All products from CJLab Pickups are developed and designed in California, more specifically, in so-called Silicon Valley. CJ, as in CJLab, has been a hardware reliability engineer in a few major tech companies for >19 years. He also has been, a DIY pickup maker for >10 years and a hobby guitarist for >30 years. His journey toward SETbucker started from the never-dying complaints about humbucker coil-splitting, which eventually led to an idea of "inner-coil". It took over 6 years - from an idea to a patent (Patent no. US 9552802), and to optimization for humbucker pickups with different specs and sound traits, and then to mass production.
The inner-coil adds an "expand" feature to existing split and/or tap for Patent-Applied-For humbucker pickups. While it does not alter the original humbucker sound, the inner-coil makes the humbucker pickup more versatile, and more importantly, the coil-split more usable. We named the humbucker pickup with the inner-coil as SETbucker - SET stands for Split-Expand-Tap. Read SETbucker Explained for more info about the inner-coil and how the SETbucker works.
We wind pickups in 2 sites - Dongho Electronics in South Korea and CJLab in the USA. Mass production is done at Dongho Electronics. You may not be familiar with Dongho but it has been winding acclaimed Kent Armstrong pickups for decades. It also has been the supplier of quality parts for many pickup and guitar makers. Dongho's know-hows and expertise on parts manufacturing have been crucial to bringing the SETbucker to reality. The US site winds all vintage series pickups and custom shop SETbuckers. Pickguard sets and prewired kits are also made in the US site.
SETbucker - Classic Series: Being wound with 42-gage plain enamel (PE) wire, they aim to reproduce 50's vintage Patent-Applied-For humbucker sounds. C-2 and C-5 are with A2 and A5 magnets, respectively, representing 2 distinctive vintage tones.
SETbucker - Modern Series: These are variations from classical humbucker for more clarity (M-2) or for higher output (M-3), which have been essential in modern jazz, rock and heavy metal. M-2 and M-3 use 42 and 43 gage magnetic wire, respectively, and both have A5 magnets.
Single Coil Series: There are 2 unique features in our single coil pickups: 1. machine-winding in a custom wide pitch to mimic scatter winding, and 2. A5 magnets are magnetized at slightly less than their maximum to tighten the bass and round the high. S-1 mimics early 60's Strat sound and S-2 is for people who like hotter and articulate sound. We also offer T-1 for telecaster users.
Inspire Series: Some of custom shop pickups may "graduate" into Inspire Series when they are considered worth releasing for more affordable price. We have 2 pre-graduates. I-1 and I-11 are the replicas of legendary Greco Dry Z pickups, and I-2 is that of the ever-favorite Seymour Duncan JB pickup. Of course, all of them incorporate the inner-coil to add versatility and usability. The Inspire Series is not limited to SETbuckers but could include single coil pickups in the future.
Custom Shop: These are Al-A-Carte pickups. SETbuckers are wound based on customer's specific needs like extra clarity or output, replica of existing pickups (+inner-coil), etc. Single coil pickups are scatter-wound for extra clarity and tightness. All custom shop pickups are made in California, USA.
Prewired Sets: Wiring SETbucker is a bit more complicated than typical humbucker wiring, and in some cases , could be painful due to complexities and limited wiring cavity space in some guitars. So we offer pickguard sets for Strat style guitars and prewired kits for Les Paul type guitars. We offer any custom prewired kits as an extended custom shop service. All prewired sets are made in the CJLab shops in US. If you have confidence with soldering and wiring, check out wiring diagrams!
Interested in trying one? Check out our Reverb shop!