Ceramic Pickups Height
Alnico made pickups have more string pull than ceramic made pickups ceramic pickups can be pretty close to the strings without causing severe hassles just the signal to be oversaturated at strong pick attacks.
Ceramic pickups height. Here s a quick way to tell if this is happening to you. Setting your pickup height too high will cause your magnets to push and pull your strings out of tune. Tune your guitar and place it on a table or a workbench with a towel or blanket underneath we measure pickup height from the top of the pickup to the bottom of the string while the string is pressed against the highest fret photo 1. But if you want a nice clean tone go alnico 5.
Those crappy ceramic bars glued next to steel slug things that come standard in so many strat s and strat copies today cannot really be made to sound good so a trip to the waste basket is the only course of treatment for them. It s a great help to use a capo on the top fret so you don t have to press the strings. Play the low e string at a high fret 15th fret is a good one to start at. There are just too many completely subjective variables to make a definitive decision.
Unfortunately there is no clear winner in our alnico vs ceramic magnets tug of war. How to adjust set pickup height on a stratocaster for ultimate strat tone. Setting pickup height too high. Don t forget that we are a seymour duncan authorized dealer.
The pickup height is the best and intended variable in adjusting tone and balance. If you still need help picking out the pickup that is right for you keep in mind that. But every pickup and guitar manufacturer has their own specifications. The best place to start for pickup height adjustment we ve found 3 32 of an inch 2 381mm is a good place to start.
What should be the determining factor for your guitar s pickup height is what sounds preferable to your playing style. Ceramic pickups have more bite wich helps get a crunchy sound even if can t afford a real classy tube amp. Bass side low e 1 16 1 6mm treble side high e 5 64 2 0mm middle pickup. If forced into it we might recommend alnico only because ceramic is the magnet of choice in cheap pickups that do sound bad.
Use a good fit screwdriver and record the positions and your ears impressions.