5 Simple Steps to Adjust Your Pickup Acme

Author: Rory Brady  Date Posted:4 December 2022

5 Uncomplicated Steps to Adapt Your Pickup Pinnacle

The purpose of adjusting the pickup height of your guitar is to attempt and accomplish the BEST tone possible. If your pickups are set too low your tone may sound thinner/ have a lower output than desired. If your pickups are too loftier, they may not exist picking up the sound to the best of their ability.

Having your pickups gear up too loftier tin cause intonation/tuning issues. Because pickups are essentially magnets what happens when they are fix too loftier is, it causes the string to be pulled downward consistently even when non in use. This is something yous need to be careful to avoid. Some other outcome caused by having the pickups set too high is magnetic interference more commonly referred to every bit Wolftones or Stratitis.

Wolftones/Stratitis is when an unwanted overtone appears on certain notes of the guitar neck.  This tin can be caused by a number of things like loose screws, dodgy saddles and also pickup height, more specifically when the magnetic field produced by your pickup interferes with the vibration of the string.

There are several ways to run your pickups which are all personal to your style, taste and tone.

  • Some people like to roll off the book or tone pot in gild to have their rhythm tone have a lower output, Then when those players take a solo or atomic number 82 line they'll often increase their book or tone back to full to raise the signal of their output and get a more pb like tone which will cut through the mix.
  • Other players may like to accept their pickups set quite low for a lower output/thinner sound. An example of this is if you were looking to reach lower output from your humbuckers lowering the pickups might exist the way to go.
  • Another pick is to have the bridge pickup higher to act as a heave so that when you switch to it, it will cutting through the mix.

The best thing to do is to endeavor a few options and see what works best for you.

Here is our stride by step on how to adapt your pickups for optimum tone!

Pace one - Get the tools you demand!

Yous will want to use a metal precision ruler for this then that you can become the verbal measurement. You lot will as well need a screwdriver suited to the adjustment screws on your pickups.

Step 2 - Know how to accept your measurements.

Then, the pull a fast one on is to fret the low Due east string on the final fret and measure the altitude between the bottom of the cord and pickups magnetic pole slice. Then use this same technique for the treble side of your pickup by applying this method to the high Due east string.

Step three - Adjust your pickup top to mill setting

It'south important here to make sure you lot know where to adjust the screws. When looking down onto the adjustment screws, yous turn the screwdriverClockwise to Heighten the pickup, and Anti-Clockwise to lower it.

Stratocaster Pickup Summit Bass side: 2mm Treble side: 1.6 mm

Humbucker Pickup Height

 Bass side: ii.4mm Treble side: 2.4mm
P90 Pickup Height: Bass side: i.6mm Treble side: 1.6mm

Step four - Adapt the pickup height

The goal hither is to achieve equal volume beyond all pickups for balanced output. This tin vary from player to player depending on playing manner and pickup gear up upwards. For case, if your picking/strumming position is closer to your span pickup the output of that pickup is likely to be louder than your neck pickup. This may mean that y'all would demand to adapt your cervix pickup to be a bit higher than your bridge pickup. There are some scenarios where y'all may want 1 pickup to have a higher output. An example of this is an HSS Strat. You lot might desire your humbucker to deed as a boost, in which case you wouldn't balance the output. Simply continue in mind that this is a personal affair based on playing way, so listen shut when making these adjustments.

Of import Annotation

You should brand these adjustments while in playing position by using a screwdriver to spin the adjustment screws. The reason for doing this in playing position is because that will give y'all the nearly accurate instance of how the pickup will sit and sound while existence played.

Stride 5 - Play the guitar and listen close.

You might not get this 100% right the first time around and there may be farther adjustments to be fabricated. Then accept a expert play once you recall you've finished making your adjustments and listen closely and try all pickup positions and continue adjusting until it sounds correct to you!

Thanks for reading this blog! to requite yous even more great content, bank check out our pages.

  • Join our newsletter for tips, advice, new products, and great deals

  • Visit our YouTube channel for some keen Demo's & Tutorials

  • Our Facebook page for updates and specials and more

  • Visit our website

I hope this commodity has helped. if you need any assistance delight email:

sales@artistguitars.com.au or call the states on 1300 489 816


© Artist Guitars 2022

Get out a comment