Adjusting poles on vintage stagger pups

[Cheeseheadblues]

Hi all-

I'm new to the forum and have a question.

I recently pushed the poles down on my Texas Special pickups (neck and middle) to make them have a flatter profile. I had read about others doing this without damaging the pups and I was able to do it successfully - it solved the problems I was having with the G string overpowering the B and E strings and the pickups sound great.

In the bridge position I have a SSL-5. This has the vintage stagger on the poles like the Texas Specials, but I've never seen anyone else post about adjusting the poles on one of these pickups - does anyone know if this can be done?

Thanks...

 

[DreX]

Re: Adjusting poles on vintage stagger pups

You're taking a big risk. The coil touches those pole pieces, and there's a bunch of wax all over the place that can create friction between the very fine wire and the pole pieces. I bet you could lower your odds of causing damage by heating up the pole piece and softening any wax, but then the problem is that getting the pole piece hot can cause it to lose magnetic charge, so there's no good avenue. They sell the SSL-5 with flat poles as the SSL-6, an I find that to be superior to modern log-G stagger or vintage stagger, most especially with hotter pickups. Try lowering the pickup a bit, too. The issue of stagger imbalance seems to be exacerbated by having the pickup close to the strings.

 

[925SS]

Re: Adjusting poles on vintage stagger pups

You're taking a big risk. The coil touches those pole pieces, and there's a bunch of wax all over the place that can create friction between the very fine wire and the pole pieces. I bet you could lower your odds of causing damage by heating up the pole piece and softening any wax, but then the problem is that getting the pole piece hot can cause it to lose magnetic charge, so there's no good avenue. They sell the SSL-5 with flat poles as the SSL-6, an I find that to be superior to modern log-G stagger or vintage stagger, most especially with hotter pickups. Try lowering the pickup a bit, too. The issue of stagger imbalance seems to be exacerbated by having the pickup close to the strings.

Like DreX says, there's always a chance of breaking the coil wire when doing this kind of mod.
I wouldn't heat the pole/mags, for the above reason, but I have good success using a hair dryer to soften the wax of the whole pickup.
Use the lower setting, it'll take a bit longer, but there's less risk of distorting the bobbin.
Good luck

 

[Cheeseheadblues]

Re: Adjusting poles on vintage stagger pups

Thanks for the feedback, guys. I haven't come across anyone who's tried this with the SSL-5, so I was already hesitant to do this. And after reading your posts, even more so!

Guess I'll have to think about getting a SSL-6...