How to Set Humbucker Pickup Height
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- Опубликовано: 8 июл 2024
- Paul John Best from Radioshop Pickups UK gives you our guide to how to set your humbucker pickup height.
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I love this video, so quiet, so easy, so calm.. you can even listen to the birds there at the background.
Thank you. I just set up my Gibson CS336 like you showed in the two videos on screw height and pickup height and it work perfecly! I will go through my other guitars the same way.
you don't need a ruler. a 2.5 allen key will work for measuring action and pickup height.
I just did exactly this (and pole piece adjustment) on my 335 and I can't believe the way it improved the tones when I switch the pickup selector. All these years I've been losing all that tone variation. Thanks. Polished it up a bit too, that gave it a "cleaner" tone. I recommend getting some magnifying goggles, good light and a metal ruler like in the video. Happy playing all.
Thanks so much for this explanation, have modded my cheap Epiphone les Paul and now that the pickup height is about right, it sounds great. Next step will be pole pieces
Hi and may the Lord bless you!!!
This setup just made my Les Paul perfectly balanced. Have to say. You guys are masters of your craft. I have the setup that you have on Telecasters and is just perfect also. Thanks.
Excellent tutorial. Followed what you said and it has balanced the pickups nicely and given it a much more pleasant sound than i have heard from it ever before. Now it feels nicer to play not having to figure out what is should sound like. Thank you!
My method is to first set the bridge pickup the way i like it to sound (or you can use his setting). Then temporarily set the neck pickup to be a similar volume. The neck pickup will usually be louder than the bridge pickup if both are set at the same height because, at the neck position, the string moves thru a greater distance than at the bridge area when plucked (greater distance = louder). NOW comes the more interesting part. Why have a middle toggle switch position for both pickups if it doesn't sound different than one or the other pickups ??? Usually you will find that the middle pos will sound more like the neck PU because the neck pos is usually louder as previously explained. Therefore the next step is to fine tune the neck pickup height such that when switching to the middle position it sounds different from either the bridge or neck sound. If the neck PU is too high, then switching to middle position will NOT sound much different than the neck PU, and visa versa, if the neck PU is too low, then the mid pos won't sound much different than the bridge PU. I keep adjusting until the mid pos has a unique sound.. When set correctly, it will usually have more of a quack or honk or chime sound to it than either PU alone. One final word, I check for this sound on the EAD strings and adjust the top PU height screw and then check on the GBE strings and adjust the bottom height screw. When all done, you should have 3 unique tones when switching the toggle switch.
Makes sense ... thanks 🎸🤟🍻
U a straight scientist with this I love it
Thanks a lot!!! This (and the especially the pole-piece adjustment video) gets my ES-339 to new life… amazingly well descripted…and so easy as well
Thanks for this video, Paul. I followed your method to reset the pickups on my Epiphone double-neck, along with the pole piece reset video and I am truly surprised and pleased with the results. The sound balance and individual string clarity is well worth all the fiddly measurement etc.
Great video! Short and to the point. Watched pole piece height adjustment video first.
Now my Heritage H-150 sounds great. Thanks!
Really helpful. Purchased a new guitar this week, everything was set up very well but it did sound a bit bass heavy. Now playing and sounding pretty much perfect. Cheers.
Nice video! Thanks for including metric measures aswell!
Thank you very much, mine were like right next to the strings and sounded very muddy, your video was very clear to follow and everything went smoothly
Thanks Paul. Nice vid. A tip to make life a little easier. If you stack 3 credit cards together it's just about 3/32".
Thanks for this helpfull and easy to follow tutorial.
Brill video. So clear to understand.. thank you for posting
Thanks for this video! I just got an unknown brand (factory blemish, blank headstock, no markings, no serial number) ES-335 copy. After raising the action just enough to eliminate string buzz, the bridge pickup is now significantly weaker than the neck pickup. I just watched your previous video of adjusting the pole pieces, and learned that I would be better off raising the entire pick up to increase the volume instead of trying to achieve that through adjusting the pole pieces (this is why RUclips is so great, because I can learn these things immediately instead of by trial-and-error screwing it up! 😀).
Thanks for your comment, Adam! Glad it was of help to you. Paul
Excellent video, as I was actually wondering how to set the height of my strings from the HB pickups, many thanks!
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@@darrellerker6673 ???????
I came across your channel and I subscribed because you helped me so much I had no idea height of a pickup can change tone so much I was about to change pickups thanks to you I'm so happy with my sound of my bridge pickup now again thank you so much
Thank you Lee!
