Metropoulos Forum

Randy Zacuto was the founder of Mighty Mite.

He hired Seymour Duncan (OEM work) around the mid 1970s to design and work on Mighty Mite pickups.

Seymour started advertising rewinds in late 1977/ early 1978 and then started making his own pickups in late 1978 and one of these pickups was the short lived EVH pickup which Ed stopped in late 1978/ early 1979.

This pickup presumably resurfaced again after a long time as the EVH78.

Ed went to Seymour Duncan to have some rewinding done presumably when Seymour advertised his rewinding services in late 1977/ early 1978 and one of the rewound pickups specs was presumably similar to the EVH78 pickup specs.

Ed's black PAF starts appearing in photos from very late 1977/ early 1978 around the same time Seymour Duncan started advertising rewinds and it looks like Ed's black PAF is one of the pickups rewound by Seymour Duncan.

EVH: Like the other guitars, I took it to a pro in Santa Barbara and had the pickup rewound. So it is custom-made and gives me an original sound.

from Young Guitar - June 1978 (reprinted and translated for The Inside - Issue 14)

EVH: and a guy named Seymour Duncan, I got pissed at him too. He called me up and said, "Can we use your name for a special pickup?" And I said no. Next time I pick up Guitar Player magazine, there's a special Van Halen model customized Duncan pickup. I called him up and said, "What the hell's goin' on?" So he stopped finally.

from Guitar player December 29 1979

FWIW

"I called duncans custom shop to inquire about the duncan 78 and was guaranteed that the 78 IS THE PU on VH-II? Was told that this is the rewind done to eddies P.A.F before he went on the world vacation tour."

http://forum.metroamp.com/viewtopic.php ... 7&p=326580" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

There is little chance that Ed had any of his Mighty Mites rewound as the bobbins were wound using a bondable wire.
This coil bonding would stop feedback much like wax potting so maybe Ed liked that about the Mighty Mite pickups because the DiMarzio Super Distortions were unpotted and Wayne Charvel tells a story about potting one of Ed's DiMarzios and it shriveling up.

http://wayneguitars.com/wordpress/?page_id=444" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

"By the way, the first Dimarzio pickup I potted for Eddie, got too hot and the cream plastic bobbin shriveled up. It looked bad, but it still worked fine. Eddie liked the way it looked. (He liked funky things in those days.) "

Ed had other Mighty Mite parts besides the Mighty Mite Distortion pickups (basically modeled on a DiMarzio Super Distortion) including a Mighty Mite bridge and a Mighty Mite single coil pickup in the Red Black and White Franky.

Ed's Destroyer with a white Mighty Mite Distortion pickup in the bridge (it has no small bobbin holes) and a black DiMarzio Super Distortion in the neck (it has small bobbin holes).





Early 1977 Burst Strat with white Mighty Mite (no bobbin holes)



1978 B&W Franky Seymour rewound PAF



1979 R&B&W Franky with probably a DiMarzio pickup that has shriveled after potting



1980 R&B&W Franky White pickup



Bee Dimarzio Super Distortion with changed magnet



Mighty Mite single coil in R&B&W Franky



Mighty Mite bridge



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http://wayneguitars.com/wordpress/?page_id=444" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Wayne Charvel

Randy Zacuto (founder of Mighty Mite), from JB Player also purchased parts from me. He hired a friend of mine named Seymour Duncan, who had been making tele three piece bridge saddles and rewinding pickups to make Mighty Mite pickups for him. A short time later, Seymour came out with his own line of pickups. We also sold those.

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http://electricbassland.com/interviews/ ... ur-duncan/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Seymour Duncan

I started doing OEMs (original equipment manufacturing) for several guitar companies and then actually manufacturing my own pickups for sale and taking them around. I started making brass bridges for Telecasters and doing the phenolic pickguards for Telecasters and Esquires. I was also modifying 5-way switches – converting 3-way to 5-way and started doing more and more rewindings. I started advertising in 1977/78 to do rewinds and by the end of 1978 I started manufacturing the humbucking pickup and went towards having an injection mould made which at the time was pretty expensive. So that’s basically how I got started.

