The curse of HRW pickups

[ElNumero]

24 minutes ago, PunkKitty said:

I think I'm going to do an experiment. I'll order an inexpensive set of Alnico humbuckers to abuse. I want them to be approximate vintage specs. Epiphone Probuckers would probably be a good choice. I'll just make sure they have Alnico 5 magnets in them before I start. Then I'll order a can of the freeze spray from Amazon. I'll take before and after samples using the same setup and the same guitar. I'll freeze the pickups repeatedly if I have to just to see if there is a difference. I'll only use clean settings. I can't do this right now. I have too much on my plate. But maybe in a month or two. Then I'll post the results to see if we, as a group, can hear a difference. 

What does freezing them do for the sound??

[PunkKitty]

8 minutes ago, ElNumero said:

What does freezing them do for the sound??

I don't know. Let's find out. That's the point of this. I'll keep two identical sets of A5 magnets. One as a control group. I'll post the sound clips of me playing simple clean chords, and we'll see what, if any, difference there is. We're trying to understand what Ren did to the Schallers to make them HRW's.

[yoslate]

If nothing else, this thread threatens to become a textbook case of the development of a rabbit hole....  It's pretty great!

[PunkKitty]

21 minutes ago, yoslate said:

If nothing else, this thread threatens to become a textbook case of the development of a rabbit hole....  It's pretty great!

Yup. Let's have some fun. I may not get to it until the fall, but I'm curious.

[ElNumero]

31 minutes ago, PunkKitty said:

I don't know. Let's find out. That's the point of this. I'll keep two identical sets of A5 magnets. One as a control group. I'll post the sound clips of me playing simple clean chords, and we'll see what, if any, difference there is. We're trying to understand what Ren did to the Schallers to make them HRW's.

I would say after conducting the freeze test, bake them to 500 degrees and then conduct the same. 

[tfb]

1 hour ago, PunkKitty said:

Let's find out.

This would be a good experiment. But my suspicion is that you probably do need to get down to really quite low temperatures to see anything interesting, as the effects aren't likely anything like linear with temperature but more like phase transitions in the material, such as happen in superconductors, say. Liquid nitrogen is at or below 77K which I suspect freeze sprays won't get very near.  You likely also need to keep things cold for a while.  Finally although I only looked briefly, it looks like that although there are low temperature changes in alnico magnets, they're generally reversible.  On the other hand people definitely do do cryogenic things to copper which have long-term effects: so perhaps it's the coils, not the magnets.

None of this is meant as me saying don't do this experiment which I think would be interesting.  (Except ... part of me likes that HRWs are a bit magic and would like them to stay that way: if Ren doesn't want to say what he did (which I would make a tiny bet was not cyrogenic) perhaps we should just let them be magic, which is what he wants perhaps?)

[PunkKitty]

16 minutes ago, tfb said:

This would be a good experiment. But my suspicion is that you probably do need to get down to really quite low temperatures to see anything interesting, as the effects aren't likely anything like linear with temperature but more like phase transitions in the material, such as happen in superconductors, say. Liquid nitrogen is at or below 77K which I suspect freeze sprays won't get very near.  You likely also need to keep things cold for a while.  Finally although I only looked briefly, it looks like that although there are low temperature changes in alnico magnets, they're generally reversible.  On the other hand people definitely do do cryogenic things to copper which have long-term effects: so perhaps it's the coils, not the magnets.

None of this is meant as me saying don't do this experiment which I think would be interesting.  (Except ... part of me likes that HRWs are a bit magic and would like them to stay that way: if Ren doesn't want to say what he did (which I would make a tiny bet was not cyrogenic) perhaps we should just let them be magic, which is what he wants perhaps?)

Eh. Like I said, it's a fun experiment. Maybe I'll even learn something along the way. 

[MartyGrass]

Dimarzio sold cryotreated pickups about 20 years ago.

https://www.guitar-list.com/guitar-science/cryogenic-pickups

https://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/callaham-pickups-and-cryogenic-treatment.171030/

[MartyGrass]

I'm not sure how hard it would be to get liquid nitrogen.  I know dermatologists who probably allow a dip into theirs.  They keep it in their offices.

I'll bet Ren dropped them in a container for a couple of minutes and removed them.

