rjgoos
24th June 2006, 4.48 pm
I have tried to read up on guitar pickups, and have tried to recall my college physics regarding electricity.
It is my understanding that single coil pickups, of course, pick up ambient 60-cycle hum from all of the AC from power mains, light bulbs, computers, etc. A 'humbucker' has a second coil, reverse wound, so that the hum is cancelled out. The unfortunate by-product is that some higher order harmonics are also lost. Some of the brightness of the single coil pickup is lost.
Strat owners can use switch positions 2 and 4 to give a humbucking effect. The middle pickup is wound reverse to the neck or bridge position, so that when combined with either the neck or bridge position pickup, hum cancellation occurs, again, with some loss of brilliance of tone. As, of course, each pickup is beneath the same set of strings.
So...is this a stupid idea...on a 10 or 12 string touchstyle instrument, with string sets physically separated, using two single coil pickups, one reverse-wound to the other. The hum (common to both pickups from ambient AC) should be cancelled, but since each pickup is picking up something different, the higher order harmonics from each pickup should not be cancelled? Or something like that? Or, is the loss of higher order harmonics not from cancellation, but from impedence/reactance of running the output through a second coil?
Did that make any sense? Perhaps I shouldn't try to theorize before having coffee in the morning.
Jay
Obviously, with two pickups sharing the same output jack, one would need a way of balancing their output. I am thinking mostly of hum and brightness, not volume here.
It is my understanding that single coil pickups, of course, pick up ambient 60-cycle hum from all of the AC from power mains, light bulbs, computers, etc. A 'humbucker' has a second coil, reverse wound, so that the hum is cancelled out. The unfortunate by-product is that some higher order harmonics are also lost. Some of the brightness of the single coil pickup is lost.
Strat owners can use switch positions 2 and 4 to give a humbucking effect. The middle pickup is wound reverse to the neck or bridge position, so that when combined with either the neck or bridge position pickup, hum cancellation occurs, again, with some loss of brilliance of tone. As, of course, each pickup is beneath the same set of strings.
So...is this a stupid idea...on a 10 or 12 string touchstyle instrument, with string sets physically separated, using two single coil pickups, one reverse-wound to the other. The hum (common to both pickups from ambient AC) should be cancelled, but since each pickup is picking up something different, the higher order harmonics from each pickup should not be cancelled? Or something like that? Or, is the loss of higher order harmonics not from cancellation, but from impedence/reactance of running the output through a second coil?
Did that make any sense? Perhaps I shouldn't try to theorize before having coffee in the morning.
Jay
Obviously, with two pickups sharing the same output jack, one would need a way of balancing their output. I am thinking mostly of hum and brightness, not volume here.