I always set the high E closer (1.6 mm) because it has less mass than the low E, otherwise it gets too boomy especially on neck position
Thank you for these great tip's! Greetings from Greenville, North Carolina..USA
You make very helpful and true videos.Thank you
I was wondering why my guitar sounded so terrible and thought it was my muting. Turns out my strings were 1/32" away from the humbuckers. My guitar sounds so much better now! Thank you!
Nice lesson mate, my les paul was total out of adjustament. Now sonds nice. Thaks 4 the video.
Thanks a lot! Very good and informative video!
One trick too is to set the neck at 3/32 then adjust bridge to match volume
Hi! Great vídeo !
With Humbuckers set on the body of the guitar,like Wolfgang EVH for exemple do yo u also need to do that ? Tks !
great informative vid - Thanks for posting ...
Great advice 👍
Thank you
Excellent advice - thanks! I have a Guild Polara that has two pickup height adjustment screws on the low e side - and one height adjustment screw on the high e side. Any idea why there's a second screw adjustment on the low e side? Is the idea to get the pickup parallel to the string, or to create an angle? Thought I'd ask whether you've seen this before, and how to approach it
Thank you. Very practical advice.
Thank you Simon!
Thanks for this. Does the micro adjustments have a dramatic effect on volume or tone. I ask as the threads are very fine. I am going to do this setup on my 335 tomorrow. Great tutorial
Just found your channel. Subscribed. Best Regards and Best Wishes!
Great video my man. After watching your video for the best measurements for humbucker pickups. All I can say is WOW. These are the best measurements for the best balanced and tone sound for these pickups. I did this to all my humbucker guitars. Thanks again.
This is why I am a cowbell player. I don’t have to make 3/32nd adjustments & spend hours looking at a ruler to see how wrong I am.
“There’s no Fate, but what we make...”
Triangle myself.
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"MORE COWBELL"!!!!!
alienlovesecrets JAZZ FLUTE!
bloozem Rock Music would not have made an impact if it weren’t for the COWBELL! 🤙🏽
Nice video!
How do you know when the pickup is too close the strings?
I know that if pickups are too close they start to attract the strings and ruin the guitar intonation
Does the 2.4mm distance avoid that? Is it the right distance for all humbucker pickups?
thank you
I started raising the humbucker on the neckside but wow, should this be sow high?? Neckside seems to be good. I will write down the old hight for to be sure I can go back because I'm so curious about how it's going to work out. 😅
I own a SG with 2 humbucker elements and I will surely use your advice to set them up with 2.4 millimeter from the underside of the strings.
This can't go wrong.
Thanx for your advice.
Thanks for posting. Nice to hear a welsh accent too.
Do you recomand a poolpieces high regulations, beside pickup hight regulations?
What do you do when you have a wolfy (muddy) neck pickup on a les Paul
Great video my man but do you also have a measurement for emg pickups?
what brand of ruler are you using in this video?
Thanks alot , my 7 string sounds brootal now and also the pinch harmonics working way better \m/
picked up the Stewmac Pickup hight gauge there pretty cool.
I bought my first Gibson Tribute and the Bridge pick up is incline forward. The front is almost at the same high of the plastic cover and the end, closer to the bridge, is like 1/8 over the plastic. Is this some kind of special setting or could be a guitar Center employee experiment?
Really helpful.
Hi Paul, Im building an electric from scratch , What is the common design length/ spacing specs between the End Piece, The String Bridge and the pick up? Thank you
Hello John great video very helpful! My American Ultra Tele in SSH setup with added metal hambucker on the neck:ceramic 15.8kΩ. roughly what height for each pickup shall I start with please?
thankyouu, so helpful!
I use allen wrenches as a measuring tool or drill bits. But I always wonder if the pickups magnets with my measuring tool might cause the string to bend slightly.
How strong do you think those magnets are? Use a wooden ruler :-)
Would the same go for Fender Wide Range Humbuckers?
Maybe it's user error, but I adjusted my Dimarzio CrunchLab and Liquifire to the 2.4 mm, and it was TOO hot. Input of my Line 6 Helix was RED, telling me that input was clipping.
Pickup Height is like choosing wine. Get the one that you like, in this case the one that sounds good for you. A review of pickup heights from great guitar players showed that they were all over the place. There is no right or wrong height, just a matter of sound you want to make or like
Would this be the same for active humbuckers and mini humbuckers? I have a Gibson Firebird and Jackson
Not sure if I commented on this before, but also make sure the humbucker top surface is parallel to the plane of the strings, this makes a huge improvement in sound, SG's are particularly prone to this issue.
It makes a * Difference * . Improvement or not is subjective , depending on what you like/ are seeking .