 

Cryo treatments have been used in many different tooling applications such as dies, drill bit sets, hammers, etc. There has actually been a fair amount of study for these applications because tools that last longer save companies money – in some cases tools have been reported to last as much as seven times as long. This is great news when we’re talking about how many times we can hit something with a hammer, but what can it do for my tone? There are some applications where cryogenically freezing things to reduce wear (making the metal harder) could be beneficial – strings and bridge saddles come to mind. Making metal harder would, theoretically, give us a brighter tone. The problem is that there hasn’t been a lot of research into the tonal attributes of cryogenically frozen guitar parts [someone call Elon Musk…]. So, while the structural changes have been proven by research, the tonal changes we might find in cryogenically treated gear is, largely, theoretical.

 

Strings, Saddles, & Frets

Lets start with the cryogenic application to guitar strings. Here is what Dean Markley has to say about their Blue Steel strings:

“By freezing our strings down to -320 degree Fahrenheit, we tighten the molecules, minimizing microscopic gaps. This process removes transient frequencies that produce harsh highs and muddy lows, creating a more consistent string, with true tone and longer life.”

The science behind this statement is pretty solid in that you can “tighten molecules” by cooling them and slowing them down – at absolute zero they would stop moving completely. We would theorize that cryogenically treated strings would give a string that would not only be more structurally sound, but that the structural integrity would, in theory, contribute to more consistency and a longer lasting brightness and response in string, relative to a regular string that would become dull after a certain length of time. So, yes, I believe that the science has proven that cryogenic treatments will improve the longevity and structural integrity of strings. Here is a link to a peer reviewed journal that conducted a study of cryogenic treatment of tool steels to improve wear resistance.

Consistency and longevity are great attributes for a guitar string. As far as touting tonal changes, Dean Markley claims that it basically knocks out your extreme highs and lows. This could be achieved with some simple tweaking of the EQ via a pedal or on your amp.

The market has seen cryogenically frozen strings, bridge saddles, frets, tubes, cables, and pickup magnets. Dry ice has even been used for certain relic-ing applications such as checking nitrocellulose finishes. I do believe that strings, saddles, and frets would benefit from being cryogenically frozen. Metals such as nickel, aluminum, and titanium (all commonly used in various guitar parts) have shown excellent response to cryogenic treatments. However, the benefits are mainly, structural, not necessarily tonal.

Pickups

If you’ve read many of my tech articles, you may know that I have an odd fascination (boarding on obsession, if I’m being honest) with magnets. So I find the idea of cryogenically treated magnets to be especially intriguing. I do have a set of pickups with CEMs (Cryogenically-Enhanced Magnets) – I didn’t buy them because they had received the cryogenic treatment (I found that out later). They’re John Birch pickups - John Birch was a luthier in the UK – he’s since passed away – but he built guitars and pickups for Tony Iommi and Angus & Malcolm Young. They do sound amazing, but I'm not sure its because of the magnets being cryogenically treated. I think its just because they do a fantastic job making pickups. I did speak to the guys at the company and this is what they told me,

“We had a full scientific report about 10 pages long of advanced mathematics explaining the process but you need a degree to understand it however it does confirm there is a noticeable effect.”

It just so happens that I do (technically) have a degree in mathematics (…I have a minor in Cryptology & Number Theory from the University of Minnesota). I have not seen their research, specifically, but the research I have seen on the subject will often confirm a correlation within the samples they use. But as we know, correlation is not causation. So it remains unconfirmed, to me, that cryogenically frozen magnets would make a pickup sound noticeably different.

Some companies cryo treat the windings of the pickup – Seymour Duncan’s Zephyr Pickups feature cryo treated silver windings, but several studies have offered evidence that cryo treatments actually diminish the response and clarity of pure silver and copper. As one physicist, Heiko Hoepfinger, concluded, "there is a change in steel when it’s treated cryogenically, but that doesn’t extend to pure copper and silver. One study using copper finds a loss of resistance of about 3 percent, while a hundred others couldn’t find any changes."

Some companies cryo treat their pole pieces – this may have some sort of an effect on the way the pole pieces direct the magnetic field. But I am skeptical that it will result in a tone that is different than a regular magnet.

