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Pearloid Strat Pickup Covers?


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I can't say I've seen any, but I'm looking for a single coil pickup cover in pearloid. I tried all the obvious vendors, and no luck. Rio Grande makes pearloid covered singles, but its part of the bobbin. If no one knows of a definite source, I'll just make them myself like a bobbin topper laminated to a white cover. So you don't have to reply with a "have you checked out........they might have..." etc. Because I've probably checked them out. But if you've ever seen them let me know. So far I've only seen P-90's available as a cover. Thanks

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I can't say I've seen any, but I'm looking for a single coil pickup cover in pearloid. I tried all the obvious vendors, and no luck. Rio Grande makes pearloid covered singles, but its part of the bobbin. If no one knows of a definite source, I'll just make them myself like a bobbin topper laminated to a white cover. So you don't have to reply with a "have you checked out........they might have..." etc. Because I've probably checked them out. But if you've ever seen them let me know. So far I've only seen P-90's available as a cover. Thanks

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/srs7/g=guit...ase_pid/361286/

Official Fender white pearloid 11-hole 3-single coil strat pickguard.

This is what came on my texas special strat, it looks pretty good.

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You might thin down pearloid pickguard material so that you only have the pearloid left. Then laminate it onto the top of white covers. Because the pearloid and the white are so closely matched you won't even see the edge.

-Doug

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Yeah that's what I was saying, to do them like bobbin toppers. I'd probably thin down the top of the white pickup cover itself too. That way together the laminations wouldn't be that much thicker than a regular cover. As it is, these single coils I'm using on this guitar don't have a lot of clearance on top of the bobbin. The magnets sit slightly below the surface of the cover. So I was even thinking of just laminating the pearloid to the pickup, and leave it uncovered like the Rio Grandes, or for that matter a Tom Anderson or Duncan 1/4 lb. Or I could go with flat covers that have no holes, and laminate them over the top of the pickup, since the magnets are already sunken in a little. But then I couldn't get the pickup as close to the strings. These are 4.5k vintage wind singles so they can't be that far from the strings. I'll figure it out one way or the other. I just thought maybe someone knew of a source for pre-mades. Or I thought maybe there were some other sources for a bobbin topper, or a new pearloid "prototype" that hadn't hit Brian's website yet.

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Hey thanks Marksound. I have some self adhesive abalam here and I thought about using that, but it might be a bit too fancy looking. But the guitar does have abalone dot inlays so.......

That fretmarker stuff is real pearl. I was hoping for the pearloid look but that might be a nice upgrade. Its $35 for a 1"x9" strip, which would get me the three bobbin tops I need.

Thanks tanglewood, but as I was saying before, Rio Grande just integrates it into the top of their bobbin. They don't sell any covers.

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I have never seen pickup covers made out of it.. perhaps it's because pickup covers are molded and pearloid can't be melted and injected into a mold.. it's a compression process that produces a sheet.. pearloid pickguard material is expensive too.. I think all RG is doing is using the fancy material as the top flat in their bobbin. You might try this though..

http://www.precisiondrum.com/html/recovering_wrap.html

Drum wrap is the same material, and it's not cheap eather but you get a whole lot more of it per sheet than in a pickguard blank. It's thin and flexible. You could email them for a free sample and see if it can withstand the tooling. I'm afraid the bestyou will get is to make a laminate for the top of your cover.. I suppose you could wrap the cover too but it would probably no longer fit in your pickguard. You could also just tape your coils and put the laminate on top of the bobbin and go coverless.

You could also scan your local music store or pawn shop for some old knockoff snare drum with a pearl finish.. those were big in the 50s and 60s and have made a big comeback.. Just get an old drum and peel the wrap off of it.

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We have a winner! Mledbetter is the man! That drum covering will be perfect. I'll laminate it to the top and bevel the edges. And the woman on the phone was kind as can be. She's sending me a small sheet right now. This guitar doesn't have a pickguard so I might try to wrap the pickup covers, as well as top them. But I actually think I'll like the look of white walls better than pearloid walls. And I wanted to stay away from just covering the bobbin and leaving it open because I felt the black cloth tape would be too much of a contrast visually. The guitar is black, too. So the bobbin top would seem to appear out of nowhere. I want the white cover to frame out the pickup shape.

In the future, I'd love to cap a guitar with one of their awesome looking laminates. Perhaps do a white pearloid and then spray a blue sunburst over it. Or do a blue pearloid with black sunbursted edges. And check out that "Mediterranean pearl"........!

For those of you wanting the Jem Bad Horsie finish, they have chrome mirror that could probably be laminated to an RG very efficiently. I can't say enough nice things about this company! I consider their prices totally reasonable.

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Cool! Glad you like them. I'm a drummer too and have researched drum building for quite a while.. There are several places that sell drum wraps, they are probably the most well known though. I forgot too that you can get precut sheets and don't have to buy the 24x52 sheets.

The guitar covered with that would be interesting indeed.. There is a company, Gigliotti guitars I think that takes a USA Custom body and puts a piece of brushed aluminum in the top and when painted it has a really wild look..

http://www.gigliottiguitars.com/

Uses the burst to cover the seam. Some of those glass sparkle sheets would be interesting.

Good luck..

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