1950's National Pickup.

Here's a crazy pickup from a 1950's National Town and Country. One of them is dead and needs a rewind. They sort of look like humbuckers at first but with they covers off the magnetic structure looks more like a mini Charlie Christian. They don't have much magnetic force. The good one shows that the coils are wound to a little more that 9K. I'll have to install these in the test guitar when there done to see what they sound like. Cool pickup!

1972 Fender Jazz Bass Bridge Pickup.

I got in a set of Fender Jazz Bass pickups this week to work on. They were microphonic and had all sorts of copper shielding tape stuck all over them. The owner said he was disappointed in the 1972 Jazz Bass because it just didn't have the punch that a good jazzer should. He wanted me to look the pickups over and see if I thought there was something we could do with them to get them sounding right.
After giving them the once over I figured out that the non original neck pickup and the original bridge pickup both had south facing poles! The magnets were improperly phased and that's what was causing some of his issue. The neck pickup also had some of the magnets shoved down too far in the bobbin. I corrected the magnet on the neck pickup, got rid of the shielding tape and potted the pickups. They will be heading back home in a few days.

Fender Duo-Sonic makeover.

Here is that Fender Duo-Sonic I was telling you about. It's a newer guitar that had a dead bridge pickup so the owner wanted to see if we could get a little Tele style twang out of it while fixing it. I wound it up with 43 ga wire like a Tele would have. Then I made a steel base plate for it to help give it a little more of that Tele flavor.
As soon as it's out of the wax pot it's getting boxed up and shipped back home to Ireland. I can't wait to hear what the owner thinks.

Single coil Madness!

The shop is full of Fender and Fender inspired single coils this week. I have built a set of vintage style Strat pickups for Benford Guitars. I'm also reworking a cool Fender Duo-Sonic to get a more Tele type sound out of it. More on that later this week. Got some custom J-Bass pickups going together. There's a Tele humbucking bridge pickup on the bench right now.

It's a busy week!

Lily Allen - The Fear

Big Screen Bliss

The new CD from Six String Bliss featuring movie songs we all know and love has just been released on their web site for FREE! Click on the Big Screen Bliss picture to go to their web site and down load the full 14 track CD. Or better yet down load episode # 142 of the Six String Bliss guitar podcast and hear the guys go through each track and comment on them.

Oh, and the very first track on the CD is your truly doing a cover of a cars classic.

Here is how Pipes and PT introduced the CD to the world...

First the Bliss community covered some of the most memorable theme songs of the small screen with the album Stay Tuned. We couldn't stop there! Now we moved on to our big screen debut with the Album Big Screen Bliss where we take on the movie themes you know and love.

According to Pipes, co-host of the Podcast: “Movie soundtracks are designed to be pure emotion. They are designed to make you feel. This was a perfect fit for the Six-String Bliss community”. Stated PT Hylton, the program’s other co-host: “One of the most rewarding parts of putting this album together was seeing the growth of the musicians in our community. This album is focused, confident and just plain fun!”

Check it!

Why is Jeff Schmidt cooler than you?

This is why...

Keep the change...

"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." -Winston Churchill

Unkel Mike's Operation

I got a note today from Jason who is the son of our own UnkleMike. I did a little pickup work and built a left handed tone circuit for him just last week. Mike has been waiting a long time for a double lung transplant. I'm not going to post the entire thing but here is an abridged version.

If you didn't receive the first email, this is Jason, Mike's son. I will be typing up some updates for you until dad is able to use a computer again. The transplant happened at about 1:00 am Thursday morning and was finished at about 10:40 am. Everything went well as expected! When we first came in to see him around 1:00 pm on Thursday, he was pretty incoherent but he was able to twitch and move his eyes underneath his eyelids. You should have seen all the needles and tubes coming out of him...quite the site. Yesterday was an enormous day of recovery for him. He went from simply being awake and alert again, to sitting up in a chair later in the day, to actually eating meatloaf and mashed potatoes for supper (which by the way was the first time he'd eaten since about noon on Wednesday). I came in to visit him earlier today and his color was better than I've ever seen it. His cheeks and nose are no longer the purplish color they used to be. Currently dad still has quite a few tubes in him, although I would say he's got about half as many in now as he did on Thursday....

...Dad's been keeping himself busy by thinking about what he wants to do when he gets out...I don't think I've ever seen this side of my dad...he's so ambitious! He told me he's looking forward to fishing and golfing again and wants to finally take my mom on their honeymoon (they never had one..it's been 25 years!). He said today that he thought he would be doing
more reading to keep himself busy but I guess he can't get comfortable because of all the tubes in him. If all goes well he could be out of the intensive care unit by tomorrow or Monday. Following that he will begin the long road to
rehabilitation. I'd like to thank everyone for being so supportive throughout this whole process. All of your prayers and thoughts have helped make this a reality finally. I know it's a huge burden off my mom's shoulders. I will try to keep everyone posted in the upcoming days as his recovery continues to progress. Again, thank you all and god bless!

So just remember Mike and wish him well. All his prayers have been answered but he's still got a long year ahead of him.