1991 360/12V64

milo · Post by **milo** » Tue Oct 28, 2003 2:01 pm

I used to visit and post here quite a bit, but I've been without internet service for quite awhile so I've missed out on a lot of the discussions. I just picked up a 1991 360/12V64 (Jetglo with gold guards and nameplate) to supplement my 1984 Jetglo 350, and my 1990 Jetglo 330.

This is my first Rick with toasters and I'm not real familiar with them. From reading the tech articles and the FAQ it appears that this guitar should have the higher output vintage pickups, is that most likely the case? The neck pup seems fairly muddy to me. Is the "de-winding" procedure as easy as it sounds? I've never opened up a pickup before, but I've repaired a couple of vintage Fender tube amps so it's not like I'm technically illiterate.

jps · Post by **jps** » Tue Oct 28, 2003 3:18 pm

Disconnect the PUs and measure their DC resistance. If they are around 6-8k Ohms they are fine, if they read something like 11-14K then you will want to unwind them. My guess is if they are muddy sounding they are the latter. I'm sure some one will chime in who has actually done unwinding.

36012 · Post by **36012** » Wed Oct 29, 2003 8:17 pm

Like Jeff said,if it sounds muddy it most definately the hot pickups.They were stock then unless someone replaced them.When de-winding be careful not to over heat the copper wire when soldering them.It is easy to do and it can be a disaster because the copper wire has a very thin clear plastic insulator that can melt enough to ground itself out on the underlying winds.You ideally want to melt just enough of the insulator on the end to contact the solder point.

wim · Post by **wim** » Fri Oct 31, 2003 3:12 am

Hello there,

I went through the same problem with my 1993 360V64 (Fireglo). The toaster pickups sounded muddy and not 'vintage Rickenbacker' at all.
Since I was not too pleased with this sound I unwound them following the procedure as described on THIS SITE
I unsoldered the pickups and measured the resistance; they were wound to 15,51K Ohm !!
I unwound them to 7.41K for the neck pickup and 7.20K Ohm for the bridge pickup.
I did the neck pickup first, then I unwound the bridge to 7.2K Ohm for an extra 210 Ohms of 'Jangle'

The procedure isn't too hard, it only takes some patience (about 2 hours), and you say you're experienced with electronics.
You'll be glad you did it (I surely was) if you want the vintage tone.

good luck!

admin · Post by **admin** » Fri Oct 31, 2003 3:26 am

Thanks for sharing this information Wim and welcome to The Rickenbacker Forum.

I find the topic of "jangle" to be most interesting. It is a difficult term to explain. Part of the jangle is certainly the K Ohm rating, however, the pickup materials, magnet and certainly the amplifier are important contributing factors.

I used to find that I was able to get a jangle (perhaps I convinced myself) with my high gain pickups.

Just what constitutes a jangle, and how one optimizes it, is a fascinating study in the psychophysics of sound and the neuropsychology of music. Jangle is in the ears of the beholder to some extent, however, you have demonstrated one very practical way to get closer to the vintage sound.

Jangle On!

wim · Post by **wim** » Fri Oct 31, 2003 5:40 am

Maybe I schould have mentioned the amp I use with this guitar. It's a Fender (can I use this name on this forum?) Blues Deville 2x12".
As for the 210 Ohms more 'jangle', I don't think this has that great an effect on the sound, hence the wink.
A more important factor may be the number of strings on the guitar. Jeff has six more of them on his, and while my 360V64 only has to be plugged in (that is now I unwound the pickups) and instantly creates that tone you hear on the old Beatles/Byrds records it isn't the same.
A Gsus4 chord as used in the intro of 'A Hard Day's Night' has the same sound played with my six stringer but lacks the fullness you hear on the record.

But overall I believe when the sound is there, any good amp wil recreate you the jangle you're looking for. When I play my 360 over a cheap Squier 15 transistor amp I just don't get anything..

milo · Post by **milo** » Fri Oct 31, 2003 7:30 am

Thanks for the answers. I'm glad you guys could pretty much guarantee me that these were the "hot" versions, because I didn't really want to take all that stuff apart to measure them if it was likely that they wouldn't need de-winding.

Peter, I would have to agree with you that the construction and materials are what actually create the jangle: All of my Ricks have a certain unique sound. I think the ohm rating is what creates the "sound" that most people are familiar with.

Wim, did the de-winding clear up muddiness of the neck pickup? Right now the bridge sounds pretty good (nowhere near as muddy as the neck), but in the neck position you can barely hear the octave strings cut through. For reference, I have a 1964 Fender Vibrolux Reverb, a 1971 Dual Showman Reverb, and a newer Reverend Hellhound. The guitar sounds great through all of them, but to me it sounds the most "classic" through the Reverend when I use the U.K. (Vox) settings.

