Replacing a pick ups with modern ones

[Dunder]

Hello, long time reader first time writer in New Zealand.
Hello, thanks to moderators for help in getting me on forum.
Here's my baby http://i304.photobucket.com/albums/nn17 ... GP7327.jpg
http://i304.photobucket.com/albums/nn17 ... GP7329.jpg
http://i304.photobucket.com/albums/nn17 ... GP7328.jpg
I think it's Kawaii
It's labelled "westerner", nailed onto the headstock.
One day I will have it rewound but for now the bridge pickup is kaput.
Anyway it's debatable if a rewind will be a true restore, surely, and the only guy who does it in my town is notoriously slow. So in the mentime, what stats do I need to ask the man in the shop for a new pickup?
Do I need more chime (what's chime?) I've no idea. What'd be an improvement? Are the pickups intechangeable? Can active pickups just slot in? would passive be the go. I'm marrying this with the original at the neck.

[cheepaxes]

So many questions! :)

Chime - does anybody really know what "chime" is ? To me it's high end, or high mid range, that has a pleasing quality and is more often a part of a clean or mildly overdriven sound than a heavily overdriven or distorted one. Do you need chime? Beats me.

As for a replacement, do you care whether it looks anything like the neck pickup? If so, are you willing to replace both?

I would think you would have a fair amount of leeway in what you put in that guitar, as it *looks* like a humbucker could go in there, or you could keep the chrome surround and put a single coil pickup in there. However I'd measure before making definte plans to do either of those things.

As to whether the pickups are interchangeable, you can certainly swap them. There's no way to know by looking whether one will sound like the other. All other things being equal, any pickup in the neck position will be louder than the bridge pickup. Sometimes guitar manufactirers will wind the bridge pickup a little hotter to compensate for that. If so, they are (arguably) not interchangeable. Sometimes manufacturers just use the same pickups and address the issue by adjusting the pickup heights to equalize the two.

As for what would be an improvement, some people might say just about anything would be an improvement over the Japanese pickups that are in there. Other people go out of their way to get Japanese pickups because they think they sound good, or different, or funky, etc... Are you happy with the sound of the working one? What kind of sound are you looking for? What kind of music do you play?

What kind of budget do you have?

Welcome. :)

-Scott

[Spud1950]

Are you sure it's actually the pickup that's not working and not some other problem in the circuit,such as the switch?

[Mgeek]

Those pickups were used on loads of japanese guitars of the era

If you check ebay you should be able to get an exact replacement for not much dough...

I know some people are big fans of swapping pickups out- but imnsho they are all basically magnets with wire wrapped round them, and are just one of many variables that go into making the tone of a guitar. If you were happy with the sound before get one that's the same.

[wietse]

[Dunder]

[Dunder]

[Dunder]

[johnnyb]

keep checking e-bay. i picked up 2 of those exact pickups about a year ago. $19 for both. they are out there, and in-expensive.

[Dunder]

[johnnyb]

here is the pickup. its seems to be a dead match. and heres an idea for you. I opened it up and there isnt much to it. you could use the outer casing, which is what you really need to keep the look, and put a cheap replacement in there. its just a coil on top of a magnet and they are just double sided taped on top of each other. im sure something would be able to fit in there.

[Spud1950]

Keep an eye on this guys eBay store. He sells a lot of pickups from old Japanese guitars and has had those exact ones for sale in the past.

[Dunder]

Oh My Goodness!

We opened up the guitar today to spray the contacts.

My mate asked what "those two wires" are doing....
There are two coaxials heading from the pickups with their centrals going to the selecter switch... they look fine at the switch but each of the outer wires are hanging loose one with a freshish looking glob of solder and the other just ending in an old rusty clump.

I said "I don't knowand put the guitar back together and now I can't hear anything at all. So now both pickups are "dead"

Just followed a lead from vintaxe to here:
http://www.guitarelectronics.com/product/WDUHH3T1101

If this can be transfered to a single coil (and it looks the same every other way it) sounds like my tech guy who "isolated the problems to the pick up hadn't even unscrewed the plate to look!!!

Do I simply need to solder the other wires coming from the pickups to the back of my volume pot??

[Dunder]

hmm but at the moment those wires reach no where near the volume pot and the wires sort of point to and can only reach another glob of solder on each switch.
Did the swicthes ground the circuit? Only seen these metal plated swicth boards on kawais and guyatones, in my naiive googlings.

[Dunder]

and it's got a five hundred k volume pot
(says pr-18
B-500K...solderglob)
May need to post a photo of all this but remember the switch is like this http://i304.photobucket.com/albums/nn17 ... GP7328.jpg