Did this over the weekend to my American Strat with staggered pickups. Only adjusted D, G and B poles and the result with each pickup was amazing. I knew I was risking ruining each pickup but I hated that staggered sound so much. Great video, thank you so much! I’ve got my dream Strat now.
The comments and criticisms that ignorant people can come up with never cease to amaze me. This is a great video and the technique this fellow demonstrates is actually used by full time professionals. If you are afraid to try it, don't try it. If you don't have patience, don't try it. If you take your time and move cautiously you'll be fine. The safes way is doing it with the pickups out of the guitar. Also, if you don't know the temperature tolerance of a fixed magnet, don't comment about destroying the magnet. This technique works. I've been doing it for decades and NEVER had a pickup failure. I would add, as some others have already said, the best result will come by setting the pole piece heights to match the fingerboard radius at the 21st, or fret nearest the neck pickup.
Hi! About moving polepieces - I'd like to point out, that the pickup in your demo is from the 80s with plastic bobbins. (Square holes on the bottom).The wire does not touch the polepieces on those pickups, so you can take out all 6 and even reposition if you like. (Be sure to have the polarity right).No demages to the coilwire. All other Fenders with a top and a bottom plate - have the wire directley on to the polepieces, and therefore this is pretty risky. The wire rest on both outer polepieces, so they can not be moved at all. The G & D in the middle of the pickup have the lowest wire pressure, and they can be carefully moved, but not repeatedly up and down. That would be like filing through the wire insulation. Move carefully only once. H & A poles are more risky, so leave them be. The most important problem is with the G&D - I have done this many times with both center pieces, and never had a problem, but it is possible to cut through and destroy the pickup. I never heated the polepieces, 'cause that may melt the insulation on the wire. So, if heating - do not warm too much. Henry Eugen
In plastic bobbin pickups like that you can move the polepieces without fear, they are press fit in and do not touch the coil wires. You can use a small C clamp and a piece of hard wood with a hole in the opposite side to adjust polepieces with more control. No heat needed. If you have fiber base pickups, it is a little more risk cause the poles hold the bobbin walls and are part of the structure of the pickup.
I salute you sir. This video just made my day. I’m always wanting to do stuff like this, & usually just go for it. I respect the people who have the guts to tweak stuff.
Did this with 57/62 pickups. The bobbin is not plastic, so i was a little nervous. worked great! Finally sounds even!! I didnt use a soldering iron. I used a small flat head screwdriver and a LIGHT hammer. Lightly Tapped the poles downward till they broke loose. Then adjusted to where i wanted them. I did not touch the high or low e just incase the wires wrapped around them. Thank you!
Another reason that the pole pieces were staggered is because guitar strings of yesterday were wound with pure nickle wraps which had very little magnetic properties as compared to today's nickle plated steel wraps. Flatwound strings were even weaker.
Just did this to my Texas specials! I was unhappy with the way the 3rd and 4th strings sounded so loud. I was allready looking into buying new pickups! No need to heat them up with a solder, only Medium plus finger force. After lowering 3rd and 4th pole I saw some lacker leftovers around them, so it might be usefull to free some of that lacker from around the poles using a thin needle. After first tiny movment they are free to adjust. Thank's Guitar guts and other repliers!
Thanks! I was always afraid to move the pole pieces. It worked for me and I can hear all my strings equally now. I'm using Texas Specials and have a modern neck with a flatter radius. Finally!!
Thanks for this, there’s a lot of misinformation on the net about doing this, yes it’s a risk, but I had no problem doing the G string on my Strat and now it sounds perfect through the range. No more super loud G! Thanks
Thanks a million, your explanation is to something that I stumbled across back in the mid 80's. After retro fitting staggered pickups to a MiJ Strat I got the natural urge to push the poles into a flatter profile. I've been doing it ever since because I always thought they sounded better, however, I learned a long time ago that I also have a strong preference towards 12"R oil and wax finished necks and now I know why I like to push the staggered Alnico poles flat.
Worked for me on flat poled Wilkinsons on a Harley Benton Strat....I didn't heat anything up though, just pushed up the D and G for a slight stagger with the screwdriver head. All pick ups read exactly as before 👍 Cheers
Thank you for this, this is an issue with my guitar, I thought I would need new pickups as the polepieces don't appear to want to move, I can see why now. Funny how it always seems so obvious when you're shown how it's done. I really appreciate your videos, thanks again.
I learned a little trick some time ago. On ebay you can buy neodymium magnets. They come in various diameters - 4mm 5mm etc - and various thicknesses - 1mm 2mm etc. Using one of these will balance out the sound i tried it and it did the job 👍
This worked on my 57/62 fender vintage pickups. Dont use heat. Never use heat. Use plyers to push it through but be careful you don't crack the plastic around the magnet and be careful around that copper!!
Great video. I just did this with some Seymour Duncan SSL-1s that I've been fighting with for 7 years. I'm glad I did. I can still have a stagger, but not nearly as pronounced. I only pushed the D & G pole pieces down. The middle position pickup worked perfectly. In the bass position pickup, I went just slightly too far, where these pole pieces match the height of the A string pole piece. I can hear the difference in comparison to the D & G pole piece adjusted middle pickup, but barely. This adjustment is the best thing that's happened to these pickups. The sound of the SSL-1 is, to me, the way a strat is supposed to sound, and getting the D & G pole pieces down enough for a modern radius neck has made these pickups sound incredible. It is truly a revelation and made these pickups usable, because the stratitis was driving me crazy before this. Thank you for this video!
You are one lucky guy. A buddy of mine tried doing this to his Strat single coils in the bridge and neck position. Worked on the neck pickup, shorted out his bridge. He didn’t really care though because he wanted a different bridge pickup anyway.
Had the G string warble on my strat with Texas Specials, even with pickups lowered way down. Squeezed the pole piece down on all 3 pickups using a crescent wrench and a washer (look for it on youtube). Gotta take the pickguard assembly off to do it of course. No heat needed, it's just some wax that's holding them in place, so once you loosen the pole piece you can push it up and down with your finger. Absolutely solved the warble problem. Now all strings are volume matched and sound like they should. Very little chance of breaking coil wires, in my opinion, unless you pull the pole piece completely out and try to force it back in.
Been thinking about doing this for a while. Saw it done on another video. After watching this, I thought I'm going to try pressing down the G pole piece on my Strats Tex Mex pickups, while still on the guitar ... and it worked. I just used a screw driver and pressed firmly with controlled pressure, and they moved no problem. It makes a quite a noticeable and preferable difference to the sound of the guitar. Before the G was too prominent but now it sounds much more balanced with the other strings. Thanks for giving me the confidence to try it. :)
I think that you're lucky that you didn't strip the height adjustment screw , or where it goes into the pup(the ear); thought about trying more than once, but know how stubborn they can be.At the very least, I would take it out & put it on a flat surface.THEN I would use heat if needed.
Understand that this is an old thread, but I would comment that the reason the poles are staggered has more to do with the magnetic properties of the string cores than anything to do with neck radius. Obviously, bridge/saddle radius should reflect neck radius, but even then you adjust for string clearance and playing feel, not just the radius. Magnetically, with a wound string, the core will be smaller in a smaller gauge string, thus the pole piece needs to be closer to maintain a similar voltage amplitude as the string moves through the field. With a wound G, the pole piece is right up there close. Then you come to that big plain B and the smaller E and the pole pieces are adjusted to some early engineer's calculation regarding voltage amplitude needed. I believe that the original pickups were optimized for particular string sets made of nickel steel. Lots of different stuff available today of different materials, gauges, and physical characteristics. Bottom line, you can't set up a guitar with a ruler, and it really helps if you are a competent player. I have fought with this issue a lot over the years, even grinding pole pieces down (not a good idea) to balance out string response on my Strats. This is useful information, an appropriate technique, and no, you won't affect the Gauss strength of your magnets with the heat available from a soldering iron. My response is not intended to address "Strat warble" which is a very real issue and caused by the height of pole pieces as described in the video. Keep on pick'n!
@@stevetellurian1280 It's material-dependent. The temperature it happens at is called the Curie temperature (Tc) of the material. A typical Tc of Alnico alloys is about 800 degrees C, but the max recommended working temperature of Alnico 2 and 3 is about 450 degrees C. For Alnico 5 and 6 it's 525 degrees C.
some pickup cores have the pole pieces inserted into a plastic 'tube' so to say, where the windings do not contact the pole pieces. On other pickups the pole pieces are the part that connects the upper pickup plate to the bottom plate, and the windings are wrapped around the poles themselves. This is the case with some telecaster style bridge pickups. With these pickups if you heat up the poles too hot with a soldering iron then you could melt the shielding on the windings and cause a short reducing the output of the pickup by the number of windings that short out. The other problem is that if the shielding melts off, and the wiring is exposed to oxygen, then then the winding could corrode and eventually break, or create a spot with high resistance.
I have taken cheap ceramic pickups and took the ceramic magnet off the bottom and taken the slugs out and put ainico magnets in and super glued them-works like a charm and sounds very good. Just be real careful. Sometimes the coil wire is right against the magnets and could damage them. Some pickups, just have lacquer sprayed on the magnets and then wrapped. Do at your own risk.
