Armstrong import vs hand wound floating pickups

[Greg Martin]

On my just finished archtop I used the Kent Armstrong slimbucker floating pickup and so far everyone has loved its tone. I know see archtops,com is offering a handwound version with flat top for close to 200 bucks,I paid about 75 dollars for the import version. What in a handwound floating pickup could be that much different ?? honest question .Anyone here have experience with both of these? I also see a handwound which is exactly like Benedetto's early pickup 189.00. I dont mind at all spending more money if there is a tried and true track record to do so. Any thoughts?????

[David King]

Presumably the hand wound ones are made in Vermont by Kent himself while the imports are made in a small Korean factory that's run or used to be run by his son Arron. You can order from Kent directly if you want or order from what might be Arron's shop in London. I'm pretty sure that WD is the exclusive US distributor for the Korean production.

[Greg Martin]

thanks I was aware Mr Armstrong was winding,but didnt know his son ran the WD/Korean shop[, Has anyone here used both the hand wound and the import and experienced the differences, if any? that is what Im curious about. Like I said I like the import one, but would still like a comparison between the both.