12-02-2014, 12:16 PM
I can make you a list:
Wood is a different issue because it's got to be plasticized anyway. So it's impregnated with some kind of resin. If not it would chip and shear. But also if not it would have really terrible expansion/contraction rates and the pores could cut the wires if they expanded/lifted with moisture. So the result of a stabilized wood bobbin is probably similar to a plastic material.
Aside from butyrate and glass filled nylon, it has been my experience that a typical pickup company would not vary the bobbin material for certain "standard" models aside from using butyrate for vintage accuracy, and whatever their normal material is for everything else. But aside from vintage reverence, most companies probably are choosing bobbin materials based on the look of the finished pickup, the shine, the resilience, cost, etc.
Companies have been known to change their bobbin material over time. Dimarzio has, and MJ has confirmed in public (so it's not private information) that Duncan started with butyrate, went to nylon, then to polycarbonate, maybe with some weird transition periods in between. Most of that happened early on, so if you're holding a used Duncan chances are high that it's polycarbonate, statistically speaking.
Sometimes companies change just to save money, sometimes to improve the look, sometimes just because they buy their bobbins from some pre-existing source and they change suppliers. Lots of "boutique" guys just use whatever Allparts sells them, and maybe switch to Mojotone at some point, or whatever. It's really a very small difference in sound.
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Wood is a different issue because it's got to be plasticized anyway. So it's impregnated with some kind of resin. If not it would chip and shear. But also if not it would have really terrible expansion/contraction rates and the pores could cut the wires if they expanded/lifted with moisture. So the result of a stabilized wood bobbin is probably similar to a plastic material.
Aside from butyrate and glass filled nylon, it has been my experience that a typical pickup company would not vary the bobbin material for certain "standard" models aside from using butyrate for vintage accuracy, and whatever their normal material is for everything else. But aside from vintage reverence, most companies probably are choosing bobbin materials based on the look of the finished pickup, the shine, the resilience, cost, etc.
Companies have been known to change their bobbin material over time. Dimarzio has, and MJ has confirmed in public (so it's not private information) that Duncan started with butyrate, went to nylon, then to polycarbonate, maybe with some weird transition periods in between. Most of that happened early on, so if you're holding a used Duncan chances are high that it's polycarbonate, statistically speaking.
Sometimes companies change just to save money, sometimes to improve the look, sometimes just because they buy their bobbins from some pre-existing source and they change suppliers. Lots of "boutique" guys just use whatever Allparts sells them, and maybe switch to Mojotone at some point, or whatever. It's really a very small difference in sound.