It really works, just go slow and tap easy on the slugs-If they are hard to get off, take you soldiering iron and heat them a little. I have done it many times and if they have a good amount of windings in them they will sound great. Come back here and let me know how they work out for you. If you mess one up you haven't lost a lot of money. I put a drop of super glue on the bottom of mine. I got the six magnets, I have not tried a bar magnet on the bottom-that might work-been aiming to try that. Good luck.
he makes it clear which pickups to do this for and which ones NOT to do it with. Gently heating the polepiece with a chisel tip on the soldering pen would let you press and move the polepiece. A thimble would be a handy way to do it and you could feel the polepiece begin to move.
The plastic bobbin pickups are easy to do this to. The magnet pole pieces are not touching the magnet wire, because of the bobbin construction. However, the Fat '50s pole pieces and many others, are touching the wire, as they are wound directly around the pole pieces. Heating the pole piece might demagnetize it a bit, and short some windings. The chances of getting an open are slim, but I would measure the pickup resistance before taking the soldering iron to it, and after the pickup cools. Shorted windings will give you less resistance, and a weaker pickup.
I have done this more often with Fat 50's than with any other set, since those are my favorite Fenders. I have never noticed a change. Doesn't mean I'm not just lucky so far...
Let me ask you the same question I always ask people who say I am going to break the wind. Have you ever actually seen someone break the wind by doing this, or are you just pointing out it is a possibility? I have never found anyone who has actually seen someone break the wind by doing this.
Guitar Guts 1984. A 1964 Fender Duo Sonic. I owned it. Never did it again. The formvar on the pickup wire was probably not as robust as today's Fat '50s. As I said in my post, an open is unlikely. I'd be more worried about taking a soldering iron to it.
you absolute legend . just knowing what the problem was is a time and money saver my new Mexican Strat's pickup's were set flat just sloping them has helped , may still need adjusting but i think it's better
Always had g string issue... even my high dollar guitars, Gibson and Fender. Thanks for the tip I will look at your tweaking ideas on neck screw qurter turns and this pickup idea. Keep up the good home remedies.
Interesting video. I have an Elite Fender Stratocaster, have had no problems at all. Damn thing sounds good in studio, gigging live, or even in the bathroom!!!!!
I didn't read all the comments, but I only saw this mentioned once out of dozens. Never heat a magnet that you want to stay magnetic! Heating magnets reduces the power of the magnet and can completely strip it, if heated up enough. While you're not likely to kill it, You'll almost certainly reduce its magnetic energy if you heat it. Do this at your own risk was mentioned, so that's good, but why is important, too.
Thanks for your video and caution approach. I just went for it on my very expensive limited edition 65 reissue Strat by using my thumb tip on top pushing carefully down on them without solder iron or breaking anything and I made some good progress to where I for sure have it sounding much better! Now I would like to get that high E and B string raised a little from the other side, but at least I can sleep tonight knowing it sounds much more even tone and better too me!
I’m a lefty and I ordered a set of fender hot ultra noiseless pick ups but the magnets are in a right handed setting from factory In comparison with the ones that came with my left handed guitar, they are in an opposite stagnation. I want to stagger the magnets to a lefty setting. I hope this heating and pressing helps me move them without damage. I’m quite a DIY and normally don’t have issues doing mods like this. Thanks for the tips.
Thanks for the explanation of this historical anomaly - I'd always wondered why the heights were so wrong! I play without a pick and I need the top two strings to be louder - they always sound weedy - so I usually swap out Strat pickups for Seymour Duncan 'Everything Axe' mini-humbucker sets, and soon I'm going to try Kinmans. I did push a G pole piece down once (I didn't know about this heating trick) and luckily I got away with it with just some judicious force!
@@deluxairhead Yes, it was ok! But since then though I have invested in four sets of the excellent Kinmans for my various Strats and they custom make the pole heights to my preference.
With vintage style pickups I use plumbers wrench no heat, no problems, and u can apply such little pressure you get perfect height 1st time. Out of about 10 pickups only had one problem, and that's because I over applied pressure and redone it to many times...that was the 1st try.😅
Thanks for sharing. I'm designing noiseless p90 split pickups like on pbass. Was going to use adjustable screws, but this method allows me to use magnetized slugs, instead of bar magnets. Also when designing i will not wax pickup yet until I can profile the heights. Flat pole pieces have uneven balance. May even be possible to use different magnetized polepieces, A2 for lower strings and A5 for unwound strings.
Heads up on the soldering iron technique. You'll want to be cautious that you know what your pole pieces are made of. One thing you are risking is reducing the strength of the magnetic pole pieces you are moving by locally heating them. You don't have to heat them to the Curie temperature to do so. Alnico is the most hardy material with respect to this, they have a working temperature (a temperature below which, on cooling, the magnet will regain most of its strength) of over 800 C/1500 F. So those are going to be alright for the most part. But ceramic magnets are some of the least tolerant to heat with working temperatures of 250 C, well within the temperature of your soldering iron tip. It might be safer to soften the wax by "re-potting" if you have ceramic magnets. Pole pieces are also in the worst geometric configuration for loss of magnetism as cylindrical magnets with a small radius relative to their length are most susceptible to temperature degradation. This is something that often comes up when people try to use neodymium magnets (probably the most fragile with regard to heat) as battery connectors and try to solder wires onto them only to discover that they are no longer magnetized, or no longer symmetrically magnetized because the Curie temperature is below that of the soldering iron. Even when carefully handled, they just cannot be heated much above 150 C without losing magnetism. The solution there is easy. Just solder onto a washer and sandwich it with thinner magnets.
Many temperature controlled soldering irons can be set to somewhere between 50-100°C, which may help avoid demagnitizaion. Now there's a caveat there, the temperature control circuits aren't necessarily linear. It's calibrated around 300°C (if it is at all - anything made by Zhongdi or Aoyue has quite a bit of leeway, and the rest of China is even much, much worse, up to 150°C wrong), and at temperatures below around 150 the temperature control can be increasingly wonky, so it's probably better to check with a thermometer (e.g. K-type multimeter thermocouple) that is good around these temperatures. I expect that much less than 50°C is sufficient to release the wax, as he can touch it with bare finger, which would have been more than a bit difficult starting around 55-60°C. At the same time, 60°C-80°C should be just about benign to neodymium magnet, at least according to what i have spontaneously googled up. Also with higher temperatures you have all kinds of issues. 50°C will certainly liquify the wax, 90°C will liquify shellac, and let me assume that the plastic is polystyrene or styrene copolymer, which i guess is fair, it'll melt at around 240°C. PVC will give up in the worst possible ways near 160°C. People are concerned about magnets but are losing a bigger picture that if the temperature was actually near as high, a lot more damage would occur.
There is no reason to heat the pole pieces to move them. Moving them in the first place is risky, so heating them too adds even more risk of destroying them. The technique that I have used twice- with success- on Fender Original '57/'62 pickups to lower the G magnet and raise the B magnet is to use vice grips. *When you are lowering a magnet you need to put a stack of 2 washers under the magnet (where the other side of your vice grips are pressing) to allow a place for the magnet to go. *To raise a magnet take a little short sheet metal screw with a wide head (I use the computer screws that secure the panels or hard drive on a computer tower) and press the tip of that screw into the bottom of the magnet with your vice grips pushing on the head. This is very low impact and gradual. The reason I had success and didn't damage anything is probably because I didn't move either of the E magnets- which have the wire wrapped around, and laying on, half of their circumference. Or else I'm just lucky. I guess this guy came up with the idea of heating the magnets out of desperation after being unable to move the magnets without the assistance of mechanical advantage. It is much better to use mechanical advantage with vice-grips. And I'm not being a typical youtube judgmental a-hole... it's no biggie that he didn't think of vice-grips. I'm not bashing the guy But I do think he is damn lucky that he has not cooked his pups (at least, not to a degree that he notices the tone loss due to the magnet field reduction). There is no negativity in the post!
Cheers mate, this was perfect for me where my B and to a lesser degree the high E were tinny sounding, on my new Strat. A 9.5" radius but with a vintage stagger. Doesn't make sense. All the bloody naysayers moaning that I can't touch the pole pieces. Sacrilege! Burn him at the stake! Well, it worked like a dream. Thanks again.
Thanks for this! However, once the polepiece is not being gripped by the potting wax, there is more of a risk of the pickup becoming microphonic at high volume/gain, so it might be worth just dripping a little bit of wax from a candle, say, around the bottom of the polepiece that you've freed up, so that it's gripped again.
I see some people on here immediately criticize either based solely on what they've more than likely heard from others, or they actually tried it, but probably had no business attempting this as a DIY project. "heat causes loss of magnetism," etc. first of all, know what you're doing and you won't damage the magnets by applying a sufficient amount of heat required to do this. You only heat just enough to soften the wax. you're not even melting it. Follow that thought pattern and even invest in a temperature controlled soldering iron if you have to. Pickups are subjected to a higher temperature when they are wax potted than what is required here. So, if anyone honestly demagnetized a pickup by trying this, YOU DID IT WRONG.
can anyone advise me I have a B 2nd string that is not picking up sound at all . I raised the pick ups to that side and lower the string just to see if it would pick up on that string . every string rang beautifully in the amp but that B 2nd string. I can see the pole is too low so I will now have to take all three pickups out and try raise that one. wish me luck thankyou for this video its helped a bit . I'm looking for videos on individual problem strings not picking up sound t all if anybody could advise me on one thanks
Great method there! Many years ago - I cannot remember what brand of single coil pickup it was - I tried moving one pole piece without heating it up. It bricked that thing royal screwage style. Rewinding the pickup did not restore the original sound at all.
