News Feature: Andy's Seymour Duncan Pickups Factory Visit

Andy recently took a visit to Seymour Duncan Pickup's production facility in Santa Barbara. In this photo journal, we see how the Seymour Duncan factory is able to produce some of the best aftermarket pickups available, using both modern and traditional techniques. elRayo Guitarworks sells a wide range of Seymour Duncan pickups, from brand new active Blackouts, to Antiquities capturing all the nuances of vintage pickups. Special thanks to Lori Greenberg for taking the photos seen here. If you have any other questions regarding Seymour Duncan pickups, email us.

Located in beautiful Santa Barbara, CA, the Seymour Duncan manufacturing facility houses all pickup assembly and distribution. Seymour and Cathy Carter Duncan started it all here, moving from a loft downtown to their own production facility.

From left to right, Andy Greenberg of elRayo Guitarworks, Seymour Duncan, Lori Greenberg, and Marcela Juarez. As head of custom shop, Marcela winds pickups for some of the biggest names in music. And of course, Seymour needs no introduction. He is the only person in the facility that hand scatter-winds pickups.

A view from up high. The factory is organized for quick production, while maintaining the highest quality.

The presses seen here are an initial step in assembly for humbucking pickups. These studloaders drive the studs into the non-adjustable bobbin of the humbucker, directing the magnetic field created by magnet bars located under the bobbins. These specific presses are used for trembucker and seven string humbuckers.

Spools of coil ready for winding. Different thickness of wire produce different impedences and DC resistances. This in turn dictates the overall tonality of the pickup. This wire coil requires the finest touch as it can easily break.

"The Green Monster": an original Leesona Model 102 winding machine purchased from Gibson's Kalamazoo factory, originally used to make the PAF humbucking pickups that defined rock and roll tone. Seymour Duncan has adapted these machines to use a digital counter to monitor the number of windings on each pickup, winding their modern PAF-styled pickups on this machine. Originally, pickup winders worked strictly by the amount of time a pickup was wound, resulting in a wide variance between pickup windings. The digital meters insure greater consistency between pickups; if you love the sound of your Seth Lover pickup, you know you can get that same sound from another Seth Lover replacement.

A modern winding machine, used in the production of such pickups as the Invader, Custom, and Jazz pickups. Again, digital accuracy guarantees the same quality and tone from pickup to pickup.

There's more though... Click here for page 2 of Andy's visit.