Pickups over the decades

[untune]

Hi all,

I was just curious if anyone knows - was there any specific character to certain pickups as the years went by and things were revised and improved and such? Like a Precision pickup in 1962 - how would that one differ from say, 1970 and onwards?

I was just listening to mine and was thinking on the recording, it'd be nice if it had a little bit more output and was maybe a tad thicker in the mids. But it just got me wondering how the spec must have changed over time, and if there's a specific 'character' for each period... magnets, wire gauge, insulation, inductance etc

You hear all the buzzwords being thrown around like 'vintage sounding' and such when reading about modern ones, how much truth is there in that?

[Lozz196]

Well when I bought my 77 Precision there was another Basschatter there as well as me and the seller - and we had a chat about various Fender Precisions over the years, and he said that the 70s ones had a more "scooped" sound to them, in contrast to the more mid-present ones of the 60s. Now I`ve not had a 60s Precision, but certainly both of my 70s ones do have less mids than 90s onwards versions - had a fair few of them.

[untune]

Now that's interesting - mine is a CIJ PB70 as you know, and I was thinking that it could use a bit of a mid boost - maybe I' should try a Fender original 62. But then again my CIJ is from 2004-5 ish, it's hard to say what spec they were even wound to!

[Dingus]

It's difficult to tell how much the sound of the pickups change with time. How a 60s Fender sounds now is not neccesarilly how it sounded fifty years ago. I've played numerous 60s and early 70s Jazz Basses that had pickups that were quite frankly shagged- out and sounded weak , thin and microphonic due to the ravages of time. For some reason I think Precision pickups are slightly less susceptible, but there are still plenty that need rewinding or replacing. How the tone of Fender pickups differed from era to era is an interesting question and I know that some people think that stock Jazz Bass pickups from the early 70s onwards were more punchy , but that might be because of placement or the fact that they were newer and had therefore deteriorated less than their 60s counterparts.

Edited October 28, 2012 by Dingus

[chris_b]

Pickups used to be wound by hand and now they are wound by machine. I guess that would make a difference.

Pete Stevens, from Wal, told me that when the UK went metric the sound of their pickups changed due to the different size of the copper wire.

[Dingus]

[quote name='chris_b' timestamp='1351439981' post='1851199']
Pickups used to be wound by hand and now they are wound by machine. I guess that would make a difference.

Pete Stevens, from Wal, told me that when the UK went metric the sound of their pickups changed due to the different size of the copper wire.
[/quote]

Do you realise that by sharing this fact with the world that you will almost certainly be helping to create a market in pre-metric Wal basses? When this little snippet of information reaches Talkbass then the price of the original authentic-sounding pre-metric Wal basses will rocket.