Thorndal Magnetic Pickup Reference System
Basis:
 

Electromagnetic pickups are essential factor for the sound features of an electric guitar.
The question arises - as well for the guitar player as the luthier: "Which criterions help valuing the sound of an instrument?

Answers to this question normally are rather vague:

    "...sounds similar to..."
"...has a lot of power..."
"...very good harmonics... " etc.
 

All attempts of sound definition will finally be inefficient because you don`t have a basis of fixed definitions, terms and standardizations.

Thorndal Pickups (as the worlwide first company) has made a point of determining and introducing standards for the production and evaluation of pickups through the next years.
Generally:
  An electric guitar is a very complex creation, made of different materials:
    - wood
- metall
- finish
- electronic parts
 

These different components have specific features. The response features of wood for example vary as a function of sort and density. Metals consist of different alloys. Also the finish in its different compositions is relevant to the sound. And finally the electronic parts like pickups have production tolerances, often deviations up to 30% of the denomination.

The creation electric guitar 'is floating' through these many imponderables. A clear sound definition also with structurally identical instruments is nearly impossible. Even professionals find it difficult to make decisive statements.
Any way out of this dilemma?
  Thorndal Pickups has made it its business to isolate (at first) the pickups out of the many parts of an electric guitar and to capture the sound features. The necessary is reasonable because we use high tech. All other guitar parts would be much more difficult to classify.
The Reference Pickup
  We had to clear up the following questions to be able to produce a pickup suitable as a reference:
 
  • Which pickup sounds are of general interest?
  • Which materials are enough precise to guarantee minimal tolerances?
  • Which pickup winder would be suited for production?
  • What are the intended results?
  Some years of research and development answered these "4 big Ws":
    "W" Number 1:
   

By interviewing bolt on guitar players (different music styles) we could learn that they prefer vintage like pickup sounds.
You can range in 3 categories:
   
  • clean and open sound, a lot of twang, 50ies sound oriented...
  • clean and open sound with more mids and a bit more power, 60ies sound oriented...
  • fat and warm sound with enough sparkle to punch overdrive units (bridge PU)
   

All guitar players prefer a defined bass sound.

For humbuckers we got more decisive statements:
   
  • vintage oriented sound with warm mids, exactly defined harmonics with very good chime tones (like old PAF's)
  • exactly defined sound with a peak in the upper mids for more modern sounds (highgain sector; mainly for bridge position)
    A perfect single string definition for the overdrive sector and also a bit more power for the bridge humbucker were often choosen features. Noticeable: these requirements are to be found in all styles and brands.
    "W" Number 2:
    Looking for qualified materials for our reference pickup production wasn't as difficult as interviewing the guitar players! Germany is a hightech location, so made a find quickly. Admittedly our suppliers are crisscross spread over country, but therefore we get high class materials.
    "W" Number 3:
    The wiring tolerances produced by customary mechanical wiring machines (for example caused by stretching the wire) are very high. So we decided quickly for a computer aided system. Adequate programms can adjust all wiring parameters exactly - and above all: you can re-produce absolutely exact.
You can`t find such a gadget on the market. We had to design and construct it ourselves.
Control parameters were the average facts of the different pickups we had taken for the musicians interviews.
    "W" Number 4:
   

These from musicians preferred sound characters led to our Singlecoil and Humbucker series.
The 'listening' tests we made with Thorndal pickups (test guitars were incidentally chosen series guitars from different well known companies, the players didn`t know which pickups were used) spoke for itself: 70% of the favorite pickups were Thorndal pickups. The biggest hit was our Mojo Blues set and the combination neck humbucker 3.1 and bridge humbucker 3.3.
So our pickups can be taken for reference pickups as far as it concerns the sound.

Another test to check the reference suitability:
Different instruments were equipped with Mojo Blues sets respectively 3.1/3.3 humbuckers and compared. Because of the minimal pickup tolerances(< 1%, that means negligible) it appeared, that just the instruments and not the pickup sound feature was evaluated. Astonishing result: Some 'cheapos' ranked not so far from expensive instruments. Differences caused by pickup tolerances didn't further distort the instruments' sound, one could compare the instruments' specifics perfectly.
As related to pickups that means, that a comparision of several instruments can be made without nasty converting: Each set can be taken as a reference set.
Advantage for building guitars: The luthier can check wood or manufacturing varieties with the aid of reference pickups. He can concentrate just on the instrument. The high production continuity of our CADCAM series pickups benefits also our customers.
Result:
 

So far so good! Reference pickups from the Thorndal CADCAM series help the guitar players reliably to orient themselves in the 'pickup jungle'.

And finally: Development and production of Thorndal pickups were not undertaken to produce world's best pickups. We wanted to specify an industrial standard - orientating at the high end, not the lower end of the quality scale.

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