P.A.F. Pickup Secrets: Start Wire and P.A.F. Tone

In this video Jon Gundry of ThroBak Electronics tests the affect the P.A.F. pickup start wire has on guitar tone and microphonics. An A/B pickup shootout gives a live comparison. https://www.throbak.com/paf-pickups.html The pickup coil start lead is one of the details used to authenticate a vintage P.A.F.. Jon Gundry explains the history of this obscure detail of P.A.F. pickups and how and why it may affect vintage P.A.F. pickup tone and microphonic qualities. Photos and video of start lead placement and vintage P.A.F. winding machine fixtures illustrate reasons for its variation in the P.A.F. pickup era. To demonstrate the tonal differences between a P.A.F. pickup with internal start wires and a Patent number pickup with external start wires, Jon Gundry winds two pickups on ThroBak's vintage 1957 Leesona 102B pickup winder. Both test pickups are wound with same number of turns and constructed identically with long Alnico 2 magnets to assure that any tonal variation is due to the different methods of connecting the pickup coil start leads. https://www.throbak.com/ ------------------- Chapter Headings: 0:00 Intro 0:07 P.A.F. start wire - the secret to P.A.F. tone? 0:35 What is the start wire 2:09 Purpose of an internal start wire 4:50 Effect of the internal start wire on the pickup 6:19 Pickup Comparison: Internal start wire vs. External start wire 7:13 Closeup of internal start wire 9:09 Wire building up around the internal start wire 10:22 Hump on the coil from the internal start wire 11:34 Winding a coil with an external start wire 14:35 Closeup of coil with external start wire 15:12 Assembling the two pickups 16:11 The two finished pickups 17:34 Test to see which pickup is more microphonic 17:56 Internal start wire pickup - microphonic test 19:01 External start wire test - microphonic test 21:40 A/B testing pickups in a guitar 22:45 Thoughts on the differences _______________