Steel guitar pickups are usually wound with more turns to increase sustain but with the increased turns and higher DC resistance there would be an increased loss of high end the further away from the bridge. The pickup is moved close to the bridge to retain the brightness and with the added turns gives the instrument a nice sustain. Some steel guitar pickups could be wound to 16 K ohms and even higher. Lap and steel guitar pickups can have many rod pole pieces either magnet rods, steel rods connected to bar magnets, steel blades and magnet blades and all give a different tone to the instrument. My favorite lap steel pickups are the 8 string Fender Stringmaster's as used by Santo & Johnny on many of their hit recordings and especially "Sleep Walk" which is one of my all time favorites. I made Johnny Farina special Stringmaster pickups using two single coil pickups and when blended together they become humbucking.
WRITTEN ON JUNE 12, 2015, BY