I did this years back and shorted out a very nice vintage strat p/u ! It is quite risky... Even though I didn't have to force it to move... I should have had it rewound stashed it away and bought a 70's flat pole from Seymour D.
Usually, the plastic bobbin pickups are pretty safe. Some of the fiber bobbins you may run into it breaking the coil. I would not heat the slugs. This will degauss the magnet. You can push the slug down without melting the wax but if you want to soften the wax use a blow dryer or heat gun but I still don't recommend that.
I've been playing for well over 25 years and recently installed a set of Texas Specials in my USA Strat. I had such high hopes for this pickup set, but was so frustrated with them that after a couple weeks trying to make subtle adjustments to overall pickup height of each pickup, etc., that I left that guitar sitting unplayed for about 6 months. Then, I saw this video a couple days ago and followed your instructions. I now love those pickups and love my Strat again! Thank you for sharing your knowledge, this is a GREAT VIDEO😎!
Fender hype: In 1996 I installed Texas specials in my USA Standard Deluxe Plus to get rid if the anemic gold Lace pickups. I was totally disappointed. Since then I found out that Mexican Strat pickups from that same era sound just like Texas Specials.
Texas specials work better than most. The Telecaster sets are the absolute best. I found a hand made pick-up make called 'Vineham" and though they are'nt expensive compared to the rest they are spot-on !
Texas specials work better than most. The Telecaster sets are the absolute best. I found a hand made pick-up make called 'Vineham" and though they are'nt expensive compared to the rest they are spot-on !
I agree . . . the G warble with the Texas Specials was impossible until I used a pair of pliers large enough to fit over the G string and some protective material, and slowly squeezed until the G pole came down to a decent radius height. Warble Gone. Indeed, I would NOT do this to all the poles and check for a base plate or anything getting in the way. And, when I saw this guy put a soldering iron to the magnet, I got sick. No, No, No. This CZcams post definitely needs a Black Label Warning.
I can't really think of a good reason to heat the pole pieces just to move them- since it can damage the magnets. Moving them in the first place is risky already... heating them too adds more risk of (or guarantees?) destroying them. The technique that I have used twice- with success- on Fender Original '57/'62 pickups to lower the G magnet and raise the B magnet is to use vice grips. *When you are lowering a magnet you need to put a stack of 2 washers under the magnet (where the other side of your vice grips are pressing) to allow a place for the magnet to go. *To raise a magnet take a little short sheet metal screw with a wide head (I use the computer screws that secure the panels or hard drive on a computer tower) and press the tip of that screw into the bottom of the magnet with your vice grips pushing on the head. This is very low impact and gradual. The reason I had success and didn't damage anything is probably because I didn't move either of the E magnets- which have the wire wrapped around, and laying on, half of their circumference. Or else I'm just lucky. I guess this guy came up with the idea of heating the magnets out of desperation after being unable to move the magnets without the assistance of mechanical advantage. It is much better to use mechanical advantage with vice-grips. And I'm not being a typical youtube judgmental a-hole... it's no biggie that he didn't think of vice-grips. I'm not bashing the guy, but I do think he is damn lucky that he has not cooked his pups (at least, not to a degree that he notices the tone loss due to the magnet field reduction). I'm not being a dick- I'm just trying to prevent people from cooking their magnets after watching this.
If you actually look into the issue of heating magnets, ultimately it all depends on the type of magnetic material and how much heat is actually applied. The level of heat generated by his soldering iron won't de-Gauss the magnets.
The stagger is not cause of how easy the were to "move" - It was the compostion of the wound and plain string and how much flux variation they were capable of generating for the pickup. Plain G needs a lower pole piece yes, but not cause of how easy they were to move. Jeez... they're all easy to move!
Yeah, I first did this on a set of Fender Tex Mex Pickups. Those have plastic bobbins and there was no problem. Then I did it on a Phat 50 Pickup and killed the thing. So only do this on vintage style pickups if you have time to get the pickup completely rewound or have a replacement ready. NEVER do this before a gig or a recording.
Ive found that so many players that try for the first time to replace their pickups simply dont measure the spacing on their strings and therefore the strings dont match up with the poles worth a damn. Same goes for many pickups that are popular but dont offer different spacings. Have a good one.
I wonder if you could cut a spare pole piece to add a short piece to the B and E poles. Magnets don't care about being a solid piece or several small pieces, they perform exactly the same. A dab of glue between them and you're set. Add exactly what you want to fix the radius problem and you don't need to alter the original poles.
Hey there - I've got no "warble." But I DO have some strings that are much quieter and some that are much louder than the others on any set that I have put on this one particular Strat-type of guitar. And on this guitar, I do think that I could at least help getting the strings to a more uniformed volume if i could manipulate the single coil pole pieces. Like you can somewhat with the screws on the top of humbuckings. In fact I bought this guitar new with a HSS config. But have just recently swapped the H for another S and pickguard. The neck and middle pickups have the same string volume issues, more or less. But to me at least, that string volume thing and the lack of fullness and round sustain on certain strings, REALLY stand out on the bridge single coil. It's funny, i could get the string volumes closer with that humbucking and it's screws, but I had trouble with the sound of the humbucker. I am a single coil guy when it comes to guitars, I guess. I like Telecasters. It just sucks when I am working with a really nice full, overdriven sound and I'm (attempting to) play a wild solo, the B string sound all cool, full and great sustain, then I hit notes on the high E and there is just nothing there. By comparison anyway. On all facets of my life, many around me say that I am picky about things. Too picky. But I want to hear what I want to hear from a guitar. Within reason of course. And this different volume on different strings thing bugs me to no end. On guitar AND bass. So I'll bring up the treble side of the single coils, to get more volume out of the high E and then the B is much ouder and the G is ANNOYINGLY too loud. Along with the low E, the 2 loudest strings. And I wack the strings with way too much force too I guess. I have been a bass player forever. But on guitar....imagine a 2 bit Neil Young meets Pete Townsend. When I strike a chord with an open low E, that E string obliterates the other strings. Even the obnoxiously loud G. And of course it is not only way too loud, but sharp as well. BWannhHYYYANGGG!! And also the D string on this guitar is considerably more quiet that the low E, A, or G. That D is what I "think" is a mechanical issue though. I say that only because I can hear less volume from that D acoustically....not pugged in. This guitar does this same stuff with ALL sets of both different brands of 10's that I use. D'Addarios and EB's. I have done the pole piece manipulation on 2 different Music Man basses, without having to heat the poll pieces or anything. And that was fairly easy. Hard to get them exactly where I want them though. It is NOT fun to keep pulling back the strings, and removing and then reinstalling all 3 of the components that make up one StingRay pickup, again and again. Not fun at all. But I have done it. And it worked to a certain degree. Music Man active basses have some weird stuff going on in their preamps. With different EQ settings WILDLY affecting string volumes, way WAY more than you would think that they would or should. But this guitar that is giving me fits with the wacky different string volumes, has pole pieces that I cannot break free from the top. I may practice on another single coil though before I try the heating thing on this boo-teek guitar. Good tip on heating up the pole piece. And on the neck heel screw idea too. That clip brought me to this one. Cheers
N2F1 neodymium magnets under the pups.i used the bar kind about 3mm thick. I used one bar right across and went up to three layers under the quiet strings. I have done three basses and a mandolin so far with good results.
I think the tall G is what gives the Strat its signature sound. Stratitis is usually cured by just lowering the base sides on all three pickups. The warble is heard in the lower notes.
For me it's not the wobble it's the volume.. Or attack.. Just really from the g.. Or if I could just get the b string a little louder. I like everything else about the pick up especially the d being More pronounced
This works on plastic bobbin pickups. Only works on a fibre bobbin if you're really really lucky and should not be attempted an a pickup you are not prepared to rewind or replace. I sometimes do this on fibre bobbin pickups i've wound myself to adjust a badly behaved G string. Usually when a client insists on a vintage stagger on a pickup but has a really flat neck. I've been putting alnico rods or steel rods with neodymium disks (careful, causes loads of wolftones if you run the pickup close) with into plastic bobbins for a while and playing with the stagger. Won't work on a pickup with a single ceramic bar underneath (these get magnet swaps). Fender seem to have longer poles with ceramic magnets each side on recent low end guitars where this technique will work.
Some post's below are correct, BE CAREFUL, on vintage pickups the wire IS wound directly on the magnets. Many PU's have been ruined doing this. The middle pole pieces are safer as the two E strings have the wire wrap half way around the mag. YES you are very lucky. Newer ones no big deal like you said the mags sit in molded plastic. Isn't that warble part of the vintage tone?
Just got some cs 69s. They sound great except the g string is overpowering the b and high e string. Guitar has a fairly flat radius. Dont think I'm gonna do this methode. Maybe I reradius the fingerboard to vintage spec. I done this to a guitar before as I didnt like the flat radius. I even used the old frets.And because you are actually making a wider surface the frets are a little short. So I had a nice roll off of the fingerboard edge. It worked out very well. Took a we while but was worth it !
