Mini humbuckers vs Johnny Smith pickup (they are different)

[feet]

Curiously, my usa kent Armstrong mounts into the neck from the bottom, not the sides. So the little prongs stick out of the top of the pickup and you shove it in there. Not sure when that stopped happening, but it's clearly for the best.

One thing I noticed about this thread is that there are no clips. If only some hero out there had a guitar and all these minis and some time on his hands. Such an underrated, little understood pickup.

I do recall people complaining about firebird pickups over the years, saying the current ones are too cheap and hot, and best little resemblance to the classic firebird sound. Ceramic magnets are often to blame. I don't know. I only played a firebird for a little once at a guitar center and I liked what I was hearing as cleans to, but I don't know if it was the guitar, the Dr z I plugged into or both. I'd try it again, but I'm partial to the ornate white ones.

But I have my Sheraton with minis, and I'm plenty happy with that. And I'll always be curious about hofners and guilds, but I think my buying days are largely over.

[aquin43]

The sound of the pickup is affected by the core material of the coils and the material of the cover as well as by the coils themselves. For example, a magnet as a core has fairly low losses and doesn't produce much high frequency loss while the steel screws used as adjustable poles have large eddy current losses that lead to a high frequency roll off. The metal can acts as a shield that causes a further high frequency roll off which depends on the material. Nickel silver is the best. The following diagram shows the frequency responses of a late 60's Johnny Smith pickup in situ with a typical cable and the volume at full. The two coils have different frequency responses.


Arthur

[garybaldy]

Out of curiosity I've ordered one of these Artec A5 Mini floaters. Don't know why the pole screws are so long on a neck mount. I'll have to cut them down. I have a ceramic version which is thinner and no pole screws. It's surprisingly good on my Fenix FAE8 (EER-a-like).
https://www.ebay.it/itm/Artec-JAZZ-G...-/324007433865

[pingu]

tel:1024259[/URL]"]1024259[/URL]]The DeArmond 1100 is wound as two coils directly on two weird rubberized ceramic magnets, one for the top two strings and the other for the bottom four. If I get it right (and seriously, this could be 100% wrong) at least one coil is partially wound and then they are wound some more across both magnets together.

It's a tricky piece of work -- as complex at the Dano Lipstick PU is simple.

Wish I could find a pic.

i believe you’re describing the RC1000
and they put some turns onto the bottom 4
poles , then added the top two and wound some more
apparently to balance the pickup for
bronze strings

and the RC 1100 is just one coil i think

not sure about the guitar mike (sic)


and what the two slots are for ....
anyone know ?

[KirkP]

and what the two slots are for ....
anyone know ?

The patent says the slots help balance the string volume. The original design showed only one slot for the first string.
https://patentimages.storage.googlea.../US2455046.pdf

[Cunamara]

The sound of the pickup is affected by the core material of the coils and the material of the cover as well as by the coils themselves. For example, a magnet as a core has fairly low losses and doesn't produce much high frequency loss while the steel screws used as adjustable poles have large eddy current losses that lead to a high frequency roll off. The metal can acts as a shield that causes a further high frequency roll off which depends on the material. Nickel silver is the best. The following diagram shows the frequency responses of a late 60's Johnny Smith pickup in situ with a typical cable and the volume at full. The two coils have different frequency responses.


Arthur

Although the Gibson JS only has one coil (the slug coil); the screw coil is a steel plate with the screws mounted in it, transferring one pole of the magnet while the slug coil is the other pole. Not sure what that means in terms of frequency response compared to two coils in a mini-humbucker.

[Hammertone]

hofner german mini-hums are great...have the woody hollowness of a fender single coil with tone rolled back...but dead quiet...and have some of that p-90 midrange grit..(but again with no noise..humbucking!)...when pushed ... wonderful pups


cheers

I prefer to call them "Hofner mini-hums." They are/were used on European-built Hofner electric and jazz guitars as well as a several of their Chinese-built import models. They did go through some changes from their introduction @1998 to now - from 2-conductor to 4-conductor wiring, and from generally higher DC output to matched sets with 4 & 5K outputs.This is what they look like inside...

[Cunamara]

How did those mount to the guitar? There's no legs, mounting screw holes, etc. that I can see.

[neatomic]

How did those mount to the guitar? There's no legs, mounting screw holes, etc. that I can see.

the pickup ring has 2 side screws on each side that hold the pup in place..definitely an odd design!




cheers

[neatomic]

and what the two slots are for ....
anyone know ?

there is no magnet under the g string slot..and the one under the high e is very small...so those slots help with the string to magnet balance


cheers

[Cunamara]

the pickup ring has 2 side screws on each side that hold the pup in place..definitely an odd design!




cheers

Huh! Well look at that. The end result is a very clean looking installation.

[Hammertone]

Huh! Well look at that. The end result is a very clean looking installation.

That's the ring for mounting the pickup on the face of the guitar. It comes in two heights and was developed in 1961. A modified version of that ring was developed @2000 and is used to mount the Hofner floating pickup off of the neck of the Chancellor, New President, Jazzica, and Verythin JS model :