Is the neck pickup surround the wrong way around? Thin end should be closest to the neck surely?
hey do you have a tip ou how to make the bridge pickup straight.... not sure what happens with my les paul bridge pickup, but it does not stay straigh, the side towards the neck is lover than the another side. have no idea how to fix it. :(
The finishing on that guitar looks really well done. Probably better than a lot of Gibson ones!
What do you do it your pickups are angled down on one side? My neck pickup is tilted forward (and is lower than the fretboard) and not parallel with the strings. Can this be fixed?
How do you think I should adjust this if I have set my action realy high and only plan to play with a slide?
Hey Paul,
Thanks for all the instructional videos about pickups!
The real question for me is how do you get a humbucker to sound as close to a PAF on a real "burst"? IMO, this sound is characterized as very woody, very very "airy", on both clean and overdriven sounds, and on top of that very thick and creamy on overdriven sounds, especially on the neck pickup. To put things in context, I have a 2018 Gibson Custom Shop 58' Les Paul Standard with Custombuckers (AlNiCo 3's), and I think it doesn't quite nail the "burst" sound, but it might... What do you think?
Thanks a lot!
In 2018 Gibson was using wax- potted Custombuckers. In 2019 they changed to using unpotted pickups reminiscent of the original PAF's which would supposedly put the Custombucker pickups closer to vintage specs. Unpotted pickups are microphonic and pick up more of the sounds of the pick against the strings, the string winding and noises from the guitar body including the tone (woodiness) of the wood and might sound more airy too. I have a 2018 R8 as well as a 2020 R9 and a 2020 R0. I actually prefer the tone of the R8 with the potted pickups, but that could be due to many factors besides the pickups. But unpotted pickups will generally put you closer to a "PAF tone", however at the risk of microphonic feedback which is one of the reasons I prefer my 2018 R8. Remember too that an actual 1958 Les Paul has been around for 60 years longer than your 2018 R8 Wood changes with age...and so do pickups.
Just a note on PAF pickups...they vary dramatically from each other. When people say to me that the prefer the PAF sound...I ask which one because every pickup was unique. They used different types of magnet, bobbins, pole pieces, slugs, covers and wire throughout the PAF pickup era. Not to mention they were all wound by hand so even the number of windings and the pattern of the windings varied.
I respect your expertise and found this video interesting, but I think the whole purpose for adjustable pickups is for string balance. You get more output form nickel plated steel than you would from pure nickel strings also if you have different types of humbuckers with too much output difference.
Thank you 😊
I have T386. Fantastic. Eastman makes superior guitars for the price point. I own 2.
0:51 - wolf tones - what are they? Can anyone link to a video that demo's them, as I can't find any examples. I have noticed if my pickups are too close, I can get this kind of metallic washboard type sound when I tap the strings - is this wolf tones? I have adjusted my pickups as instructed by Paul in this video, and my guitar is sounding pretty great now - thanks!
Check the Stew Mac you tube video, where he sets up the Stratocaster pickups. He demonstrates the "wolf tones" for a few seconds, they sound really awful.
Cool.. I think. But why are you going to the trouble of pressing the string onto the top fret? Couldn't you just add a little distance, (calculated to spec of course) to the clearance height and save some finger work?
Confused are you referring to inch or cm.seem using inch.tq.
It’s crazy how this effects sound
Best way to set P.U.'s is by using an oscilloscope.
Different type of P.U.'s require different heights.
A set distance would be ok of all P.U.'s were equal. But they are not.
Sir, may I ask a question, I’m a beginner and I’ve been playing acoustic guitar for more than one year now. I want to play an electric guitar. Please help me decide on what kind guitar I will buy, here are the list: 1) Yamaha Pacifica 012 HSS pickup, USD207. 2) Yamaha EG112GPII, HSH pickup, USD260 - with free GA15 amplifier 15w, Gig bag, strap, etc. 3) Severo Les Paul model electric guitar USD163.
I have a bent wooden tool, one eighth of an inch thick. I hold the strings on top and bottom down on the last fret and adjust. That’s close enough.
did you guys did this in standard tuning?
Great vid. Question though. In the beginning you said the bridge PUP needed to be a little closer than the neck PUP because of less string vibration. Yet, you set them both at .093"? Why not set the bridge a bit higher like you said?