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Mighty Mite from Seymour Duncan

http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/fa ... -a/451475/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

462. I had an old "Mighty Mite" single coil that was damaged and the coil was very hard to remove, how come?


Mighty Mite pickups were made at a Southern California company called Turbo-Jet and the bobbins were wound using a bondable wire. After the bobbins were wound, the coils were heated in ovens and the special insulation would bond to each other making a solid coil. The coils were difficult to remove if the bobbin needed rewinding or turns needed to be removed. There are other bondable wire’s that are activated by chemicals but can get very messy when working with them. I prefer a hot wax solution used with a vacuum to draw the air bubbles out and this allows the pickup to be repaired easier and potting with epoxy also makes the pickup almost impossible to repair. 


Not sure what the purpose of this post is, but I guess I'll bite...

leadguy wrote:He hired a friend of mine named Seymour Duncan, who had been making tele three piece bridge saddles and rewinding pickups to make Mighty Mite pickups for him.

First, isn't the above quote the heart of the matter? Seymour was a friend of Wayne's who had already been winding pickups before he advertised or worked making Mighty Mites. Is it that big of a stretch to believe Wayne told Ed about him and he had his pickups rewound before the first album? I don't think so.

Second, you always neglect to mention that we don't have photographs of Ed or his guitars after May of 1977 until much later in the year - that is, the recording time is photo-less. You choose to go with what he had in his guitar at demo time - early 1977. I choose to go with what he had after he recorded because he said that's what he used on the record - PAFs. Simple.

Hope this helps somebody.

wjamflan wrote:
First, isn't the above quote the heart of the matter? Seymour was a friend of Wayne's who had already been winding pickups before he advertised or worked making Mighty Mites. Is it that big of a stretch to believe Wayne told Ed about him and he had his pickups rewound before the first album? I don't think so.

Second, you always neglect to mention that we don't have photographs of Ed or his guitars after May of 1977 until much later in the year - that is, the recording time is photo-less. You choose to go with what he had in his guitar at demo time - early 1977. I choose to go with what he had after he recorded because he said that's what he used on the record - PAFs. Simple.

Hope this helps somebody.

I have said this same thing,wayne knew seymour and ed knew wayne,i cant beleive that wayne would not tell eddie that there "
a pickup winder i know named seymour" Cmon,eddie had a big interest in potting,magnet swapping and such why wouldnt wayne introduce to the two guys?(ed and seymour)
I find it very easy to believe that seymour rewound one of ed's PAF's right before eddie went into the studio. try to put yourself in his place. you are going to do your very first major record for a major label wouldnt you want all the gear related things in order? why wait till AFTER the record was finished? and dont tell me he had no cash,they got a huge advance.
this is what makes me

I'm just presenting what is publicly available and lumping it together.

If others want to fill in gaps with their own view then that is their own view.

I hope you all notice that I have said nothing about what pickup was used on VH1 or whatever and I really don't favor any pickup.

Ed used what he used and he could have swapped in an unknown pickup a day before the recording of VH1 for all we know.

The pickup has nothing to do with Ed's playing or style, Ed can do his thing on Acoustic with no pickups.

http://www.independent.com/news/2011/ju ... n-special/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

"But one of the most dramatic rises for Duncan was during the “hair band” era. “It was the Van Halen time,” he said. “I was doing a lot of oddball things for Eddie [Van Halen]. He wouldn’t tell anybody what he had in his guitars, and he was telling people that he was winding his own pickups. But he wasn’t.” If Duncan remembers correctly, Van Halen opted for the JB model pickup, the one he first made for Beck way back when. “To this day, it’s our biggest-selling pickup of all time,” said Duncan. “I can’t comprehend how many we’ve made. It’s probably over 500,000 that we’ve made by now. It’s an amazing amount.”

Has anyone here had 1st, 2nd or whatever hand experience with the original, unauthorized EVH SD pickup that was ceased and desisted? Is there any record of that pickup? That would be quite a collector's piece, no? It sure would be revealing to know what SD put out after VH took off with his record of what he did for Ed still that fresh in his head.

Yes it would.

Someone would have had to get in quick before Ed's legal dudes did.

