Is it possible to have a pole style and bar style pickup all in one?

[jackevorkian]

Probably exposing my ignorance of the physics of pickups, but...

Say you wanted a Tele and PAF all in one. It may not me elegant to look at, but is it physically possible to have a Tele pole style pickup housed with a PAF bar magnet style pickup? Or would their proximity create all sorts of magnetic chaos?

[Ashe]

Probably exposing my ignorance of the physics of pickups, but...

Say you wanted a Tele and PAF all in one. It may not me elegant to look at, but is it physically possible to have a Tele pole style pickup housed with a PAF bar magnet style pickup? Or would their proximity create all sorts of magnetic chaos?
try it out. go build one. people may say it will be horrible, but i doubt they've actually built one and tried.

sometimes reality and theory don't match up.... like all the time with scientists and carbon dating.


but i digress, this is about pickups, not something fickle like scientists... and their ever changing theories.

[Structo]

You mean like Seymour Duncan P Rails?

http://www.seymourduncan.com/products/electric/humbucker/medium-output/prails_shpr1/

[jackevorkian]

You mean like Seymour Duncan P Rails?

http://www.seymourduncan.com/products/electric/humbucker/medium-output/prails_shpr1/

huh...so it sort of exists already. the single coil tone isn't too tele-ish, but still pretty cool.

[Giraffecaster]

Don't think I understand what you're after... Do you want a Tele bridge pickup bobbin with PAF bobbin in a humbucker?

Teles coils are large and deep. PAF's are smaller and shallower. You might be able to cram it all in, but it will neither sound like a Tele nor a PAF.

[V-P]

Don't think I understand what you're after... Do you want a Tele bridge pickup bobbin with PAF bobbin in a humbucker?

Teles coils are large and deep. PAF's are smaller and shallower. You might be able to cram it all in, but it will neither sound like a Tele nor a PAF.

But it would make a great pickup for coil splitting if it was possible.
And the the same thing but a strat neck pickup instead of the tele pickup for the neck position.
Would be a very versatile setup!

[Whiskeyrebel]

So, rod magnets in one bobbin and in the other bobbin, steel screws or slugs butted up to a bar magnet in the baseplate? I suppose a quick way to try that would be to take an arrangement like the Peavey Predator AX. It has two separate RWRP single coils in the bridge position side by side, rather than a pickup that mounts both bobbins on a shared baseplate. If one of the two had a bar magnet and the other had rod magnets, there you go.

[Giraffecaster]

But it would make a great pickup for coil splitting if it was possible.
And the the same thing but a strat neck pickup instead of the tele pickup for the neck position.
Would be a very versatile setup!

But again it would not sound like a good tele pickup or a good PAF pickup.

I've tried replacing the slug coil bobbin slugs with magnet rod pole pieces and using the regular humbucker bar magnet. Found that it didn't sound like a PAF anymore and the split tone wasn't that great either.

I've also tried a tele neck pickup (small enough to fit under a humbucker cover) with a humbucker bobbin and again it wasn't great sounding.

The tele bridge pickup gets its sound from the bridgeplate, the backplate, the thick coil, and how it has a large footprint. It won't fit under a humbucker cover by itself! And it's the wrong string spacing.

Additionally, the extra magnet makes an odd magnetic field.

If you want a humbucker to split and sound like a tele, perhaps a Rio Grande Twangbucker may work out better?

[walterw]

any "steel-pole" tele pickup will consist of humbucker-style steel slugs with bar magnets underneath.

it'll be louder and less twangy than the same coil wrapped around individual alnico rod magnets.

[Whiskeyrebel]

Hmmm... I've mentioned this before, but what about rod magnets in one bobbin and a bar magnet in the other? Think a Strat pickup paired with a Melody Maker pickup. Sort of a Firebird pickup with asymmetric coils.

[LarryOM]

How about a humbucker with magnets instead of slug poles, and a steel bar instead of a bar magnet? The steel bar would transfer some of the magnetism from the magnets to the screw poles in the other coil.

[Giraffecaster]

Larry OM,
Duncan makes this as well as their "Stag Mag":
http://www.seymourduncan.com/products/custom-shop/humbuckers/nokie_edwards_s/

[LarryOM]

Larry OM,
Duncan makes this as well as their "Stag Mag":
http://www.seymourduncan.com/products/custom-shop/humbuckers/nokie_edwards_s/
Neither is exactly what I was describing. One coil would be a typical humbucker screw coil. The other coil would have magnet poles instead of steel slugs. And underneath would be a steel bar instead of a bar magnet.

[Whiskeyrebel]

How about a humbucker with magnets instead of slug poles, and a steel bar instead of a bar magnet? The steel bar would transfer some of the magnetism from the magnets to the screw poles in the other coil.
That's almost a Johnny Smith pickup I think.

[EADGBE]

http://www.weloveshopping.com/shop/client/000032/ddaymusic/513.jpg

The DiMarzio megadrive. It's splittable.

[robertkoa]

I thought the OP meant a Humbucker where one side is Alnico Rods ( like Strat or Tele ) and the other side is like a PAF coil.

So coil cut you have "true" single coil and yes the PAF coil would have to be wound a little darker to compensate in Humbuckler mode and no it would NOT sound exactly like a PAF in full Humbucker mode- but could be really cool in both modes.

Does anyone make this?

[Giraffecaster]

Neither is exactly what I was describing. One coil would be a typical humbucker screw coil. The other coil would have magnet poles instead of steel slugs. And underneath would be a steel bar instead of a bar magnet.

Humbucker construction has a bar magnet in the middle that touches the slugs and the screw retainer plate to magnetize both coils. By having "a steel bar" underneath it would essentially sound like a really weak single coil because only one coil would have a magnetic field - the one with the slug magnets.

I was taking apart a humbucker a while back that used what was essentially half of a bar magnet but it was ceramic and it went out the outside of the coil relative to the center of the humbucker. Something like that may work to achieve what you're talking about, but again it wouldn't sound all that great.

To take it back a bit, pickups with rod magnets tend to sound more focused and have more chime. Pickups with bar magnets tend to have more midrange. It has to do with the way the magnetic fields of each type of magnet interact with the strings.

By putting in a rod magnet coil in a humbucker platform it won't sound like a traditional humbucker.

By putting in a humbucker sized coil with rod magnet it won't sound like a traditional single coil.

If there was a way to combine it all and make a pickup that captures both sounds dead on, do you not think that the plethora of pickup makers today wouldn't have come up with a solution years ago?

[TonyD]

This is called a Johnny Smith pickup. It's a humbucker with adjustable pole pieces for one coil and and a blade magnet in the other coil. Good article below.

http://www.premierguitar.com/Magazine/Issue/2009/May/Humbuckers_and_Mini_Humbuckers.aspx

Novak and Lollar make them.

http://www.lollarguitars.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=LGP&Product_Code=264&Category_Code=humbucker-pickups

http://curtisnovak.com/pickups/miniJS.shtml