Patent ID: 8853517

Claim:
A magnetic pickup for detecting the vibration of ferromagnetic strings on a musical instrument, the pickup comprising: at least one ferromagnetic pole piece with each pole piece having at least one string-sensing surface; a magnetic source associated with each of the at least one pole pieces that generates at least a portion of a magnetic field at the at least one string-sensing surface of each pole piece; a wire coil having its innermost windings defining an interior coil volume and a top and bottom of the volume defined by a top and bottom of the wire coil, the wire coil surrounding at least a portion of each pole piece; a mounting structure that secures each of the pole pieces and the coil in a stable relative position and enables their attachment to the stringed musical instrument; and a component that at least partially determines a tone of the pickup through ferromagnetic loss mechanisms, the component being formed from a low permeability material that comprises an insulating binder and a granulated ferromagnetic material that is selected from a group consisting of hysteresis materials and soft ferromagnetic materials and the low permeability component having a portion that is outside of the interior coil volume.