Warning. Check the design of the pickup before adjusting pole pieces. If you have a cheap made single coil pickup that uses a plastic bobbin that the pole pieces slot into you can move the poke pieces safely. On vintage spec pickups with cloth bottoms and the windings wrap around the pole pieces do not take the chance on moving the pole pieces . This style of pickup is not designed to have its pole pieces moved after its assembled. Moving the pole pieces can damage the coil rendering the pickup useless. Just because someone got lucky and didn't destroy the pickup doesn't make it the right thing to do. Be smart !
Having just obtained a Strat (classic vibe 60's Squier) I was used to a Les Paul imitation, and I just assumed somebody could get a pair of grips (pliers) with soft jaw covering, and screw/unscrew those plain pole pieces. Waddayaknow, you can't! I take it, the guitar player probably adjusts his playing to compensate for any volume difference with the strings on their guitar. All theories and allegiances aside, it patently is a necessary tuning adjustment, if they were made differently in the first place (pole heights). Screw-adjust have their own issues - a 'hole' or slot in the screw, right where you want a nice full magnetic field.Not to put too fine a point on it - if you made a guitar from scratch now, you would have adjustable height pole pieces, but adjust from the back so the pole face was flat where the string is. Kind of seems obvious and a no-brainer. HOWEVER if the tradition and convention of how it's always been, is more important, I guess that's a non-starter. Lastly, the heat of a soldering iron destroying magnetism - theoretically, it can occur.Magnets of the neodymium material at least, lose their magnetism around 180 degrees centigrade (350 deg F), up to about 300 degrees centigrade (570 deg F) I believe. So, when in the Netflix series 'Power' they fit a magnetic tracker to the exhaust of Tommy's muscle car, I mused over the (fictional) wisdom of that. Perhaps these are merely 'induced' magnets, maybe it's better. Common for motorcyclists to pop a strong magnet onto the bottom of their oil drain plugs, to gather bits of loose metal to the bottom of the engine and hold them to the plug inside face. Then drain oil, and get metal filings out during maintenance. However, they can find the magnet is good for months, then abruptly one day, is gone. It is put down to the heat de-magnetising the material enough so vibration and bump forces, finally are sufficient to knock it off.
I just bought a strat (a squier contemporary with that middle position close to the bridge) and it's got a 12" radius....with staggered pole pieces. Yeah, I dont think they thought it entirely through when they developed the pickups for this series. Dont get me wrong, they sound great, but it's noticeably uneven in output. EADand G will all be fat n juicy, but B and e will sound all wimpy. It sucks because I really like these pickups, but I'm forced to swap em out because of that damn stagger.
You can also buy the Seymour Duncan SSL2 which is a flat pole piece. Seems I got a bit less quack though, so I switched to the CS 69's. But, the volume on the high strings is definitely a problem.
I got a SSL-2 but I don't like it. I want to stagger it for more middle and some low frequencies. I've a 9.5 radius. I'll give a try. It cost me 24 euro only new...
Talking about 300 degrees etc misses the point. He used a soldering iron to WARM the pole pieces and soften the wax. Adjusting anything not built to be adjusted carries risk; Slow and easy wins the race. Thanks for another possibility for pup mods.
hey folks have been doing this since, banjo strings started going on guitars. After you find the sweet spot, you may want to heat up the pole again, then let it cool with out letting it move. This should 'glue' it tight, for you. I am wondering if I can get away with this with a Jazzmaster pick up. The D out put is way low. Thanks.
i have an american strat fat fifties in it and yeah that warble bothered the hell out of me! I always thought it might be the screw in trem arm, as the warble is most pronounced when digging in somewhat. Or when strumming "Chuck a chunk" funk type rhythm.
great video and explanation but the solder iron didn't work for me. The pole pieces wouldn't move even after a minute of heating. In the end I took a plumbers spanner and used that to squeeze the G string pole piece down. btw: I have a korean Squier strat so maybe the pickup is assembled differently. I've still to put it back together but at least the G should be quieter now. Thanks for the vid
Too bad the pole pieces aren’t slotted and adjustable (with a screwdriver) from the factory as it would make it easier for people to adjust to their own tastes.
I use a 12 inch radius gauge lay it cross the pole pieces and adjust pole pieces so that the radius gauge sits and all six pole pieces are touching the gauge in a 12 inch arc . This is with a 9.5 neck radius . And found every string outputed same volume as there texas specials ii set pickup height to roughly the same specs fender says .
Absolutely what i was looking for, thank you so much. Yep, I'm gonna give it a go. I have just bought a set of TEX MEX and although i very much like the sound of them, they have the 'G Pole Blues'. Gotta be a song in that somewhere? Thanks again.
A similar issue (radius vs pole piece height) exists in Jazz basses as well. The poles for the "E" are often too high compared to the "A" and "D". I cold grind just a 16th off the "E" poles ( grind in tiny increments without getting the pole hot) makes for much nicer "E" balance. I will try your pole push-in next time!
My gripe with Strat pickups is that the high E string is too lacking in volume, compared to the other strings. The high E string has very little metal to it, because it is so thin. So, naturally, it creates the least disturbance in the magnetic field of the pickup. So what does Fender do? They slam the pole piece down to the lowest position of all the pole pieces on the pickup, generally. This makes for a nicely DEAD high E string. Good thinking Fender! This really messes with single-note lines, where you want all notes to ring out with pretty much the same volume.
I thought I would try a wound G string. Then I realized why it didn't sound as loud as the others. The core is smaller. So....they will all be switched soon.
Ha, this is funny, but I have pickups with that kind of stagger, but completely by chance, I also have a 7.25" radius and I'm using a wound 3rd string. Not because of vintage accuracy, I just prefer the ease of chording (small hands) and my B-standard tuning requires heavy strings with a wound 3rd. I do get warble if I raise the pickups too high, though.
Can I do the same in a bass? I purchased the Fender Custom Shop '62 P Bass Pickups and I get noise whenever I touch the pole pieces while playing. All 8 pole pieces are higher than other pickpus, which causes the aformentioned. Now, I can try clear nailpolish to avoid direct contact, or grounding the pole pieces again (which I already tried and didn't work) but this one seems like the solution I'm willing to try by myself, however, oddly enough, it is the most risky.
I did this years ago on a cheap squire - no soldering iron, just forced it down with a screwdriver. It went too far and so I had to push it back up from the bottom. I think some reckneck in a music store told me about it. I have been tempted to drill out and thread the holes to make my own adjustable pole pieces. Would probably demagnetize the pickups. Someone try it and let me know what happens.
Did this over the weekend to my American Strat with staggered pickups. Only adjusted D, G and B poles and the result with each pickup was amazing. I knew I was risking ruining each pickup but I hated that staggered sound so much. Great video, thank you so much! I’ve got my dream Strat now.
The comments and criticisms that ignorant people can come up with never cease to amaze me. This is a great video and the technique this fellow demonstrates is actually used by full time professionals. If you are afraid to try it, don't try it. If you don't have patience, don't try it. If you take your time and move cautiously you'll be fine. The safes way is doing it with the pickups out of the guitar. Also, if you don't know the temperature tolerance of a fixed magnet, don't comment about destroying the magnet. This technique works. I've been doing it for decades and NEVER had a pickup failure. I would add, as some others have already said, the best result will come by setting the pole piece heights to match the fingerboard radius at the 21st, or fret nearest the neck pickup.
Because professional luthiers work on guitars on their couch.
Hi! About moving polepieces - I'd like to point out, that the pickup in your demo is from the 80s with plastic bobbins. (Square holes on the bottom).The wire does not touch the polepieces on those pickups, so you can take out all 6 and even reposition if you like. (Be sure to have the polarity right).No demages to the coilwire. All other Fenders with a top and a bottom plate - have the wire directley on to the polepieces, and therefore this is pretty risky. The wire rest on both outer polepieces, so they can not be moved at all. The G & D in the middle of the pickup have the lowest wire pressure, and they can be carefully moved, but not repeatedly up and down. That would be like filing through the wire insulation. Move carefully only once. H & A poles are more risky, so leave them be. The most important problem is with the G&D - I have done this many times with both center pieces, and never had a problem, but it is possible to cut through and destroy the pickup. I never heated the polepieces, 'cause that may melt the insulation on the wire. So, if heating - do not warm too much.
Henry Eugen
Henry - you referred to the "H & A poles". Am I right in thinking that by 'H' you mean the German for 'B'?
Hi! I'm so used to say H, but yes, it's B in Germany
No worries. I reckoned I knew what you meant, but could imagine a few people getting confused :-)
@@redpaul101 German has B for Bb and H for B natural ergo Bb A C Bnatural spells B A C H in German...
In plastic bobbin pickups like that you can move the polepieces without fear, they are press fit in and do not touch the coil wires. You can use a small C clamp and a piece of hard wood with a hole in the opposite side to adjust polepieces with more control. No heat needed.
If you have fiber base pickups, it is a little more risk cause the poles hold the bobbin walls and are part of the structure of the pickup.
