings. This came about after creating custom angled 7s for Carillion guitars, and meant I had some standard CAD drawings that could be modified for streight pickups and other spacings. This means I can be very flexible and also offer super low profile pickups ... as the 'cranked' metal baseplates really do suck up space. 

Anyway, on with the pickup build: 

Right ... this middle pickup well the original Ibanez is really just half a humbucker, with the very shallow bobbin that characterises a bucker, simply sat on a pair of big ceramic magnets. To get a proper stratty tone you need a deeper bobbin, so I would have to custom build one to be 20% taller but still not make the pickup any higher overall. The baseplate would be cut with our laser, then given a ground plane like the humbuckers.


I suffer for my art!!! in making the custom bobbin there was 'claret!'


Anyway
Here we have the as yet unwound custom bobbin ... trial fitted with pole screws and 'placeholder' magnets to check it all goes together.


I have used black slot head pole screws for the middle pickup as these are available in the softer grade steel that better suits single coil tone. The pole screws are not driven in all the way ... and won't stick up like that on the finished pickup.

More soon

OilCityPickups

Now to wind the single coil bobbin (while I wait for a consignment of more screw pole bobbins from the US for the neck pickup). The Ibanez middle pickup was a strange beast indeed ... virtually an empty bobbin , obviously filled with very VERY fine 44 or even 45awg wire. This made for a tall coil,true, which is good on an SC Strat style pickup... er ... ish, but it comes with the price of extra compression and tons of treble roll off. My stretched bobbin would hold 43awg wire ... much closer to what's needed for a Strat style response.


And here it is wound and potted.

more soon ....