[sdiy] [OT] Fender Rhodes Pickup Wiring

[Michael Zacherl]

Hi, I just found that I know little to nothing about pick-ups as used on guitars and in e-Pianos.

I dug through some papers and found the wiring scheme for a Fender Rhodes 73.

On the bottom of page 27 of this PDF 
http://www.synthfool.com/docs/Other_Misc/Rhodes_Servicemanual.pdf (Thanks Kevin! R.I.P.)

it says 
"Later, basic voltage output was quadrupled by changing the series/parallel arrangement as shown in Figure 10-4. 
This change can be made on any of the older Pianos simply by re-routing the bus wires as shown in Figure 10-5. The output impedance then becomes approximately 2500 ohms.”

Looking more closely to the change (I’d love to see betters scans, sorry!)

http://www.fenderrhodes.com/org/manual/fig10-3.gif

http://www.fenderrhodes.com/org/manual/fig10-4.gif

I wonder how the summed up output voltage gets this 4x increase?

Also what are the pros/cons of wiring those coils in parallel and/or serial configuration?
I did some experiments with the guts of an abandoned Rhodes and found the levels very low and the whole thing very noisy.

BTW, one pick-up has a DC resistance of about 175Ω. 
If I could rewire the pickups completely, what would you recommend?

Thanks, Michael.