I salute you sir. This video just made my day. I’m always wanting to do stuff like this, & usually just go for it. I respect the people who have the guts to tweak stuff.
Did this with 57/62 pickups. The bobbin is not plastic, so i was a little nervous. worked great! Finally sounds even!! I didnt use a soldering iron. I used a small flat head screwdriver and a LIGHT hammer. Lightly Tapped the poles downward till they broke loose. Then adjusted to where i wanted them. I did not touch the high or low e just incase the wires wrapped around them.
Thank you!
Another reason that the pole pieces were staggered is because guitar strings of yesterday were wound with pure nickle wraps which had very little magnetic properties as compared to today's nickle plated steel wraps. Flatwound strings were even weaker.
Just did this to my Texas specials! I was unhappy with the way the 3rd and 4th strings sounded so loud. I was allready looking into buying new pickups!
No need to heat them up with a solder, only Medium plus finger force.
After lowering 3rd and 4th pole I saw some lacker leftovers around them, so it might be usefull to free some of that lacker from around the poles using a thin needle.
After first tiny movment they are free to adjust.
Thank's Guitar guts and other repliers!
Thanks! I was always afraid to move the pole pieces. It worked for me and I can hear all my strings equally now. I'm using Texas Specials and have a modern neck with a flatter radius. Finally!!
Thankyou brother, Your a legend, no more stratitis. Stef U.K. 🎸🕉
Thanks for this, there’s a lot of misinformation on the net about doing this, yes it’s a risk, but I had no problem doing the G string on my Strat and now it sounds perfect through the range. No more super loud G!
Thanks
you did this with the soldering iron?
@@stevetellurian1280 I did this with a pair of tongs, no heat. Seymour Duncan SSL-1
Thanks a million, your explanation is to something that I stumbled across back in the mid 80's. After retro fitting staggered pickups to a MiJ Strat I got the natural urge to push the poles into a flatter profile. I've been doing it ever since because I always thought they sounded better, however, I learned a long time ago that I also have a strong preference towards 12"R oil and wax finished necks and now I know why I like to push the staggered Alnico poles flat.
Thanks for posting man, this worked perfectly on my AVRI strat that had a real bad string volume balance. Now it shines!
I have a AVRI 62 Fender strat. So, there is no harm for moving the pole pieces un these Fender models?
@@JorgeTheilacker just be careful and you’ll be fine. No guarantee though, but it worked very well for me.
@@Tomsdrawings
Thanks!
Anyway, I will look closely and check what kind of pick up frame AVRI 62 has (plastic or fiber).
I think you really hate Strats
Worked for me on flat poled Wilkinsons on a Harley Benton Strat....I didn't heat anything up though, just pushed up the D and G for a slight stagger with the screwdriver head. All pick ups read exactly as before 👍 Cheers
Wilkinson aren't made as fenders
Thank you for this, this is an issue with my guitar, I thought I would need new pickups as the polepieces don't appear to want to move, I can see why now. Funny how it always seems so obvious when you're shown how it's done. I really appreciate your videos, thanks again.
I learned a little trick some time ago. On ebay you can buy neodymium magnets. They come in various diameters - 4mm 5mm etc - and various thicknesses - 1mm 2mm etc. Using one of these will balance out the sound i tried it and it did the job 👍
this is an awesome idea dude, much safer than pushing the pole pieces and risking to damage the pickip winding
This worked on my 57/62 fender vintage pickups. Dont use heat. Never use heat. Use plyers to push it through but be careful you don't crack the plastic around the magnet and be careful around that copper!!
I actually really like wound thirds. Can't really bend, but completely fixes the "ringa dinga" sound of the third string when played clean.
Thanks for this tip. Now I actually understand pickup/string height relationship!
Great video. I just did this with some Seymour Duncan SSL-1s that I've been fighting with for 7 years. I'm glad I did. I can still have a stagger, but not nearly as pronounced. I only pushed the D & G pole pieces down. The middle position pickup worked perfectly. In the bass position pickup, I went just slightly too far, where these pole pieces match the height of the A string pole piece. I can hear the difference in comparison to the D & G pole piece adjusted middle pickup, but barely. This adjustment is the best thing that's happened to these pickups. The sound of the SSL-1 is, to me, the way a strat is supposed to sound, and getting the D & G pole pieces down enough for a modern radius neck has made these pickups sound incredible. It is truly a revelation and made these pickups usable, because the stratitis was driving me crazy before this. Thank you for this video!
You are one lucky guy. A buddy of mine tried doing this to his Strat single coils in the bridge and neck position. Worked on the neck pickup, shorted out his bridge. He didn’t really care though because he wanted a different bridge pickup anyway.
Had the G string warble on my strat with Texas Specials, even with pickups lowered way down. Squeezed the pole piece down on all 3 pickups using a crescent wrench and a washer (look for it on youtube). Gotta take the pickguard assembly off to do it of course. No heat needed, it's just some wax that's holding them in place, so once you loosen the pole piece you can push it up and down with your finger. Absolutely solved the warble problem. Now all strings are volume matched and sound like they should. Very little chance of breaking coil wires, in my opinion, unless you pull the pole piece completely out and try to force it back in.
Been thinking about doing this for a while. Saw it done on another video. After watching this, I thought I'm going to try pressing down the G pole piece on my Strats Tex Mex pickups, while still on the guitar ... and it worked. I just used a screw driver and pressed firmly with controlled pressure, and they moved no problem. It makes a quite a noticeable and preferable difference to the sound of the guitar. Before the G was too prominent but now it sounds much more balanced with the other strings. Thanks for giving me the confidence to try it. :)
I think that you're lucky that you didn't strip the height adjustment screw , or where it goes into the pup(the ear); thought about trying more than once, but know how stubborn they can be.At the very least, I would take it out & put it on a flat surface.THEN I would use heat if needed.
Understand that this is an old thread, but I would comment that the reason the poles are staggered has more to do with the magnetic properties of the string cores than anything to do with neck radius. Obviously, bridge/saddle radius should reflect neck radius, but even then you adjust for string clearance and playing feel, not just the radius. Magnetically, with a wound string, the core will be smaller in a smaller gauge string, thus the pole piece needs to be closer to maintain a similar voltage amplitude as the string moves through the field. With a wound G, the pole piece is right up there close. Then you come to that big plain B and the smaller E and the pole pieces are adjusted to some early engineer's calculation regarding voltage amplitude needed. I believe that the original pickups were optimized for particular string sets made of nickel steel. Lots of different stuff available today of different materials, gauges, and physical characteristics. Bottom line, you can't set up a guitar with a ruler, and it really helps if you are a competent player. I have fought with this issue a lot over the years, even grinding pole pieces down (not a good idea) to balance out string response on my Strats. This is useful information, an appropriate technique, and no, you won't affect the Gauss strength of your magnets with the heat available from a soldering iron. My response is not intended to address "Strat warble" which is a very real issue and caused by the height of pole pieces as described in the video. Keep on pick'n!
doesn't heat destroy magnetism? I have the same issue it's driving me nuts, everything cranks , get to the B and it's like where did all my sustain go
@@stevetellurian1280 have you tried those stainless steel saddles? Seems to help alot
@@stevetellurian1280 Heat destroys magnetism, but this impact is varied across different magnet types, Alnico is the most resistant magnet to heat.
@@stevetellurian1280 It's material-dependent. The temperature it happens at is called the Curie temperature (Tc) of the material. A typical Tc of Alnico alloys is about 800 degrees C, but the max recommended working temperature of Alnico 2 and 3 is about 450 degrees C. For Alnico 5 and 6 it's 525 degrees C.
some pickup cores have the pole pieces inserted into a plastic 'tube' so to say, where the windings do not contact the pole pieces. On other pickups the pole pieces are the part that connects the upper pickup plate to the bottom plate, and the windings are wrapped around the poles themselves. This is the case with some telecaster style bridge pickups. With these pickups if you heat up the poles too hot with a soldering iron then you could melt the shielding on the windings and cause a short reducing the output of the pickup by the number of windings that short out. The other problem is that if the shielding melts off, and the wiring is exposed to oxygen, then then the winding could corrode and eventually break, or create a spot with high resistance.
Good man.
Done this 20 years ago,,,,,it works....
Just tried this. It works. Good advice.
I have taken cheap ceramic pickups and took the ceramic magnet off the bottom and taken the slugs out and put ainico magnets in and super glued them-works like a charm and sounds very good. Just be real careful. Sometimes the coil wire is right against the magnets and could damage them. Some pickups, just have lacquer sprayed on the magnets and then wrapped. Do at your own risk.
Think I'm going to give your idea a try
It really works, just go slow and tap easy on the slugs-If they are hard to get off, take you soldiering iron and heat them a little. I have done it many times and if they have a good amount of windings in them they will sound great. Come back here and let me know how they work out for you. If you mess one up you haven't lost a lot of money. I put a drop of super glue on the bottom of mine. I got the six magnets, I have not tried a bar magnet on the bottom-that might work-been aiming to try that. Good luck.
he makes it clear which pickups to do this for and which ones NOT to do it with. Gently heating the polepiece with a chisel tip on the soldering pen would let you press and move the polepiece. A thimble would be a handy way to do it and you could feel the polepiece begin to move.
Thank you...Great instructional video!
