Dummy coil for just one pickup.

[llmk]

Hey guys,

How would one go about connecting a dummy coil directly to the coil intended to be silenced?

I got a very cheap J/P and the J-pickup's 60-cycle hum drives me bonkers. I am not looking to invest any money into it right now and I have a bunch of strat pickups gathering dust in a drawer that I could use as a dummy coil.

I am not concerned about dulling the tone of the pickup (I rarely use it, I just don't want any hum when I engage it), I don't want to connect the dummy to a switch, I would like to connect it directly to the J-pickup but I am not sure how to do it.

Could somebody be kind enough to explain how to do this? Am I just supposed to remove the magnet and connect the dummy in series after the J-pickup or did I get it wrong?

Thanks in advance for the help.

 

[dwizum]

The dummy coil should have no magnet, and should be placed so it's not immediately adjacent to any other pickup's magnet.

Ideally, it would have no steel or other magnetically conductive materials in it's core. i.e. if it has steel pole pieces, it would be best to remove them if it's safe to do so. Some bottom-magnet pickups are wound on bobbins with molded holes for the poles so you can just push them out. Others are wound on flat plates where the poles basically are part of the structure, and you definitely don't want to push them out. If you can't remove the poles, it'll alter the tone a little more, which might not be a big deal.

The coil can be in series or in parallel with the J. Do what works best for you, tonally. It needs to be reverse wound, i.e. the start/finish of the coil need to be wired opposite the J. If you don't know the winding direction, you can determine this experimentally by trying it one way and then swapping if it doesn't work.

The axis of the coil needs to be pointing in the same direction, as well. i.e. you can't put the coil in the instrument such that it's laying on it's side - it needs to be facing "up" like a typical pickup coil.

Ideally, the coil would be the same gauge wire, same physical size, and same number of turns as the J. That's not gonna happen with a strat pickup, but it should be OK anyways, you'll get some hum cancelling no matter what. If you have lots of coils, it might pay to experiment with different choices to see which sounds best.

 

[ex-tension]

Found some related threads:
Wiring up a setup with a dummy coil?
Dummy/Phantom Coils
phantom coil

 

[llmk]

Thanks a bunch, guys. That's a big help.