This is my take on it, and I’ll admit, it’s debatable. Really, the most important attribute regarding the magnet is its strength. Maybe the realigning of the molecules in the magnet would help it hold more of a charge, but we’d just end up a hotter pickup. That is one thing that some companies claim is up to an 18% boost in a pickup’s output. So that’s like taking a 10k humbucker and boosting it to 11.8k. You could just go get an 11.8k pickup… Boosting the output of a pickup would not result in more dynamics; in fact they generally have less dynamics than their lower output counterparts. In the case of magnets, it seems like somewhat of a marketing ploy to me. Most companies that offer it will boast more clarity and less decay, relative to an identical, non-treated magnet although I have yet to come across consistent studies that would back this up. Perhaps this is due to a lack of research rather than a lack of truth, but either way, I’m not able to say that cryogenically treated magnets will effect the way a pickups sounds in any way. As always, the real question here, as always is - does it sound good to you?

From a marketing standpoint, the idea is to make every unique characteristic of your product seem like the secret key to making you sound better. I’ve written a few marketing pieces for various companies over the years (I won’t say which ones…). The idea wasn’t to make you sound better… I didn’t really care. I just wanted you to buy the product.

I want to send out a huge “Thank You!” to Kenny Vetter, who helped me navigate the world of peer reviewed physics research to bring you this article. For a summation on the science backing cryogenic treatments of guitar parts, I’ll just quote him since his sentiments echo my own, and, frankly, I can’t really say it any better, myself,

"Studies published in peer-reviewed materials science journals do report an increase in the durability of steel alloys when cryogenically treated. This points to the fact that your pickups probably won't be terribly different, but the strings might actually experience some material changes. That being said, any claims about a noticeable change in tone are probably just a marketing scheme. There isn't a large body of scientific work on the change in tone quality due to cryo-treating strings. (Usually, materials scientists are more interested in testing structural integrity as opposed to the sound properties of the metal.) The improved structural quality of the strings will likely keep your strings sounding bright and new, but that's all the science can really back up. You may notice that your strings sound good for longer, but don't expect your cryo-treated strings to sound better than your average strings that have been at room temperature for their whole lives."

[Steiner]

I call BS.

[MartyGrass]

1 hour ago, Steiner said:

I call BS.

You may be right.  I spent a couple of hours looking at current use of cryo treatment in industry for both magnet alteration and wire conduction.  There are a few esoteric uses but none for anything related to copper wire or to small magnets.  This may have been snake oil in the pickup industry back in the day.

OTOH, I don't think you can rule it out.  It would not be that difficult to take the covers off a bunch of Schallers and dip them in liquid nitrogen.  That substance is not scarce in Kalamazoo.

Ren Wall is beginning to remind me of Andy Kaufman.  Andy did comedy that no one would understand immediately.  He was a very mysterious guy.  Many claimed that he faked his own death as his final joke.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=et_dLbO7sTE

[Steiner]

1 minute ago, MartyGrass said:

You may be right.  I spent a couple of hours looking at current use of cryo treatment in industry for both magnet alteration and wire conduction.  There are a few esoteric uses but none for anything related to copper wire or to small magnets.  This may have been snake oil in the pickup industry back in the day.

OTOH, I don't think you can rule it out.  It would not be that difficult to take the covers off a bunch of Schallers and dip them in liquid nitrogen.  That substance is not scarce in Kalamazoo.

Ren Wall is beginning to remind me of Andy Kaufman.  Andy did comedy that no one would understand immediately.  He was a very mysterious guy.  Many claimed that he faked his own death as his final joke.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=et_dLbO7sTE

It seems that the cryogenics fad has come and gone.  It fizzled faster than alchemy.  To properly conduct experiments and derive a capable manufacturing process would require controlling soo many factors.  Good luck keeping the plastic (or wood) bobbin from shattering.  Initial temp and ambient humidity, the rate that one lowers into the nitrogen, how long the soak lasts, which parameters are controlled as the unit returns to room temp...  I remember the hi-fi industry ads where cryogenically "improved" tubes were for sale.  I didn't buy it then, I'll not buy it now.

[tfb]

A thing that would be interesting would be to make spectrograms of HRWs vs Schallers on the same (or very similar) guitar set up the same way & playing the same note as carefully the same way as possible.  I could almost do some of this as my two H150s should be reasonably similar ... but different string gauges, probably different pickup heights etc, and I'm mildly terrified of adjusting things in case I can't get them back to how they were.

