Make A Guitar Pickup

Step 7 Potting the pickup

Potting or saturating a pickup with wax is done to help keep the wires in the coil in place and prevent the pickup from becoming microphonic.

I used Gulf Wax (candle wax) to saturate my pickup because it was available, but you could also use a mixture of 80% candle wax and 20% beeswax.

Melting the wax directly on top of a heat source, in a saucepan on the stove, for example, can overheat the wax and cause it to become highly flammable. And we do not want to lose our eyebrows while making guitar pickups do we? NO! So, to melt the wax, I filled a big container about half full of almost boiling water and placed a smaller container inside. A tin can works transfers the heat from the water to the wax more effectively, so use one if you have one handy. Gulf wax comes in blocks, which don't melt very quickly, so I used a knife to break the wax into smaller pieces. Then I put this wax in the smaller container.

When the wax is completely melted, hold your pickup by the lead wires and submerse it in the wax. You will see bubbles coming out of the coil and you need to leave the pickup in the wax until the bubbles stop. For me this seemed to be about 5-10 minutes, but for you it could be longer.

Take the pickup out of the wax and wipe of the excess while it's still in a liquid form.

Comments

[BadgerDervy]

I did this, but it was very quiet because I used bolts that weren't very magnetic as polepieces. I tried it again using alnico magnet polepieces and it sounds good to me, sound demo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qa37BO9XbBA Thanks for this instructable. I found it really useful.

[renegade_rabbit]

Seen the video, sounds damn good. Awesome job

[Leperello Mikesiah]

Sounds good!! Quite similar to how mine sounds actually. Thanks for sharing, really, it's cool to see this has helped so many people. :)

[BadgerDervy]

Mine had no bubbles..... I found this quite disconcerting, but so far my pickup seems to work.

[zazarul]

hey,if using steel its okay or not..in screw

[DK69]

the screw can be a variety of metal compositions some work better than others the easiest way to look at it is take your magnet, see which screws you have that seem to stick the best to your magnet and use them they have more iron if they are same size, but experiment too, I say at first start with what u have with best attraction for first try at it

[zazarul]

OK.......thanks

[zazarul]

because i NOT understand...part wax candle

[ojb197]

Dude, bad solder joint on both wires!! try using eyelets, you can get those from stewart-macdonald.

[RetroTechno]

You should edit this to explain how the wax can become dangerously flammable if heated incorrectly. Your method is the safe one, but the reader may not understand the need for the double-boiler approach.

[Leperello Mikesiah]

Oh, you're right. Thanks for the suggestion, I hadn't really thought of that.

[PAPAROACH]

how much did this cost you to make this pickup

[Leperello Mikesiah]

I happened to have almost everything I needed on hand, so I really only had to buy the screws and the magnets, if I remember correctly. So for me, about $5?

[PAPAROACH]

thats is actually pretty cheap i thought that it was around 10 dollars

[RetroTechno]

Nice. :-)

[PAPAROACH]

(removed by author or community request)

[zimmemic25]

could you please stop writing ALL IN CAPSLOCK? it looks like you are shouting at people, and people usually dont like to answer someone who is shouting at them. and, yes he submerged the entire pickup, as you can see in picture2@step7

[PAPAROACH]

sorry dude

[freestriker]

hi your idea for ading wax was great but i used cianocrylate and it works great it is easier but more expensive

[gorgo333]

would electrical or duct tape work for this instead of wax???

[Leperello Mikesiah]

The wax fills in the spaces between the wires and keeps them from vibrating too much and tape wouldn't exactly do the same thing. Wax isn't expensive and you can get it at Walmart. (I think it was by the Jello in my Walmart.) Thanks for reading!