Guitar pickup wax potting

I've a telecaster copy by Tradition Guitars, it's a tobacco sunburst from 2005 and it sounds pretty good for the price.

Times ago i shift the default ceramic pickup with a set of Alnico 5 Vintage Plus TRT1 by ToneRider. Those pickups sounds very very good! Indeed, I want to mount those pickup on another Telecaster model I've, but I do not want to leave the Tradition TL without Alnico, so, I've buy a set of FLEOR Vintage Alnico 5 pickups from China for less than 20Eur with shipping.
The set it's composed of course by a neck and a bridge pickup for Tele syle guitar, they are wax potted, magnets are Alnico 5, and the resistance almost fits the specification, namely neck is 6k7 and bridge is 6k3.

I was skeptical about those pickups, the delivery was really fast just 2 weeks, when mounted I have to change my mind. The Fleor set sounds as vintage as the TonerRider, the bridge one it's a little bassy sounding in contrat to the ToneRider, but overall they have really a good "feeling".
BUT, there's a BUT here, cause we are speaking about guitar pickup potting on this post, the bridge one was microphonic, as soon as I plug the overdrive on it starts hissing.
I've read comments from other buyer of Fleor, no one has microphonic issues, so I think mine was just an oversight.
To me this is the opportunity to learn how to pot a pickup, in fact so i did, and with the wax potting I've solved all the issues.
I decide to disassemble this pickup and pot it.
Guitar pickup potting is a process whereby the pickup coil are encaplusated in a substance that inhibits the coil movement that may cause oscillations and so hissing. Many new pickups are potting using epoxy glue, but old and vintage pickups use wax.
When I remove the tape around the coils of the bridge pickup I've notice that it was potted, but the wax does not soaks coils under the tape, it seems to me that the employee that pot this pickup forgot to leave this enough time in wax or do pot with the tape on it.

Warning! Paraffin is flammable and fumes may be toxics. Do pot in open environment. Potting is made at high temperature, pay attention to your skin. Everything you do at your own risk.

Here is the recipe I've used:

1. 80% paraffin + 20% beewax
2. put this mixture in a pot, then the pot in waterbath till the wax liquefy
3. check the temperature, it should be something around 60degree
4. put the pickup in wax, try to prevent the pickup to touch the pot
5. leave the pickup there for almost 20 minutes
6. take the pickup out and clean with a rag, then wait till it cools down

While potting you should see small air bubbles that cames out from the pickup, that's normal it's the air between coils that leaves the space to the wax.
I've pot both the pickup, just in case.

Reassembling the bridge pickup I've put the tape back, then wrap a cord on the pickup just to give it a vintage look.
To my surprise when i mount the pickups back, they both still works, and microphonics issue was gone!
This is how I potted the pickup, of course I'm not an expert on this field, so if you have suggestions or tricks put comments below.

Notes

• read risk disclaimer
• excuse my bad english

Homemade lap steel guitar

The lap steel guitar is a type of steel guitar, an instrument derived from and similar to the guitar. The player changes pitch by pressing a metal or glass bar against the strings instead of by pressing strings against the fretboard.

This is my homemade lap steel guitar.
It is built using a 6.5cm x 4.5cm x 85cm piece of wood taken from an old pallet, then planed and sanded.
The action is 1cm height. Bridge and nut are built using L shape aluminium bar of 1cm x 1cm. An additional aluminium bar is mounted and perforated to lead strings out of the nut to the tunings pegs. Nut and bridge has string slot. Strings are 1 cm apart from each other.
Tunings pegs are standard electric guitar pegs.

Sound is amplified using a stratocaster model like pickup, at 5cm from the bridge. It has 2 250pots one log and the other linear, used for tone and volume.
Fret reference are drawn on the wood, before the transparent lucid finiture paint was given.
The scale is 22 1/2".

Scale length 571.5mm 22.5"
Fret	Distance (mm)	Distance (inches)
1	32.08	1.263
2	62.35	2.455
3	90.93	3.580
4	117.90	4.642
5	143.36	5.644
6	167.39	6.590
7	190.07	7.483
8	211.48	8.326
9	231.69	9.121
10	250.76	9.872
11	268.76	10.581
12	285.75	11.250
13	301.79	11.881
14	316.93	12.477
15	331.22	13.040
16	344.70	13.571
17	357.43	14.072
18	369.45	14.545
19	380.79	14.992
20	391.49	15.413
21	401.59	15.811
22	411.13	16.186
23	420.13	16.541
24	428.63	16.875
25	436.65	17.191
* Distance is measured from the nut

About the video: this is my first lap steel guitar, I've never played one, so i've to to practice a little more to play it better, but that's just a demo video.

Notes

• read risk disclaimer
• excuse my bad english

Homemade 2 Guitar Strings Diddley Bow

The diddley bow is a string instrument of African origin made popular in America, probably developed from instruments found on the Ghana coast of west Africa. The diddley bow is typically homemade, consisting usually of a wooden board and a single wire string stretched between two screws, and played by plucking while varying the pitch with a metal or glass slide held in the other hand.

This is my homemade 2 Guitar Strings Diddley Bow.

This diddley bow is built using an "B" (.016), and a "D" (.032) acoustic strings, and a piece of wood.
You can tune this instrument as you want, and use any string you want, in the sample video i've used:
"B" (.016) tuned to F#, "D" (.032) to B.
Wooden board dimension is 82.5cm length, 9.0cm width, 2.2cm height.
The string action is 2.5cm.
Two piece of aluminum L are used as bridge and nut, dimension are: 2.5cm long side (make the diddley action), 1cm short side, 0.2cm thickness.
The tuning peg is a cheap one used for guitar. Two screws are used to direct strings from the nut to the pegs.
The guitar pridge is built using an aluminium cigaret box, it is opened, inside a piezo is glued to act as a pickup, wired to a 500k log pot, and a female 1/4" panel plug. The cigaret box is open and it rely on the bridge aliminium L.
Inside the cigaret box there is a piece of cloth to prevent piezo feedback.
Even it this diddley has no fret reference, the scale is set to 22".
It is painted using wood protective teak.

Notes

• read risk disclaimer
• excuse my bad english

Homemade Bass Diddley Bow

The diddley bow is a string instrument of African origin made popular in America, probably developed from instruments found on the Ghana coast of west Africa. The diddley bow is typically homemade, consisting usually of a wooden board and a single wire string stretched between two screws, and played by plucking while varying the pitch with a metal or glass slide held in the other hand.

This is my homemade Bass Diddley Bow.

This diddley bow is built using an "A" (.080) bass string and a piece of wood taken from an old pallet.
Wooden board dimension is 103.5cm length, 5.5cm width, 4cm height.
The string action is 3.4cm.
A simple bass pickup is used to amplify this instrument, it's wired to a 250k log pot, and a female 1/4" panel plug, both mounted on a piece of aluminum cut from a pc case. An additional piezo pickup is glued on the wood inside the volume/jack box, it's signal is mixed with the standard pickup, the piezo pickup reacts to the stroke on the instruments, giving a more natural sound to it.
Two piece of aluminum pipe are used as bridge and nut, dimension are: 3.7cm diameter, 5.3cm length, 0.1cm thickness.
The tuning peg is a cheap one used for guitar.
Even it this diddley has no fret reference, the scale is set to 25".
It is painted using wood protective teak finish mixed with black varnish.


Notes

• read risk disclaimer
• excuse my bad english