Why did this take Fender 50 YEARS?! | Friday Fretworks

hey guys I'm Chris buck and a very warm welcome to Ferrari fratworks and this week Fender's lost pickup the wine range humbucker [Applause] [Applause] now rewind June 22nd of 1955 and Gibson employee Seth leather has just filed a patent application that no doubt he didn't fully appreciate it at the time but would prove pivotal in defining the sound of electric guitar as we know it today although that paid an application wouldn't be granted for at least another four years love is designed for a humbucking electric guitar pickup is still ubiquitous some 68 years later and virtually Inseparable from the story of Gibson guitars arguably a little bit ahead of its time Gibson's paf and subsequent part number pickups would proved to be at the heart of the shift towards heavier more distorted electric guitar tones in the late 1960s it's typified by the likes of Eric Clapton Jeff Beck Peter Green Jimmy Page and of course Richie Blackmore to name but a few and thus it's probably a very little surprise the fender a guitar company that throughout the 1950s at least on Commercial Center near enough monopolize the concept of a commercially available electric guitar albeit with their traditional kind of single coil weaker output cups sought to follow the prevailing wind after luring set Lover from Kalamazoo to California in 1967 with an offer of twelve thousand dollars a year compared to the nine thousand dollars he was receiving at Gibson found a task the pickup Guru with making a pickup that could compete with his existing design the result of which would prove to be one of the most enigmatic pickup designs ever steeped in mystery myth and misnomer the wide range humbucker so what happened why were they only made for eight years and I guess more importantly well on Earth are we talking about them today now the off-repeated tale is that inspired by the success of the humbucking pickup found a task Seth level with designing a pickup that could compete but without sacrificing that Brilliance and top-end Clarity and single coil articulation that you think of when you think of Fender guitars unsurprisingly Seth recalls it slightly differently recalling the fender sales team simply requested a direct copy only one problem with that however to do so would be infringing on a patent set of his own in fact it was still very much enforced from his time at Gibson Seth did indeed set about designing a pickup that could compete and that was fundamentally different enough to not infringe on any copyrights but would still retain that top-end Brilliance and character that you do associate with Fender pickups with Seth at the very least thought should be integral to the project now the answer would come in the form of kunafel countafe it's called Helsing off the acronym for an ally comprised of 60 copper CU 20 nickel and I add 20 iron Fe of course the acronym comprised of their three alchemical symbols now although it's unusual construction would undoubtedly play a massive part in its tonal characteristics its Choice was unsurprisingly as a result of its ease of tooling at the time it was one of the few available metals that could actually be threaded or turned into a screw this meant the Seth lover could circumvent the distinctive bar magnet design of the paf and actually make magnets out of the pole pieces themselves while its practicality was undoubtedly at the heart of its Choice kunafay's incredibly low iron content 20 if you recall from its composition means that it has a very low inductance inductance in this case being a pickup's ability to generate current from a magnetic field charge all of that meaning that higher frequencies are much more pronounced than they would be in your typical handmaking pickup which of course uses El Nico typical our Nico magnet being comprised of at least 30 to upwards of 60 Iron to offset this and bring in increased bass response Seth required more wire on the coils which of course required a bigger bobbin bigger bobbin means the pole pieces are further apart which picks up a wider range you can see where I'm going with this a wider range of string vibration and as such the iconic wide range humbucker was born it was introduced in 1971 and immediately included on the Telecaster Deluxe Telecaster Thin Line Telecaster custom as well as Fender's answer to the es335 5 the Starcaster over the years the wide range humbucker has found favor with an incredible truly incredible array of guitar players anyone from Keith Richards to Graeme coxon to West Borland to Ryan Adams to Roy Buchanan to Tom York to Chris schifflett to the edge to Johnny Buckland to Tab Benoit to Sonic Youth Lee Ronaldo so why until very recently despite this incredibly Rich history has it not impossible to get hold of a genuine new set of wide range humbuckers for the better part of 50 years what happened [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Applause] now despite Seth having found an incredibly clever work around to his existing Gibson patent what he offender couldn't possibly have foreseen was that kuna phase ready availability primarily because of its relevance of the automotive industry and its inclusion in the likes of speedometers tachometers and altimeters would essentially evaporate overnight as all of those dials shifted towards being electronic in the mid to late 1970s and as such By 1979 Fender were left with virtually no other option but to discontinue the wide range humbuckers the supply of kunafig dried up that's beginning the wide range handbag is 41 year Hiatus there have been other pickups resembling wire and chambakers in Fender's lineup over the years but it's important to point out their fundamentally different construction Fender Japan having utilized ceramic magnets with Fender Mexico having utilized our Nikon magnets which substantially just means they are typical humbuckers in an oversized case however in 2020 Fender introduced the American original 70s Telecaster custom crucially with cunape magnets the first time these pickups had been seen as I said in the better part of 41 years fast forward to 2023 and it's probably a little surprise that clearly having found a reliable source of kuna face somewhere after all of these years Fender have now introduced the kind of face series not just with the recreation of that original humbucker but Stratocaster Conifer pickups and Jazz Master kind of Fate pickups this was the project spearheaded by Tim Short arguably the most notable pickup Guru since Seth lover himself and now fenders Chief pickup engineer who set about recreating that original handbagger but also imagining taking a little bit of creative license and thinking what Seth may have done with kunafane if he'd not had just eight years to work with them it'd be remiss not to mention several smaller Boutique pickup companies who have done incredible work with kunafe over the years presumably finding very small batches of availability somewhere notably because it's Novak talinator Mojo and more recently North Star pickup ups but it is incredibly exciting to see a company not only as big as Fender but as intrinsic and important to the story of kunafay wide range humbuckers clearly having the facility and the source of kunafay to do this on such a mass scale in recent years original examples of wide range hamburgers have reached new eye watering prices on reverb so it's very cool to think that a story that otherwise had its last chapter written the better part of 50 years ago and that has a new lease of life as ever I'm Chris Buck thank you very much for watching please subscribe hit the Bell icon if you haven't already and I shall see you next week for another episode Friday freightworks Cheers guys take care see you soon [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] [Applause] foreign [Music]

Channel: Chris Buck

Views: 65,872

Keywords: Fender, CuNiFe, Wide Range Humbucker, CuNiFe Pickups, Fender Pickups, Telecaster Deluxe, Telecaster Custom, Seth Lover, Pickup Shootout, That Pedal Show, Andertons, Rhett Shull, Paul Davids, Mary Spender, Tim Pierce, Pete Thorn, Robert Baker, Rick Beato, Chris Buck, Chris Buck Guitar Solo, Chris Buck Guitar Lesson, Fender Guitars, Fender Telecaster, Fender Jazzmaster, Fender Stratocaster, Stratocaster, Jazzmaster

Id: qN51gOLvz0A

Length: 11min 39sec (699 seconds)

Published: Fri May 19 2023