Excess wax around pickup screws?

skunkwerx

Ello all. 

Just noticed this, is it normal, or has something gone wrong here? 

Theyre new (guitar is new), so untampered with. Seymour duncan '59 and a JB. 

See the wax in and around the screws on the pickups?
Never seen it in excess like this. 

I've made the top image worse because I scraped some out from the slot in the screw.. some came away, the rest turned whiter lol. 

Its on both the bridge and neck.

I don't know much about this kinda stuff, but I presume as the pickups are covered, the covers have been waxed sealed.. and I hope this is just a messy excess that isnt a problem. 

Some of the screw heads are clean as you can see, but 50% of them are full of wax. 

They seem to sound just fine. 

Whats yer thoughts?

longjaw

I've had a couple of guitars with a similar issue and it's never been a problem, easy enough to scrape off with a pin.
Think it's just excess from when they were dipped.

TTBZ

Had a few Bare Knuckles arrive like this and always assumed it’s normal, just a bit of excess from when they pot them I think.

OilCityPickups

It's pretty normal. We drain our wax potted pickups upside down to give a 'seal' between the bobbin tops and the cover and thus help prevent squeal. Many manufacturers do this, With us, we the clean up the covers and pole screws by hand when the wax has solidified slightly.It's an easy step to miss however, particularly if you are making a lot of pickups! The excess is totally harmless, and pretty easy to remove. 

Sassafras

They're an extremely dangerous fire hazard. They could go up at any time. Your whole guitar is at risk. I would invest in a pair of asbestos gloves.

Henrytwang

It’s quite normal on mass produced pickups to find wax leaking out, it can become apparent some time later in the pickups life as the wax never really solidifies. I’ve found that some old Korean Epiphone pickups are absolutely packed with wax and can actually leak around the baseplate. Of course you never had the problem with early Gibson PAFs as they were not potted.

OilCityPickups

Henrytwang said:

It’s quite normal on mass produced pickups to find wax leaking out, it can become apparent some time later in the pickups life as the wax never really solidifies. I’ve found that some old Korean Epiphone pickups are absolutely packed with wax and can actually leak around the baseplate. Of course you never had the problem with early Gibson PAFs as they were not potted.

Often lower end mass produced pickups use cheaper wax, which as you say, never totally solidifies and they use WAY more than is needed to do the job. Totally soaking the coils is unnecessary unless super high gain is going to be used, and often lots of wax is used to make up for poor winding and sloppy component fit. A well wound (and well assembled) pickup can go pretty high gain with zero or minimal potting.

skunkwerx

Thanks for all the replies guys. 

I'll get my hazmat suit out just incase.. but... 

Will give em a lil scrape, see if I can't tidy it up when I get the strings off! 

Henrytwang

OilCityPickups said:

Henrytwang said:

It’s quite normal on mass produced pickups to find wax leaking out, it can become apparent some time later in the pickups life as the wax never really solidifies. I’ve found that some old Korean Epiphone pickups are absolutely packed with wax and can actually leak around the baseplate. Of course you never had the problem with early Gibson PAFs as they were not potted.

Often lower end mass produced pickups use cheaper wax, which as you say, never totally solidifies and they use WAY more than is needed to do the job. Totally soaking the coils is unnecessary unless super high gain is going to be used, and often lots of wax is used to make up for poor winding and sloppy component fit. A well wound (and well assembled) pickup can go pretty high gain with zero or minimal potting.

I’ve improved the tone of old Korean Epiphone humbucking pickups in the past by removing the covers and Carefully melting the excessive wax with a heat gun. Although it doesn’t make them sound absolutely amazing there is a marked improvement in tone.