[MartyGrass]

We may just have to learn to live with uncertainty. 

[yoslate]

5 hours ago, MartyGrass said:

This may have been snake oil in the pickup industry back in the day.

Pickups?  Snakeoil?!  Say it ain't so!

5 hours ago, MartyGrass said:

Ren Wall is beginning to remind me of Andy Kaufman. 

"A riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma."  It's all about the folklore, and Ren wouldn't have it any other way. 

[rockabilly69]

Okay I am now donning my flak jacket...

Why spend all this money on freezing crappy pickups, buy a set of Throbaks, or better yet, some 25% off Wolfetone (Legends, Dr Vintage, or Marhsallhead II), and be done with it. This is going to sound harsh, but just like most of their hardware, Schaller stuff to me comes up short, Ren Wall modified or not. I've never heard a set of HRWs that could compare to a set of Throbaks or Wolfetones. If Heritage would have ever been serious about pickups, they wouldn't have sold their original G-I-B-S-O-N pickup winder to Jon at Throbak, and would have learned how to use it. The custom core pickups on the other hand seem to me to be a step in the right direction.

 

This is a set of recently wound Wolfetones, a Dr Vintage neck with a Marshallhead bridge. Point me to a better sounding set of HRWs (and post an audio clip), and I will reconsider my statement. These Wolfetones are totally the reason for this guitar being transformed from my WORST sounding guitar, to one of the best.  There are so many better options than HRWs for reasonable prices. These pickups were $224 for the set shipped to me. And Wolftone will make them in any depth, and 2 or 4 wire whatever works better for the guitar your pulling the HRWs out of.

DIRTY...

 

[rockabilly69]

And cryogenics for pickups (or strings, or whatever the hell), don't get me started on that snake oil. Put a set a set of cheap Ernie Ball strings on any good guitar with PAFs and see if you need to freeze anything. It's just fixing something that ain't broke to begin with. I could just imagine this conversation, "Hey Duane, can I borrow your darkburst for a while so I can freeze your PAFs, your tone needs it". 

[Gitfiddler]

9 minutes ago, rockabilly69 said:

Okay I am now donning my flak jacket...

Why spend all this money on freezing crappy pickups, buy a set of Throbaks, or better yet, some 25% off Wolfetone (Legends, Dr Vintage, or Marhsallhead II), and be done with it. This is going to sound harsh, but just like most of their hardware, Schaller stuff to me comes up short, Ren Wall modified or not. I've never heard a set of HRWs that could compare to a set of Throbaks or Wolfetones. If Heritage would have ever been serious about pickups, they wouldn't have sold their original Gibbons pickup winder to Jon at Throbak, and would have learned how to use it. The custom core pickups on the other hand seem to me to be a step in the right direction.

@rockabilly68...This is an excellent, logical comment in my view.  Whether one loves or hates HRW's, Schallers or even Throbaks, it all comes down to what each of us likes.

Flak jacket Sidebar:  Back in '68 and '69 when I did my USO tours in Viet Nam, we traveled mostly by Jeeps, trucks, Hueys or C130's.  The first time our band flew in a Huey, the GI sitting next to me gave me his flak jacket.  He said "Here, sit on this."  I asked him why I should sit on such an uncomfortable thing like that and not just the nice padded passenger seat.  He then pointed to the streaks of light coming up towards and around our helicopter from the ground and calmly said the following:  "Those are AK47 tracer bullets from the VC down in that rice paddy."   I immediately planted my 17 year old ass on his flak jacket and thanked him profusely!

 

 

[rockabilly69]

3 minutes ago, Gitfiddler said:

@rockabilly68...This is an excellent, logical comment in my view.  Whether one loves or hates HRW's, Schallers or even Throbaks, it all comes down to what each of us likes.

Flak jacket Sidebar:  Back in '68 and '69 when I did my USO tours in Viet Nam, we traveled mostly by Jeeps, trucks, Hueys or C130's.  The first time our band flew in a Huey, the GI sitting next to me gave me his flak jacket.  He said "Here, sit on this."  I asked him why I should sit on such an uncomfortable thing like that and not just the nice padded passenger seat.  He then pointed to the streaks of light coming up towards and around our helicopter from the ground and calmly said the following:  "Those are AK47 tracer bullets from the VC down in that rice paddy."   I immediately planted my 17 year old ass on his flak jacket and thanked him profusely!

