Wizard wrote
Now that I understand how a pickup works, what differentiates a cheap, stock, Squier pickup from a really expensive trendy pickup?
A cheap Squier will use a cheaper ceramic magnet bar under the pickup and soft magnets made of iron for polepieces. The more expensive pickup uses alnico magnets for polepieces. The wire will usually be different too (more consistent wire is more expensive) as well as the insulation on the wire (a minute difference in the thickness of the insulator can make a big difference in the size of the coil).
As GH pointed out, wrap method makes a difference. Nice clean machine wrapping makes a hotter pickup for the same number of turns, but it won't be as sonically interesting. Speed of wrapping affects the stretching of the wire, as does a variable speed method that compensates for the shape of the coil former (at constant speed, going around the corners pulls wire off the roll at a different rate than along the length of the pickup, so the wire tends to be thinner round the edges of a pickup).
Winding a coil by hand is an art - the real fundis at handwiring (Don Mare, Tom Wolfe, Jason Lollar, Scott Lentz, et. al.) can wind a pickup to have a certain sound and in most cases have analyzed the winding patterns of original vintage pickups to get their secrets (Scott Lentz winds each set specifically to suit each individual guitar). Two winders wrapping two pickups with identical specs will usually end up with different sounding pickups. Early handwound pickups were all different and each women who wound them each had their own method of wrapping a coil. Some have come to be regarded higher than others as great sounding pickups (Abby Ybarra and the unknown "Josie" who wound pickups for fender in the '50s). "Scatter winding" tries to emulate some of the random character of a hand-wound coil using a machine.
Some secret that Kinman has that he's not sharing?
Noiseless are a different animal completely. The art of making something that is essentially a humbucker sound like a single-coil is more in the design than arcane wrap methods. Some very interesting magnetic "tricks" in those babies - patent searches will bring up some real interesting details, as to patent a "secret", you have to give details of the secret. ?