Rich_D wrote:Has anyone here had 1st, 2nd or whatever hand experience with the original, unauthorized EVH SD pickup that was ceased and desisted? Is there any record of that pickup? That would be quite a collector's piece, no? It sure would be revealing to know what SD put out after VH took off with his record of what he did for Ed still that fresh in his head.

that said pu is the duncan 78 formally named the EVH. i own 2 of these. this was advertised in GP mag back in 78/79 as the "special van halen pickup" eddie put a stop to seymour advertising this pu but could not stop the pu from still being sold as a custom ordered model known as the 78 wind on the side. it is a 9K paf with one coil(front) wound hotter than the rear coil. it has a alnico 2 magnet as well.
seymour duncan archieves/writes down all the custom winds he does for famous clients. this pu was always available through custom ordering. all you had to do was ask for the wind that was done for VH back in 78

leadguy wrote:I'm just presenting what is publicly available and lumping it together.

If others want to fill in gaps with their own view then that is their own view.

I hope you all notice that I have said nothing about what pickup was used on VH1 or whatever and I really don't favor any pickup.

Ed used what he used and he could have swapped in an unknown pickup a day before the recording of VH1 for all we know.

The pickup has nothing to do with Ed's playing or style, Ed can do his thing on Acoustic with no pickups.

Sorry. I posted before you did the numerous edits and additions.

The one thing I will add to what you said is, although a pickup may not make or break Ed's style, it definitely had a lot to do with the brown sound that this forum is supposed to be about.

AWESOME leadguy! Thanks! 1 Q: Did SiMarzio make black SDs back then (Shark)? Thought they were only double creams.

I get ONE thing from this for sure, which is,,,,

ED definately had a custom wound pu in the Franky by late '77.

I also think that , REGARDLESS of the pu,, that Ed did something with his amps (from early '77 to the Pasadena Civic show) which he WASNT doing by Late '77 (the 'eve' Whiskey gig) REGARDLESS of whatever pu he was using.

Tone Slinger wrote:I get ONE thing from this for sure, which is,,,,

ED definately had a custom wound pu in the Franky by late '77.

I also think that , REGARDLESS of the pu,, that Ed did something with his amps (from early '77 to the Pasadena Civic show) which he WASNT doing by Late '77 (the 'eve' Whiskey gig) REGARDLESS of whatever pu he was using.

I agree, and while we are talkin pu's the guy here named TED B was absolutely right about not using resistance as a guide to output or tone. I have a dimarzio EVH custom wound bridge pu i just got that i put in a alder charvel with a all maple neck. theis EVH dimarzio is a 17.7K pu which is about where a tone zone is resistance wise BUT the EVH dimarzio has real clean,articulate PAF type sound whereas the tone zone is over the top in output and frequencies. both use a alnico 5 magnet,
The EVH dimarzio is freakin amazing it has power liike a super d but has a classic PAF tone to it. i wish dimarzio sold these, i had to get one used on a trade from someone out of their EBMM axis. the pu smokes,much better than the EVH frankenstein and the duncan 78. If eddie had benn using his old plexi with this instead of the soldano or 5150 he wound have stll got his classic tone.

Has anyone done an actual comparison between the MM 1300 and the DSD in the same guitar? If so how similar were they? The MM's were essentially DiMarzio clones form what I understand. But, they were still made by Duncan, whose pup's sound very different from Dimarzio's in general.

Tone Slinger wrote:I get ONE thing from this for sure, which is,,,,

ED definately had a custom wound pu in the Franky by late '77.

I also think that , REGARDLESS of the pu,, that Ed did something with his amps (from early '77 to the Pasadena Civic show) which he WASNT doing by Late '77 (the 'eve' Whiskey gig) REGARDLESS of whatever pu he was using.

What differences in tone from his amp are you hearing?? It could be a pickup. We all know what a super distortion does to a plexi compared to a PAF

JTM100 wrote:Has anyone done an actual comparison between the MM 1300 and the DSD in the same guitar? If so how similar were they? The MM's were essentially DiMarzio clones form what I understand. But, they were still made by Duncan, whose pup's sound very different from Dimarzio's in general.

Yep. I have both and prefer the MM. My only issue is that it's from the 70's and though they used a "bondable" wire, there's nothing left about its insulation and it squeals horribly. Just need to pot it and I should be happy. They are very very close though but clarity and definition goes to the MM.