Pickup Identification

Roysterdoyster

This question arose out of another thread (NGD) so I thought I’d ask it. I bought a telecaster and the seller said there was a Bareknuckle pickup in the bridge. Although to be fair to him he said he couldn’t confirm it as the previous owner had told him that, and so wasn’t charging anything extra for it. He had taken the guitar as a trade in against an amp and was just selling it on. He only told me that when I collected it, so I was never expecting it.

So the question is,how does one ever know what pickups are in a used guitar, on the assumption that there is no branding on them somewhere, but a commenter on the other thread suggested that they’re not (or at least the bareknuckles aren’t) and I can’t recall seeing a pick up branded anywhere except the top of it eg: Seymour Duncan.

So do we just take the word of the seller?

thegummy

Sorry I was mistaken in the other thread - I just checked now and mine are branded with their script logo on the bottom.

They are humbuckers though, can't say for sure if their single coils have branding on them.

Would be worth emailing and asking, they're usually very quick to reply.

thegummy

Just checked on Google - they do brand the bottom of their Tele pickups:

OilCityPickups

They are branded on the bottom, but it's very VERY difficult to determine which BK you actually have: as apart from the details on the outside of the original box, BK don't label their individual pickups with which model they are. DC resistance can be a help, but that's a bit of a long dawn out process of elimination ... and in the end, a bit of a guessing game. 

Funkfingers

TheGuitarWeasel said:

DC resistance can be a help but that's a bit of a long dawn out process of elimination ... and in the end, a bit of a guessing game. 

Taking the Seymour Duncan range as an example, several of their vintage style models have similar d.c. resistance values. (Certainly, close enough to fox a cheap multimeter ... and that is before considering the effects of temperature on the readings.) Then, there are several permutations of copper wire gauge, insulation and magnet material(s). The Antiquity series even comes with added fluff and dust!

Roysterdoyster said:

do we just take the word of the seller?

Worst case scenario, you eventually raise the bridge/tailpiece to discover no BKP logo on the underside of the bridge position pickup. That just means you can not claim the pickup to be something that it is not. 


Play the guitar as is. If you like the bridge position pickup, keep it. If you find it unsatisfying, change it.

Roysterdoyster

Funkfingers said:

TheGuitarWeasel said:

DC resistance can be a help but that's a bit of a long dawn out process of elimination ... and in the end, a bit of a guessing game. 

Taking the Seymour Duncan range as an example, several of their vintage style models have similar d.c. resistance values. (Certainly, close enough to fox a cheap multimeter ... and that is before considering the effects of temperature on the readings.) Then, there are several permutations of copper wire gauge, insulation and magnet material(s). The Antiquity series even comes with added fluff and dust!

Roysterdoyster said:

do we just take the word of the seller?

Worst case scenario, you eventually raise the bridge/tailpiece to discover no BKP logo on the underside of the bridge position pickup. That just means you can not claim the pickup to be something that it is not. 


Play the guitar as is. If you like the bridge position pickup, keep it. If you find it unsatisfying, change it.

Thanks for the reply. Ive no intention of changing, and I had agreed to buy it without mention of pick ups. So I don't really care what is in it. It was kind of a "oh and I believe there's a bareknuckle pickup in the bridge" Which just posed the question, without branding, how does one ever know what it is?

ICBM

It really baffles me why makers don’t identify their pickups properly.

skullfunkerry

The SDs I've got for sale at the moment have stickers on with the model numbers, as well as the Seymour Duncan logo etched into the metal plates on the bottoms of the pickups. Without the stickers you'd be pretty stuck I guess...

Johnnyseven

ICBM said:

It really baffles me why makers don’t identify their pickups properly.

Probably so it's less attractive to buy a used one than a new one, if the seller doesn't know or can't prove what it is.

WezV

There is also the chance of a rewind, which would not have a logo.

first guy sells it as a BKP rewind.  Second guy sells it as a BKP pickup.  

ICBM

Johnnyseven said:

Probably so it's less attractive to buy a used one than a new one, if the seller doesn't know or can't prove what it is.

Cynical... but possible.

WezV said:

There is also the chance of a rewind, which would not have a logo.

first guy sells it as a BKP rewind.  Second guy sells it as a BKP pickup.  

They do have Bareknuckle labels, so it wouldn’t stop that - just no model designation.

Funkfingers

ICBM said:

It really baffles me why makers don’t identify their pickups properly.

I suspect that some makers are pandering to customer fantasies.

Since, for example, a vintage Fender single coil carried no identifying markings, the purchaser of a present day vintage-alike pickup may wish to pretend that the modern recreation resembles the original item as closely as possible. Hence, no logo. 

normula1

Bare Knuckle didn't add a label to a Duncan I had them rewind (luckily I'd kept the invoice when I moved it on) whereas Oil City did add some labels.

WezV

ICBM said:

WezV said:

There is also the chance of a rewind, which would not have a logo.

first guy sells it as a BKP rewind.  Second guy sells it as a BKP pickup.  

They do have Bareknuckle labels, so it wouldn’t stop that - just no model designation.

their own pickups have stamps, not labels.   the rewinds I have seen don't have anything, nor would i expect them to.


they also made many custom models for a long time before restricting most customers to the standard range
 

ICBM

WezV said:

their own pickups have stamps, not labels.   the rewinds I have seen don't have anything, nor would i expect them to.

Ah, I see - you mean a Bareknuckle rewind of someone else's pickup, rather than a Bareknuckle pickup rewound by someone else! I assumed the second, and that they wouldn't want it passed off as one of theirs.

It's not that I'm so puzzled by though - it's the lack of model identification on the pickup, so if you've got one you may know it's a Bareknuckle, but without some at best informed guesswork you can't tell what type.

WezV

I think for a long time every other order was a customer request for a slight tweak on an existing design or a completely custom request ...  model names would not have helped tell you what you had.

that stopped when Tim decided the range was complete enough to cover most scenarios.  They could have stickers now

Some have also changed names and been tweaked along the way.  A tele Flat 50 from 10 years ago is a different model today.  I think it became the 52 model and they made a new 50 based on more experiences with the real things