What properties of a pickup can you measure with a multimeter?

[capnkid]

I have an old dimarzio and was wondering how to measure the output, maybe others stuff.
so what do I set the multimeter on to measure this stuff?

 

[Light]

All you can really measure is the DC Resistance, but that tells you what the impedance is (multiply DC resistance by 1.25), which gives you a rough idea of the output of the pickup. The higher the impedance, the higher the output.


Light

"Cowards can never be moral."
M.K. Gandhi

 

[Milnoque]

You can use resistance to compare similar pickups. The strength of the magnet and configuration of the coil(s) matter a lot too.

Resistance is a very good way to decide which pickup to use in the bridge position, but it's less usefull when deciding whether a Lace Sensor will be as loud as a PAF. It also says nothing about tone.

A G&L Field coil pickup uses stronger magnets and less resistance to arrive at it's output.

People make too much of coil resistance when selecting pickups.

All that said, it's still a useful piece of info to have.

 

[chazba]

You can measure the output voltage (Millivolts AC) but there are so many variables (how hard the note was picked, string gauge and age, etc) that I doubt that it would be very useful info. A typical out put voltage from a Bucker might be 150 to 300 mV AC.

 

[dragonworks]

Is there any way to tell if a pickup is any good at all with a meter without hooking it up and tapping on it?

 

[ggunn]

Is there any way to tell if a pickup is any good at all with a meter without hooking it up and tapping on it?

Yes. The most common way a pickup fails is breakage of the wire that makes up the coil. If you put an ohmmeter across the terminals of a pickup which has failed in that way, you'll see an open circuit. A good pickup will read in the k Ohms range. A shorted pickup (also a failure) will read a very low resistance.