Newbie Question about Westone Pickups:

who made them, and are there specs?

I have another thread seeking an arm for a Corsair I just ordered, and I thought I'd check with the Westone brain trust to see what info there is on the pickups.  Mine will have the S/S/H setup with the mini toggles, and they're supposedly Alnico pickups...but that's all I can (quickly) see.  Were they made by Duncan, Dimarzio, or...?

there are general descriptions of the pickups etc in the catalogs, but as far as i know there are no officially issued specifications

it seems that the pickups were custom made for Westone guitars and made specifically for each model and position

the only information available is from owners that have shared their observations of guitars they own

i have one of those Corsair guitars and i gotta say, the pickups sound great!

I generally like them, but there are a couple of issues:

1.  The humbucker has lost a lot of its "oomph" over 30+ years. The single-coil position on the switch, while noisier, seems to give more bite.

2.  The middle pickups isn't reverse wound for noise cancelling when used with the neck pickup, which is something I've kinda gotten used to over the decades of playing.

I'm torn, because I'm a shameless tinkerer and my first instinct is to experiment with pickups...but the covers on these have aged exactly with the body binding, they match perfectly...I'm considering getting them rewound by Lollar or Seymour Duncan, just to update the sound while keeping the guitar very close to original.

gittarasaurus wrote:there are general descriptions of the pickups etc in the catalogs, but as far as i know there are no officially issued specifications

it seems that the pickups were custom made for Westone guitars and made specifically for each model and position

the only information available is from owners that have shared their observations of guitars they own

i have one of those Corsair guitars and i gotta say, the pickups sound great!

Your guitar is the freakin' twin of mine...do you have actual model info?  The decal was long gone from mine....

my best guess is that it is a Corsair Standard XA1430
check out the 1988 Limited Editions catalog >here<

one difference from the catalog is that mine has a reverse headstock

Mine's also a reverse headstock, and I can't find any listings of a trans purple option in the catalog pages I've found.  Hmmm.

i believe it was actually not an anniversary issue model, but from the next year with some modifications.

originally the color was blue, but every one i've seen seems to have faded to a purple color

the closest version of this guitar in this finish that i can find is on the Westone website.

open the tab for 'Guitars' and select 'Spectrum Series'
skip to the bottom of the table and find 'Spectrum Series II', and click

check out the very last picture at the bottom of the >page<

so... i don't know which. corsair or spectrum s2? or, the missing link between them?
right nice guitar no matter what you call it!