Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Does anyone know what year Rickenbacker started installing scatter wound vintage p.u.'s on guitars? Thanks

I believe the first models to have them were the 425V63, 450V63, and the 325/12V63 "specials" produced in late 1999. They were also used on the Carl Wilson LE models and phased in on the standard models with the "Vintage Pickup" option starting in 2000.

If you have a previous one that's around 14K, can you simply unwind them to make 'em scatterwounds?

In a word no. You can unwind them to make them 7.4k, or whatever DC resistance you want, but it won't sound the same. A scatterwind refers to how the wire is wound around the bobbin on the pickup. Instead of winding each row of wire neatly one right after another and building the coil that way, a scatterwound coil is wound with the wire going back and forth from each side of the bobbin quite a lot faster, and the wire doesn't lay neatly side by side against the pickup bobbin, but goes over previous winds in a scatter pattern. This changes the capacitance in the coil among other things and changes the sound for the better in most people's eyes. I think it probably flattens the resonent peak out a bit too instead of making it very peaky, and this helps to make the pickup sound smoother.