 

 

I think you and I have talked about this, I played for the USO for three years so I feel like we are brothers in arms! Remember when the buss blew up in Beirut, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Beirut_barracks_bombings  Well, I was on my way to that base to play for those guys right before that happened. We were supposed to meet up with Bob Hope and Brook Shields for that show. We got diverted to Greece to play there and some of those guys were shipped there so they could hear us!

But fortunately for me I never needed a FLAK jacket. If I was in your shoes I would have definitely had one on!!!

[tfb]

26 minutes ago, rockabilly69 said:

I've never heard a set of HRWs that could compare to [...]

Well, as the person who posted the original question: it happens that I really like the HRWs I have on two extremely different guitars.  You may not like them, which is fine.  But, surprisingly perhaps, there is not an officially-anointed ranking of pickups: different people are allowed to like different makes.   I don't particularly believe (or disbelieve: the only proof would be experiment) in the cryogenic thing, but I like HRWs which is why I asked.

Sorry if this appears rude.

[rockabilly69]

Just now, tfb said:

Well, as the person who posted the original question: it happens that I really like the HRWs I have on two extremely different guitars.  You may not like them, which is fine.  But, surprisingly perhaps, there is not an officially-anointed ranking of pickups: different people are allowed to like different makes.   I don't particularly believe (or disbelieve: the only proof would be experiment) in the cryogenic thing, but I like HRWs which is why I asked.

Sorry if this appears rude.

No more rude than my post, just one more opinion to keep things balanced

[Steiner]

3 hours ago, MartyGrass said:

We may just have to learn to live with uncertainty. 

You can bet on that! 

 

30 minutes ago, Gitfiddler said:

@rockabilly68...This is an excellent, logical comment in my view.  Whether one loves or hates HRW's, Schallers or even Throbaks, it all comes down to what each of us likes.

Flak jacket Sidebar:  Back in '68 and '69 when I did my USO tours in Viet Nam, we traveled mostly by Jeeps, trucks, Hueys or C130's.  The first time our band flew in a Huey, the GI sitting next to me gave me his flak jacket.  He said "Here, sit on this."  I asked him why I should sit on such an uncomfortable thing like that and not just the nice padded passenger seat.  He then pointed to the streaks of light coming up towards and around our helicopter from the ground and calmly said the following:  "Those are AK47 tracer bullets from the VC down in that rice paddy."   I immediately planted my 17 year old ass on his flak jacket and thanked him profusely!

And saw to it that you'd have an unholey ass.  ?

[Millennium Maestro]

There are many out there with a plethora of reasons why their guitar will never sound good no matter what pup is loaded in.  They are just F'n pups!

[Gitfiddler]

1 hour ago, rockabilly69 said:

I think you and I have talked about this, I played for the USO for three years so I feel like we are brothers in arms! Remember when the buss blew up in Beirut, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Beirut_barracks_bombings  Well, I was on my way to that base to play for those guys right before that happened. We were supposed to meet up with Bob Hope and Brook Shields for that show. We got diverted to Greece to play there and some of those guys were shipped there so they could hear us!

But fortunately for me I never needed a FLAK jacket. If I was in your shoes I would have definitely had one on!!!

We are indeed Brothers from other Mothers! 

You however, made a choice to remain in the entertainment biz, and are damned good at what you do.  I enjoyed it then, but chose a 'normal' business career.  But I still love playing in front of folks when the opportunity arises.

[rockabilly69]

3 minutes ago, Millennium Maestro said:

There are many out there with a plethora of reasons why their guitar will never sound good no matter what pup is loaded in.  They are just F'n pups!

Really??? I've heard guitars that sounded like absolute ass, sound great with new pickups! Case in point, that PRS that I swapped pickups on!!! That guitar defined the term crap sounding guitar! For two years I did guitar setups and repairs at my house before I went absolute full-time as a musician, and I can't count the amount of times pickups, and correct value pots too, totally transformed guitars. I did hundreds of guitar pickup swaps! Yes, there are many people that no matter what they do will never sound good, no matter what pickup are in there guitar, for many reasons. But assuming someone can actually play, and assuming they have fairly decent ears, I'm 100% positive pickups can make a difference in most guitars for them. Once again, just my opinion, but informed by actual experience!