The plastic bobbin pickups are easy to do this to. The magnet pole pieces are not touching the magnet wire, because of the bobbin construction. However, the Fat '50s pole pieces and many others, are touching the wire, as they are wound directly around the pole pieces. Heating the pole piece might demagnetize it a bit, and short some windings. The chances of getting an open are slim, but I would measure the pickup resistance before taking the soldering iron to it, and after the pickup cools. Shorted windings will give you less resistance, and a weaker pickup.
I have done this more often with Fat 50's than with any other set, since those are my favorite Fenders. I have never noticed a change. Doesn't mean I'm not just lucky so far...
I wind pickups and it does mean you have been lucky so far. :-)
Let me ask you the same question I always ask people who say I am going to break the wind. Have you ever actually seen someone break the wind by doing this, or are you just pointing out it is a possibility? I have never found anyone who has actually seen someone break the wind by doing this.
Guitar Guts
1984. A 1964 Fender Duo Sonic. I owned it. Never did it again. The formvar on the pickup wire was probably not as robust as today's Fat '50s. As I said in my post, an open is unlikely. I'd be more worried about taking a soldering iron to it.
I wind my own and know how fragile that wire is, definitely luck nothing went wrong.
you absolute legend . just knowing what the problem was is a time and money saver my new Mexican Strat's pickup's were set flat just sloping them has helped , may still need adjusting but i think it's better
Always had g string issue... even my high dollar guitars, Gibson and Fender. Thanks for the tip I will look at your tweaking ideas on neck screw qurter turns and this pickup idea. Keep up the good home remedies.
Thanks for the info. I moved one of the poles already but the others won't budge. Nice to know there's something I can do about the imbalance.
Interesting video. I have an Elite Fender Stratocaster, have had no problems at all. Damn thing sounds good in studio, gigging live, or even in the bathroom!!!!!
leftymadrid fenderstratocasters
Can you play Led Zeppelin songs on her car
I didn't read all the comments, but I only saw this mentioned once out of dozens. Never heat a magnet that you want to stay magnetic! Heating magnets reduces the power of the magnet and can completely strip it, if heated up enough. While you're not likely to kill it, You'll almost certainly reduce its magnetic energy if you heat it. Do this at your own risk was mentioned, so that's good, but why is important, too.
Thanks for your video and caution approach.
I just went for it on my very expensive limited edition 65 reissue Strat by using my thumb tip on top pushing carefully down on them without solder iron or breaking anything and I made some good progress to where I for sure have it sounding much better!
Now I would like to get that high E and B string raised a little from the other side, but at least I can sleep tonight knowing it sounds much more even tone and better too me!
i did it long ago, and the pickup broke a couple of months later
Still good, but yes probably bent the wire a little?
I’m a lefty and I ordered a set of fender hot ultra noiseless pick ups but the magnets are in a right handed setting from factory In comparison with the ones that came with my left handed guitar, they are in an opposite stagnation. I want to stagger the magnets to a lefty setting. I hope this heating and pressing helps me move them without damage. I’m quite a DIY and normally don’t have issues doing mods like this. Thanks for the tips.
You would think for a fender a $2000 guitar they would have matched the pickup to the newer 9.5" radius but no. They were lazy.
Great video, I have a set I was going to use a dremel to grind down the middle poles but I like your solution better. Thanks.
Thanks for the explanation of this historical anomaly - I'd always wondered why the heights were so wrong! I play without a pick and I need the top two strings to be louder - they always sound weedy - so I usually swap out Strat pickups for Seymour Duncan 'Everything Axe' mini-humbucker sets, and soon I'm going to try Kinmans. I did push a G pole piece down once (I didn't know about this heating trick) and luckily I got away with it with just some judicious force!
I have to ask the Kinsman's are not cheap right, how did the pole move go, did it work to your liking ?
PS - Hope your didn't damage them...
@@deluxairhead Yes, it was ok! But since then though I have invested in four sets of the excellent Kinmans for my various Strats and they custom make the pole heights to my preference.
Ljubljana
With vintage style pickups I use plumbers wrench no heat, no problems, and u can apply such little pressure you get perfect height 1st time. Out of about 10 pickups only had one problem, and that's because I over applied pressure and redone it to many times...that was the 1st try.😅
You're amazing! Thanks for your clear and concise video
Thanks for sharing. I'm designing noiseless p90 split pickups like on pbass. Was going to use adjustable screws, but this method allows me to use magnetized slugs, instead of bar magnets. Also when designing i will not wax pickup yet until I can profile the heights. Flat pole pieces have uneven balance. May even be possible to use different magnetized polepieces, A2 for lower strings and A5 for unwound strings.
Heads up on the soldering iron technique. You'll want to be cautious that you know what your pole pieces are made of. One thing you are risking is reducing the strength of the magnetic pole pieces you are moving by locally heating them. You don't have to heat them to the Curie temperature to do so. Alnico is the most hardy material with respect to this, they have a working temperature (a temperature below which, on cooling, the magnet will regain most of its strength) of over 800 C/1500 F. So those are going to be alright for the most part. But ceramic magnets are some of the least tolerant to heat with working temperatures of 250 C, well within the temperature of your soldering iron tip.
It might be safer to soften the wax by "re-potting" if you have ceramic magnets.
Pole pieces are also in the worst geometric configuration for loss of magnetism as cylindrical magnets with a small radius relative to their length are most susceptible to temperature degradation.
This is something that often comes up when people try to use neodymium magnets (probably the most fragile with regard to heat) as battery connectors and try to solder wires onto them only to discover that they are no longer magnetized, or no longer symmetrically magnetized because the Curie temperature is below that of the soldering iron. Even when carefully handled, they just cannot be heated much above 150 C without losing magnetism. The solution there is easy. Just solder onto a washer and sandwich it with thinner magnets.
Many temperature controlled soldering irons can be set to somewhere between 50-100°C, which may help avoid demagnitizaion. Now there's a caveat there, the temperature control circuits aren't necessarily linear. It's calibrated around 300°C (if it is at all - anything made by Zhongdi or Aoyue has quite a bit of leeway, and the rest of China is even much, much worse, up to 150°C wrong), and at temperatures below around 150 the temperature control can be increasingly wonky, so it's probably better to check with a thermometer (e.g. K-type multimeter thermocouple) that is good around these temperatures. I expect that much less than 50°C is sufficient to release the wax, as he can touch it with bare finger, which would have been more than a bit difficult starting around 55-60°C. At the same time, 60°C-80°C should be just about benign to neodymium magnet, at least according to what i have spontaneously googled up.
Also with higher temperatures you have all kinds of issues. 50°C will certainly liquify the wax, 90°C will liquify shellac, and let me assume that the plastic is polystyrene or styrene copolymer, which i guess is fair, it'll melt at around 240°C. PVC will give up in the worst possible ways near 160°C. People are concerned about magnets but are losing a bigger picture that if the temperature was actually near as high, a lot more damage would occur.
There is no reason to heat the pole pieces to move them.
Moving them in the first place is risky, so heating them too adds even more risk of destroying them.
The technique that I have used twice- with success- on Fender Original '57/'62 pickups to lower the G magnet and raise the B magnet is to use vice grips.
*When you are lowering a magnet you need to put a stack of 2 washers under the magnet (where the other side of your vice grips are pressing) to allow a place for the magnet to go.
*To raise a magnet take a little short sheet metal screw with a wide head (I use the computer screws that secure the panels or hard drive on a computer tower) and press the tip of that screw into the bottom of the magnet with your vice grips pushing on the head.
This is very low impact and gradual.
The reason I had success and didn't damage anything is probably because I didn't move either of the E magnets- which have the wire wrapped around, and laying on, half of their circumference.
Or else I'm just lucky.
I guess this guy came up with the idea of heating the magnets out of desperation after being unable to move the magnets without the assistance of mechanical advantage.
It is much better to use mechanical advantage with vice-grips.
And I'm not being a typical youtube judgmental a-hole... it's no biggie that he didn't think of vice-grips. I'm not bashing the guy
But I do think he is damn lucky that he has not cooked his pups (at least, not to a degree that he notices the tone loss due to the magnet field reduction).
There is no negativity in the post!
Markle2k man that's science !!
Where did you picked this up??? greetings from Frans Venrooy fransvenrooy@gmail.com 👍👍👌❤☮🎸
Science!
StratMat777. The magnet wire is not resting on the sides of the e string poles. The poles are inside the bobbin.
Cheers mate, this was perfect for me where my B and to a lesser degree the high E were tinny sounding, on my new Strat. A 9.5" radius but with a vintage stagger. Doesn't make sense. All the bloody naysayers moaning that I can't touch the pole pieces. Sacrilege! Burn him at the stake! Well, it worked like a dream. Thanks again.
Thanks for this! However, once the polepiece is not being gripped by the potting wax, there is more of a risk of the pickup becoming microphonic at high volume/gain, so it might be worth just dripping a little bit of wax from a candle, say, around the bottom of the polepiece that you've freed up, so that it's gripped again.
Great explanation and tutorial, will definitely be trying this, thank you!!