Hi Don, thanks for your question. I use the string held down at the last fret to do the measurement for both pickups so because of the angle of the string, this does lead to the bridge being set quite a bit higher, although it's not visually that apparent in the video probably! Hope that helps - Paul @ Radioshop
duuuude, just check it with a 2.4mm drill
Why would you put the ruler on an angle on the end of the neck and not flat on the pickup? How can you measure an angled lined
some how my neck pick ups got to high on my Sg and now i can't even play my new gutair
Bit confused, setting up my Gibson 339 and watched your vid on setting polepiece screw heights and you show setting screws flush then adjust for radius on middle 4 screws, yet in this vid for height of humbucker your screws are recessed so height would be different?
I'm confused reading your comment, it's all over the place like you're hyped up with adderall.
wow i lowered my jacksons pickup a little and guitar sounds a lot sweeter
Gibson recommends pickup heights different on high and low E strings. They are only guide lines, not hard and fast rules.
My pickups are slightly tiled to the left side. Any tips on how to fix it?
Check if you don't have wires in the way, pushing the pickup up at one point.
I use the Allen keys - they are marked for thickness and are very accurate. Easy to use.
That's bloody clever.
Excellent work Quigley.
U the real mvp
My pickups are tightened as far as they can be and there's still 3/4" space between the pickup and the string. Any solutions? Different springs or height screws? Deeper cavity? Anything? Pretty sure it's the pickups because the old ones had no problems.
If you buy aftermarket pickups like Dimarzio or Seymour Duncans, they come with ridiculously long replacement screws, my guess is to accommodate the deeper body cavity in a les paul vs a strat style guitar. Les Pauls and Gibson style guitars have pickup rings whereas most Fenders don't. Sometimes the actual spacing on the bottom of the pickup's mounting bracket is different too, for example, I used to have a Gibson brand 500T ceramic pickup in a Gretsch guitar that I had trouble mounting because the dog ear bits that the screws screw into went deeper than say a Seymour Duncan or the Dimarzio super distortion that I had in there previously. It's hard to explain on here but if you hold your pickups together side by side you'll see what I'm talking about. If your pickup is going into a Gibson guitar, you'll need longer screws, if it's going into a Fender, shorter screws. If the screws are too long going into a Fender style or shallow body guitar, they will hit the bottom of the cavity and you won't be able to tighten them. Another solution is to install a pickup ring, but they look retarded on some guitar styles. EDIT: you might have to clip your springs too because if they're too long you won't be able to tighten the screws all the way. Sorry this is a year too late but there ya go.
I like the low e lower than the high e. Seems to make my bass less boomy
if your high e sound terrible then probably wrong heigh or second bad intonation or possible using wrong string guage
los polos magneticos deben tener los radios del diapason y el puente.
Must stagger the screws on the humbucker pickup for radius les paul guitars I've watched also, as shown at 1:59
I have a G string that seems quieter than the other strings. If I raise the pole piece of just the g string, would that fix it?
John Hurt, yes!
Would be nice if an ocilloscoop were used..just to see what the signal is doing at a perfect setting
Exactly. Different types of P.U.'s require their own height.
That goes for different types of humbuckers as well (not just the main types, like lipstick, P90's, HB's but Ceramic vs Alnico etc.)
why is the pole piece screwed in to the pickup on the bass side
because the thickest string has the highest output and you want to balance the outputs
Their PRS nor Gibson recommend having the same measurement on the treble and bass side. (high E and low E)
The Best
Old South Wales! Nice, but NEW South Wales is nicer! ;oP
You make nice pick ups! (Oh and I LOOVE Tom Jones!)
Watching the video, I was curious. Would it be acceptable to lay a 3/32 drill bit across the poles and adjust the screw until the drill bit hits the bottom of the string?. Thought that might be easier than trying to read the ruler
Feeler gauges work as well. That's what I prefer to use
OMG my pickups are not that high?
what about the floating pickup on a 2015 gibson les paul supreme?
My pickups move slightly towards the bridge & neck.Do you know how to stabilize them?they wabble.thx
Yes, a common problem... When I bought my 2010 trad Les Paul new from the shop, the bridge pickup, wobbled and also leaned back a little too far towards the bridge (wasn't parallel to the strings). The fix... Just stuff a little folded sponge under the back of the pickup until it's running in line with strings and also stable.
@@yellingelk ok,thank you
Thought i recognised the accent, btw im in north wales, thsnks for the video
Croeso mawr ichi, Hayden - you're welcome! Diolch, Paul
Da i weld yr iaith, diolch am y fideo, nath o helpu llawer!
@@rejinal3005 Dda i glywed :) Gobeithio bo chi'n cadw'n saff lan man'na 👍
@@RadioshopPickups rhy fath gyda ti, pob lwc!
Wow that action is high! Especially the treble side! Must be for slide?
With all these hot modern new pickups I set them much lower than that, much lower a sound way better 3/32 to close
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