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Fender Rhodes Pickups
Fender Rhodes Pickups
Purchase original or new repoduction pickups for your Fender Rhodes or Rhodes piano!
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Product Details
Description
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Pickup Guide
Video
Description
Vintage Vibe offers new original reproduction and used Fender Rhodes pickups. Different years of Rhodes pianos offered varying characteristics as well as bracket sizing. If we are out of stock on any original pickup a Vintage Vibe reproduction can be used in its place in most cases. In the case of different bracket lengths, the Vintage Vibe bobbin can be purchased and installed onto the original bracket for a match. Please read our pickup history for more info. Each pickup is carefully tested before shipping and are guaranteed to work.
When replacing multiple pickups, we recommend purchasing our custom pickup wire that is original to the Rhodes specifications. Purchase pickup wire here.
Pickup wire is fragile and can be burned with too much heat causing the pickup to open up, use caution when installing-
Note: Each pickup is sold individually. All pickups are tested prior to shipping to the customer. Reproduction Pickups are inspected and tested throughout the manufacturing process and once again prior to shipping to the customer. Pickups are not returnable.
Please contact us if interested in purchasing a set of 73 or 88 pickups.
Pickup Guide
1965-1969 Era (1960s 4" Pickup): Pickups used during this era were found in early Fender Rhodes Silver Sparkle top pianos, some early student models and bass pianos models. Pickups often had a green bobbin wire (also found in Red) around 4” long.
1970-71 Era (1970 3.5" Pickup): Pickups found in this era had long bracket which were about 3.5” long. These pickups are unique in that they still used the early style bobbin which was bigger and implemented a longer magnet which was stronger. The strength of this pickup led to shorter dwell and pitch shifting. These pianos are usually wired in series/parallel configuration.
Note: The main obstacle with trying to replace this type of pickup is that for some reason Fender implemented a north facing magnet as opposed to all other years which was south facing. When replacing pickups in this era of piano you must replace with the same era of pickup. If you cannot find this type, you must remove the magnet and pole piece and flip it in order to achieve full fundamental of note.
1972-73 Era (1972 3.5" Pickup): This era of pickups have changed bobbins and shortened the magnet yet the overall length was still longer than the late style pickups. These pickups were roughly 3.5" long.
1974-1979 Era (1974 3" Pickup): This era of pickups are the most common pickup. The bobbin stayed the same as well as the magnet and pole piece from the earlier 72 era but the bracket shortened with an overall length of 3”.
1980-1984 Era (1980 3" White Pickup): This era of pickups are known as the "White" pickups. They are known as having a high failure rate due to the copper wiring used. Age and moisture were and still are detrimental to this type of pickup. It’s not unheard of to have 40+ bad pickups in one piano of this era. 1974-79 era pickups are a perfect replacement.
Vintage Vibe Reproductions- Vintage Vibe Pickups are made to the same specs as the 1974 to 1984 era Rhodes pickups .Vintage Vibe pickups will blend perfectly every time not only in looks and fit but more importantly in tone. Made in the USA and wound to exact tight tolerances every time. You will find all of our pickups are held within the same tight tolerance from one to the next.