I see some people on here immediately criticize either based solely on what they've more than likely heard from others, or they actually tried it, but probably had no business attempting this as a DIY project. "heat causes loss of magnetism," etc. first of all, know what you're doing and you won't damage the magnets by applying a sufficient amount of heat required to do this. You only heat just enough to soften the wax. you're not even melting it. Follow that thought pattern and even invest in a temperature controlled soldering iron if you have to. Pickups are subjected to a higher temperature when they are wax potted than what is required here. So, if anyone honestly demagnetized a pickup by trying this, YOU DID IT WRONG.
can anyone advise me I have a B 2nd string that is not picking up sound at all . I raised the pick ups to that side and lower the string just to see if it would pick up on that string . every string rang beautifully in the amp but that B 2nd string. I can see the pole is too low so I will now have to take all three pickups out and try raise that one. wish me luck thankyou for this video its helped a bit . I'm looking for videos on individual problem strings not picking up sound t all if anybody could advise me on one thanks
Great method there! Many years ago - I cannot remember what brand of single coil pickup it was - I tried moving one pole piece without heating it up. It bricked that thing royal screwage style. Rewinding the pickup did not restore the original sound at all.
Thanks for the information! ... a few of my Strats do that kind of "Warble" ... I always wondered what caused it
I did this years back and shorted out a very nice vintage strat p/u ! It is quite risky... Even though I didn't have to force it to move... I should have had it rewound stashed it away and bought a 70's flat pole from Seymour D.
Usually, the plastic bobbin pickups are pretty safe. Some of the fiber bobbins you may run into it breaking the coil. I would not heat the slugs. This will degauss the magnet. You can push the slug down without melting the wax but if you want to soften the wax use a blow dryer or heat gun but I still don't recommend that.
I've been playing for well over 25 years and recently installed a set of Texas Specials in my USA Strat. I had such high hopes for this pickup set, but was so frustrated with them that after a couple weeks trying to make subtle adjustments to overall pickup height of each pickup, etc., that I left that guitar sitting unplayed for about 6 months. Then, I saw this video a couple days ago and followed your instructions. I now love those pickups and love my Strat again! Thank you for sharing your knowledge, this is a GREAT VIDEO😎!
Fender hype: In 1996 I installed Texas specials in my USA Standard Deluxe Plus to get rid if the anemic gold Lace pickups. I was totally disappointed. Since then I found out that Mexican Strat pickups from that same era sound just like Texas Specials.
@@archiguitarchi No chance they sound the same in the guitars I've compared.
Texas specials work better than most. The Telecaster sets are the absolute best. I found a hand made pick-up make called 'Vineham" and though they are'nt expensive compared to the rest they are spot-on !
Texas specials work better than most. The Telecaster sets are the absolute best. I found a hand made pick-up make called 'Vineham" and though they are'nt expensive compared to the rest they are spot-on !
I agree . . . the G warble with the Texas Specials was impossible until I used a pair of pliers large enough to fit over the G string and some protective material, and slowly squeezed until the G pole came down to a decent radius height. Warble Gone.
Indeed, I would NOT do this to all the poles and check for a base plate or anything getting in the way.
And, when I saw this guy put a soldering iron to the magnet, I got sick. No, No, No.
This CZcams post definitely needs a Black Label Warning.
I believe they originally had a 7.25 radius, not 7.5.
I can't really think of a good reason to heat the pole pieces just to move them- since it can damage the magnets.
Moving them in the first place is risky already... heating them too adds more risk of (or guarantees?) destroying them.
The technique that I have used twice- with success- on Fender Original '57/'62 pickups to lower the G magnet and raise the B magnet is to use vice grips.
*When you are lowering a magnet you need to put a stack of 2 washers under the magnet (where the other side of your vice grips are pressing) to allow a place for the magnet to go.
*To raise a magnet take a little short sheet metal screw with a wide head (I use the computer screws that secure the panels or hard drive on a computer tower) and press the tip of that screw into the bottom of the magnet with your vice grips pushing on the head.
This is very low impact and gradual.
The reason I had success and didn't damage anything is probably because I didn't move either of the E magnets- which have the wire wrapped around, and laying on, half of their circumference. Or else I'm just lucky.
I guess this guy came up with the idea of heating the magnets out of desperation after being unable to move the magnets without the assistance of mechanical advantage. It is much better to use mechanical advantage with vice-grips.
And I'm not being a typical youtube judgmental a-hole... it's no biggie that he didn't think of vice-grips. I'm not bashing the guy, but I do think he is damn lucky that he has not cooked his pups (at least, not to a degree that he notices the tone loss due to the magnet field reduction).
I'm not being a dick- I'm just trying to prevent people from cooking their magnets after watching this.
If you actually look into the issue of heating magnets, ultimately it all depends on the type of magnetic material and how much heat is actually applied. The level of heat generated by his soldering iron won't de-Gauss the magnets.
The stagger is not cause of how easy the were to "move" - It was the compostion of the wound and plain string and how much flux variation they were capable of generating for the pickup. Plain G needs a lower pole piece yes, but not cause of how easy they were to move. Jeez... they're all easy to move!
Yeah, I first did this on a set of Fender Tex Mex Pickups. Those have plastic bobbins and there was no problem. Then I did it on a Phat 50 Pickup and killed the thing. So only do this on vintage style pickups if you have time to get the pickup completely rewound or have a replacement ready. NEVER do this before a gig or a recording.
Thanks, the Texas Specials have this stagger and are great pickups.
Ive found that so many players that try for the first time to replace their pickups simply dont measure the spacing on their strings and therefore the strings dont match up with the poles worth a damn. Same goes for many pickups that are popular but dont offer different spacings. Have a good one.
I wonder if you could cut a spare pole piece to add a short piece to the B and E poles. Magnets don't care about being a solid piece or several small pieces, they perform exactly the same. A dab of glue between them and you're set. Add exactly what you want to fix the radius problem and you don't need to alter the original poles.
Nah bro
Your scaring me with that soldering iron!
Hey there - I've got no "warble." But I DO have some strings that are much quieter and some that are much louder than the others on any set that I have put on this one particular Strat-type of guitar.
And on this guitar, I do think that I could at least help getting the strings to a more uniformed volume if i could manipulate the single coil pole pieces. Like you can somewhat with the screws on the top of humbuckings.
In fact I bought this guitar new with a HSS config. But have just recently swapped the H for another S and pickguard.
The neck and middle pickups have the same string volume issues, more or less. But to me at least, that string volume thing and the lack of fullness and round sustain on certain strings, REALLY stand out on the bridge single coil.
It's funny, i could get the string volumes closer with that humbucking and it's screws, but I had trouble with the sound of the humbucker. I am a single coil guy when it comes to guitars, I guess. I like Telecasters.
It just sucks when I am working with a really nice full, overdriven sound and I'm (attempting to) play a wild solo, the B string sound all cool, full and great sustain, then I hit notes on the high E and there is just nothing there. By comparison anyway.
On all facets of my life, many around me say that I am picky about things. Too picky. But I want to hear what I want to hear from a guitar. Within reason of course. And this different volume on different strings thing bugs me to no end. On guitar AND bass.
So I'll bring up the treble side of the single coils, to get more volume out of the high E and then the B is much ouder and the G is ANNOYINGLY too loud. Along with the low E, the 2 loudest strings.
And I wack the strings with way too much force too I guess. I have been a bass player forever. But on guitar....imagine a 2 bit Neil Young meets Pete Townsend. When I strike a chord with an open low E, that E string obliterates the other strings. Even the obnoxiously loud G. And of course it is not only way too loud, but sharp as well. BWannhHYYYANGGG!!
And also the D string on this guitar is considerably more quiet that the low E, A, or G. That D is what I "think" is a mechanical issue though. I say that only because I can hear less volume from that D acoustically....not pugged in.
This guitar does this same stuff with ALL sets of both different brands of 10's that I use. D'Addarios and EB's.
I have done the pole piece manipulation on 2 different Music Man basses, without having to heat the poll pieces or anything.
And that was fairly easy. Hard to get them exactly where I want them though. It is NOT fun to keep pulling back the strings, and removing and then reinstalling all 3 of the components that make up one StingRay pickup, again and again. Not fun at all.
But I have done it. And it worked to a certain degree.
Music Man active basses have some weird stuff going on in their preamps. With different EQ settings WILDLY affecting string volumes, way WAY more than you would think that they would or should.
But this guitar that is giving me fits with the wacky different string volumes, has pole pieces that I cannot break free from the top.
I may practice on another single coil though before I try the heating thing on this boo-teek guitar.
Good tip on heating up the pole piece.
And on the neck heel screw idea too. That clip brought me to this one.
Cheers
N2F1 neodymium magnets under the pups.i used the bar kind about 3mm thick. I used one bar right across and went up to three layers under the quiet strings. I have done three basses and a mandolin so far with good results.
I think the tall G is what gives the Strat its signature sound. Stratitis is usually cured by just lowering the base sides on all three pickups. The warble is heard in the lower notes.
In other words, trying to make a Strat NOT sound like a Strat. Yep, modern players.
For me it's not the wobble it's the volume.. Or attack.. Just really from the g.. Or if I could just get the b string a little louder. I like everything else about the pick up especially the d being More pronounced
This works on plastic bobbin pickups. Only works on a fibre bobbin if you're really really lucky and should not be attempted an a pickup you are not prepared to rewind or replace. I sometimes do this on fibre bobbin pickups i've wound myself to adjust a badly behaved G string. Usually when a client insists on a vintage stagger on a pickup but has a really flat neck.
