The heart of any electric guitar is the pickups. Body and neck wood, nut material, scale and bridge style may affect the tone, but it all starts with the pickups.
I am proud to announce a range of pickups suited to all genres and playing styles. Each pickup uses a pair of magnets per string, perfectly aligned to create the most dynamic sound.
Double Magnets per String
Double pole pieces ensure the string path stays within the magnetic field and to maximize harmonic overtones. This design helps with signal strength and prevents signal clipping that can occur with single-pole pickups.
This results in the following effects for Alderton pickups:
Improved Signal Path:
Each string falls between two pole pieces, allowing the string’s vibration to effectively transmit the signal to the pickup. This ensures that the string remains within the magnetic field as it moves, preventing potential signal clipping.
Enhanced Harmonic Transfer:
The string’s vibration in this position transfers more harmonic overtones (natural overtones that create a richer, fuller sound) than the fundamental tone.
Wider Range of Motion:
Having two magnets per string allows for a wider range of string motion while still maintaining a strong and consistent magnetic field.
Magnets used in my pickups are typically Alnico V’s:
Alnico V magnets have a strong magnetic field that helps to amplify the signal and produce a focused, well-defined tone.
Handwound For A Unique Sound
My pickups are hand wound, produced with the highest quality components and housed in a range of covers, in a wide range of formats, colours and designs.
Handwinding effects the output in a number of ways:
Hand-winding guitar pickups, also known as scatterwinding, results in a brighter, more open tone compared to machine-wound pickups, which tend to have a darker, less articulate sound. This is because hand-winding creates a more irregular and less uniform winding pattern, leading to a lower inherent capacitance.
Click here for a more detailed explanation:
Capacitance:
The number of turns and the way the wire is wound significantly impact capacitance. Machine winding creates a more uniform and compact coil, resulting in higher capacitance and potentially rolling off some high frequencies. Hand-winding, on the other hand, creates more space between the windings, leading to less capacitance and a brighter, more articulate tone.
Frequency Response:
Hand-wound pickups often have a wider range of frequency response, particularly in the higher frequencies, compared to machine-wound pickups.
Output and DC Resistance:
The number of windings also influences output and DC resistance. More windings typically lead to higher output and DC resistance, which can result in a “hotter” or more compressed sound. Hand-wound pickups, with their generally lower number of turns, tend to have a slightly lower output and DC resistance.
Individual Variation:
Hand-winding, with its more irregular pattern, can lead to greater variation in tone between individual pickups. Each pickup will have a unique sound due to the variations in winding tension, spacing, and wire placement.
Sculpting the Coil:
Hand-winding allows for more control over the coil’s shape and tension, which can further influence the pickup’s tone.
In essence, hand-winding offers a more nuanced and potentially brighter tone compared to machine winding. Each pickup will therefore have a unique sound, as unique as my basses and pedalboards.
Pickup Ranges
Copper
Overwound pickups with Alnico or Ceramic magnets producing a dark high output sound, especially suitable for high gain players.
Silver
Modern “standard” wound pickups, available with Alnico 5, Ceramic or a combination to create a dynamic response with medium output. These are suitable for most genres of music ranging from low to high gain.
Gold
Vintage style pickups with Alnico 5 magnets to create a warm sound with crisp highs and tight lows.
Each of my pickups is made to order and can be customised to your needs. Want Alnico, Ceramic in a Soapbar? Single coil or humbucker? Each set of pickups will be constructed to your specific requirements. Get in touch to discuss how we can make your sound.
Pickup Types
Single Coil
My single coil pickups are handwound over paired magnets with custom flatwork, shielded cables, wax dipped and sealed in resin to provide complete protection.
Humbucker
My humbuckers are handwound over paired magnets with custom flatwork, shielded cables, wax dipped and sealed in resin to provide complete protection with 5 way shielded cables to allow for parallel, series and coil tapped connections.
Multicoil Humbucker
Inspired by the P Bass split coil humbucker, this goes one step further. Instead of dual coils with one coil per pair of strings, this beast has a single coil for each string, in a North-South-North-South configuration from E to G.
The coils are wired in parallel internally, creating two pairs of North and South aligned coils, with 5 way output wiring to enable parallel or series humbucking.
To model the P Bass shift from neck to bridge across the strings, this pickup is offered in an unusual 10 degree offset, angling toward the bridge from E to G, resulting in an expanded range of lows and highs and adding a distinct P Bass growl. The unusual design means this can only be installed in Alderton basses, but a 5 degree offset version is available in soapbar housings for installation into standard basses that can house humbuckers or soapbars.
For basses with pickguards, the guards can be custom built to enable this to be also installed into standard P Basses or if preferred a P Bass split housing can be used for a traditional look.
None-bucker
My most unusual pickup inspired by a custom acoustic guitar I encountered in Portgual whilst visiting the amazing luthier Andy Manson. It consists of a pair of coils like a traditional humbucker, but the second coil is housed in the body away from the strings. The result of this franken-pickup? A clean sound, but with the punch and clarity of a single coil.
The primary coil, housed in the pickup itself lies under the strings, but with the secondary coil housed in the body, only present to remove the 50 or 60 Hz hum. By not cancelling out the higher frequencies in the way a normal humbucker does, the result is a silent single coil.
The original that inspired me requires a custom built scratchplate to hold the second coil. I have tweaked the design a little to enable the second coil to nestle in place inside the control cavity.
Pickup Covers
All Alderton pickup covers are custom made and I can provide pickups with traditional metal or plastic enclosures, but if you are looking for something a little different I also offer wooden or resin based covers in a wide range of styles, including transparent in any colour or finish.
Want a custom cut, imprint or a completely unique pickup for your bass or guitar? Get in touch