I'm sitting home with the flu and a new set of Pyramid flats (use them on my 330, but never tried them on my 360/12 when I had one) so it may be a good day to re-string, de-wind, and catch up on "Mister Ed".

wim · Post by **wim** » Fri Oct 31, 2003 8:59 am

I unwound the neck pickup first and then reassembled the whole guitar.
In combination with the still 'hot' bridge Pu the sound was more balanced in volume and already much brighter.
The neck pu alone is still kind of bass heavy but I guess that's due to the position of it, the combination with the already warm sound the Blues Deville produces and the fact that it is actually supposed to do this.
Difficult how to describe the sound of it.. the first thing that comes to mind is the guitar in Chris Isaac's 'Wicked Game' (which is actually not even a Rickenbacker)
The difference was so obvious that even my wife immediatly heard the difference, and she's not into guitars at all. Go figure..
Because I was so happy with the result I unwound the neck pu too and this resulted in the sound known as 'jingle jangle'.
With distortion it sounds exactly like Paul Weller's guitar in 'News Of The World'
If you follow this link you can actually see how the hot bridge pickup looks like. If you recognize this, yours is one too.
This picture is taken when it was measured 15.51K Ohm.
This weekend, if I find time for it, I'll take a picture of how it looks now.
link to neck pickup
The next link shows you a picture of the amount of wire removed from the 2 pickups. For reference I displayed a 1 Euro coin with it. It was a total of 28 Grams of copperwire
link to Coil wire

milo · Post by **milo** » Fri Oct 31, 2003 10:33 am

Wim,
Thanks for the pics. Did your pups have a layer of foam rubber wrapped around the electrical tape to keep them snug in the cover? I haven't pulled the tape off yet, but mine don't look like they have as much winding on them. The neck pup measures 12.35K when I have that pickup unselected with the switch, but I don't know how much resistance the rest of the circuit will add to the reading.

wim · Post by **wim** » Fri Oct 31, 2003 10:52 am

You're welcome.

There was NO foam wrapped around the pickups. as a matter of fact the winding was so overdone that it apparently had to be pressed into the cover. If you look carefully at the picture you can see the side of the coil is flattened by this.
There was another thing that worried me, it's difficult to explain for me because English isn't my native language, but I'll take a picture of it soon and post it in a separate topic.
I can't answer right away on your question about the circuitry, but tomorrow I' ll do some measuring and I'll let you know which values I got from them.

milo · Post by **milo** » Fri Oct 31, 2003 12:20 pm

Thanks again,
I'm thinking that maybe the neck pup has been modified already. The foam looks like it was cut from a bigger peice. After looking at the amount of wire that came off of your pickups, though, maybe whoever did mine had no way of measuring the resistance and just stopped after they took a bunch of windings off. If the pickup started out near 15K like yours were, maybe they just quit too early. I would appreciate it if you could find the values when they are wired into the circuit, I know that there can be some big differences in values if you don't take the component out of an amp when taking readings.

Your English is fine.

keb · Post by **keb** » Fri Oct 31, 2003 1:57 pm

That pic of the coil wire made me smile. Just about a month ago I did the same thing; I unwound the pickups of my '92 4003 bass (about 12.5K ohms down to 7.5k ohms.) Like you, I did the neck pickup first (mostly because I use it less and in case I screwed up, I wouldn't be too much up the creek until I got it fixed/replaced.) When the neck pickup unwinding was a success, I went ahead with the bridge. I was a bit amazed at just how much wire came off those pickups.

milo · Post by **milo** » Sat Nov 01, 2003 8:20 am

Thanks for the great pictures and the measurements. Based on your readings I'm guessing that someone either de-wound mine a little bit and stopped, or they just added some foam around the windings for a tighter fit in the cover. I think I'll probably bite the bullet and unsolder the neck pickup to take another reading just to be sure. I guess I was being lazy and didn't want to mess with any solder joints if I wasn't sure the pickup would need to be de-wound further.

I'll let you know how it goes, and I'll try to take some pictures as well.
Thanks again.

wim · Post by **wim** » Sat Nov 01, 2003 9:15 am

You're welcome

I was disappointed with the sound of my 360 for five years, so nothing is too much effort if I can help somebody with doubts.

This link has helped me out a lot.
click to read mr. Breaux text

Mr. Breaux talks about late eighties pu's wound to 11-12K and your guitar is a '91, so I guess it's possible it hasn't been altered yet.

I also whish to add that my guitar sounds not as compressed anymore as it did before the unwinding.
Maybe an important factor for you to know.

keb · Post by **keb** » Sat Nov 01, 2003 9:39 am

I've noticed my bass sounds less "compressed" as well. Before I unwound it, the G string in particular sounded pinched no matter how I set the pickup heights, etc. Now it sounds punchier and more articulate.