I've been putting alnico rods or steel rods with neodymium disks (careful, causes loads of wolftones if you run the pickup close) with into plastic bobbins for a while and playing with the stagger. Won't work on a pickup with a single ceramic bar underneath (these get magnet swaps). Fender seem to have longer poles with ceramic magnets each side on recent low end guitars where this technique will work.
I know this is old but do you know if Seymour Duncan SSL-1 are plastic or fiber? I did this with mine and all three worked out
@@simongosimon they're fibre. You've been really lucky.
@@rowlandstraylight I didn't use heat, just controlled force, but woop woop I guess, go me
What I want to know is why is there a soldering iron sitting on a bright shiny red guitar? 🤔
ituneyou 12 um! it adds to the tone! duh!.. 😏😆
It's unplugged, doofus!
Some post's below are correct, BE CAREFUL, on vintage pickups the wire IS wound directly on the magnets. Many PU's have been ruined doing this. The middle pole pieces are safer as the two E strings have the wire wrap half way around the mag. YES you are very lucky. Newer ones no big deal like you said the mags sit in molded plastic. Isn't that warble part of the vintage tone?
I won't lie. This scared the crap out of me. But it makes sense!
Just got some cs 69s. They sound great except the g string is overpowering the b and high e string. Guitar has a fairly flat radius. Dont think I'm gonna do this methode. Maybe I reradius the fingerboard to vintage spec. I done this to a guitar before as I didnt like the flat radius. I even used the old frets.And because you are actually making a wider surface the frets are a little short. So I had a nice roll off of the fingerboard edge. It worked out very well. Took a we while but was worth it !
Warning. Check the design of the pickup before adjusting pole pieces. If you have a cheap made single coil pickup that uses a plastic bobbin that the pole pieces slot into you can move the poke pieces safely. On vintage spec pickups with cloth bottoms and the windings wrap around the pole pieces do not take the chance on moving the pole pieces . This style of pickup is not designed to have its pole pieces moved after its assembled. Moving the pole pieces can damage the coil rendering the pickup useless. Just because someone got lucky and didn't destroy the pickup doesn't make it the right thing to do. Be smart !
Having just obtained a Strat (classic vibe 60's Squier) I was used to a Les Paul imitation, and I just assumed somebody could get a pair of grips (pliers) with soft jaw covering, and screw/unscrew those plain pole pieces. Waddayaknow, you can't! I take it, the guitar player probably adjusts his playing to compensate for any volume difference with the strings on their guitar. All theories and allegiances aside, it patently is a necessary tuning adjustment, if they were made differently in the first place (pole heights). Screw-adjust have their own issues - a 'hole' or slot in the screw, right where you want a nice full magnetic field.Not to put too fine a point on it - if you made a guitar from scratch now, you would have adjustable height pole pieces, but adjust from the back so the pole face was flat where the string is. Kind of seems obvious and a no-brainer. HOWEVER if the tradition and convention of how it's always been, is more important, I guess that's a non-starter. Lastly, the heat of a soldering iron destroying magnetism - theoretically, it can occur.Magnets of the neodymium material at least, lose their magnetism around 180 degrees centigrade (350 deg F), up to about 300 degrees centigrade (570 deg F) I believe. So, when in the Netflix series 'Power' they fit a magnetic tracker to the exhaust of Tommy's muscle car, I mused over the (fictional) wisdom of that. Perhaps these are merely 'induced' magnets, maybe it's better. Common for motorcyclists to pop a strong magnet onto the bottom of their oil drain plugs, to gather bits of loose metal to the bottom of the engine and hold them to the plug inside face. Then drain oil, and get metal filings out during maintenance. However, they can find the magnet is good for months, then abruptly one day, is gone. It is put down to the heat de-magnetising the material enough so vibration and bump forces, finally are sufficient to knock it off.
Nice move! Thanks for sharing.
I just bought a strat (a squier contemporary with that middle position close to the bridge) and it's got a 12" radius....with staggered pole pieces. Yeah, I dont think they thought it entirely through when they developed the pickups for this series. Dont get me wrong, they sound great, but it's noticeably uneven in output. EADand G will all be fat n juicy, but B and e will sound all wimpy. It sucks because I really like these pickups, but I'm forced to swap em out because of that damn stagger.
You can also buy the Seymour Duncan SSL2 which is a flat pole piece. Seems I got a bit less quack though, so I switched to the CS 69's. But, the volume on the high strings is definitely a problem.
I got a SSL-2 but I don't like it. I want to stagger it for more middle and some low frequencies. I've a 9.5 radius. I'll give a try. It cost me 24 euro only new...
Talking about 300 degrees etc misses the point. He used a soldering iron to WARM the pole pieces and soften the wax. Adjusting anything not built to be adjusted carries risk; Slow and easy wins the race. Thanks for another possibility for pup mods.
hey folks have been doing this since, banjo strings started going on guitars.
After you find the sweet spot, you may want to heat up the pole again, then let it cool with out letting it move. This should 'glue' it tight, for you.
I am wondering if I can get away with this with a Jazzmaster pick up.
The D out put is way low.
Thanks.
Even my reissue 57 had a bad volume balance. G string go even distorted sound, when hi strings can barely heare them
I've done this technique, but without the heat. Just on a vice. Push the pole peice down to loosen it
i have an american strat fat fifties in it and yeah that warble bothered the hell out of me! I always thought it might be the screw in trem arm, as the warble is most pronounced when digging in somewhat. Or when strumming "Chuck a chunk" funk type rhythm.
great video and explanation but the solder iron didn't work for me. The pole pieces wouldn't move even after a minute of heating. In the end I took a plumbers spanner and used that to squeeze the G string pole piece down. btw: I have a korean Squier strat so maybe the pickup is assembled differently. I've still to put it back together but at least the G should be quieter now. Thanks for the vid
Too bad the pole pieces aren’t slotted and adjustable (with a screwdriver) from the factory as it would make it easier for people to adjust to their own tastes.
Thank you, allways thought the warble was from unbalanced pickup heights in relation to each other
I use a 12 inch radius gauge lay it cross the pole pieces and adjust pole pieces so that the radius gauge sits and all six pole pieces are touching the gauge in a 12 inch arc . This is with a 9.5 neck radius . And found every string outputed same volume as there texas specials ii set pickup height to roughly the same specs fender says .
Good work man, I might just try this myself; thanks for posting
I wonder if you could accidentally demagnetize the polepieces by applying heat to them...?
Absolutely what i was looking for, thank you so much. Yep, I'm gonna give it a go. I have just bought a set of TEX MEX and although i very much like the sound of them, they have the 'G Pole Blues'. Gotta be a song in that somewhere? Thanks again.
very good diy info.
Thank you
A similar issue (radius vs pole piece height) exists in Jazz basses as well.
The poles for the "E" are often too high compared to the "A" and "D".
I cold grind just a 16th off the "E" poles ( grind in tiny increments without getting
the pole hot) makes for much nicer "E" balance. I will try your pole push-in
next time!
this works on all alnico ss pickups. I custom voice all mine
My gripe with Strat pickups is that the high E string is too lacking in volume, compared to the other strings. The high E string has very little metal to it, because it is so thin. So, naturally, it creates the least disturbance in the magnetic field of the pickup. So what does Fender do? They slam the pole piece down to the lowest position of all the pole pieces on the pickup, generally. This makes for a nicely DEAD high E string. Good thinking Fender! This really messes with single-note lines, where you want all notes to ring out with pretty much the same volume.
yep pisses me off too
man right on the mony I have that and I can not lower my strings it hits the pole piece.
I thought I would try a wound G string. Then I realized why it didn't sound as loud as the others. The core is smaller. So....they will all be switched soon.
Ha, this is funny, but I have pickups with that kind of stagger, but completely by chance, I also have a 7.25" radius and I'm using a wound 3rd string. Not because of vintage accuracy, I just prefer the ease of chording (small hands) and my B-standard tuning requires heavy strings with a wound 3rd. I do get warble if I raise the pickups too high, though.
Can I do the same in a bass? I purchased the Fender Custom Shop '62 P Bass Pickups and I get noise whenever I touch the pole pieces while playing. All 8 pole pieces are higher than other pickpus, which causes the aformentioned. Now, I can try clear nailpolish to avoid direct contact, or grounding the pole pieces again (which I already tried and didn't work) but this one seems like the solution I'm willing to try by myself, however, oddly enough, it is the most risky.
I own that exact same strat.. I switched out the stock pickups for tone zone and air norton..
I simply use a wound g string. I use a fender vintage nickel 10 set and replaced the g with a pyramid nickel .017 wound.
I tried a wound and it was fine but trying string bends to get the right pitch was hard. You need to bend a lot further to reach the note.
amazing well done
I did this years ago on a cheap squire - no soldering iron, just forced it down with a screwdriver. It went too far and so I had to push it back up from the bottom. I think some reckneck in a music store told me about it.
I have been tempted to drill out and thread the holes to make my own adjustable pole pieces. Would probably demagnetize the pickups. Someone try it and let me know what happens.