Nice story. We all hope our products work perfectly but if not, you’ll be surprised at how much support a lot of manufacturers do give.

Any chance of a photo of the bare wire pickup, as they were obviously keen to show the construction off?

You can get the cloth tape and wrap the windings yourself. I’ve just bought a reel from Allparts as I need to do the wax potting on an old (1982) pickup as it’s gone microphonic. You can dip with the tape on (you’ll have to with a covered humbucker unless you want the hassle of taking the cover off), but the wax will penetrate more easily with just bare windings and the pickup can spend less time immersed in the hot wax. But the tape comes in a confusing variety of widths, none of which seem to conform to the typical gap between the bobbins!