Five Two pickup

[Flyman55]

Hi SD friends, Just upgraded my HSS Strat with a 59 Custom, Five Two middle and Classic Stack neck, Love the great sound. One issue i see is the Five Two middle position i notice a significant volume difference from the G string too the B string. How can i adjust this. The pole heights are significantly different. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

 

[hamerfan]

The vintage stagger on the Five Two does not work well with modern strings and flatter fingerboards. There is no safe cure.

 

[Mincer]

I have this same set, but it isn't wired to get me the middle pickup alone...in the middle position of the switch, I have the top coil of the stack and one coil of the bridge pickup. I used a MegaSwitch to do this.

 

[Flyman55]

Ok Mincer can you explain what a Megaswitch is and how i can get my hands on one. ty

 

[Mincer]

It is a special Schaller switch, read about them here. They allow combinations not possible with a regular 5 way. Like I said, the one I use relies on a rw/rp neck pickup, and doesn't allow the middle pickup by itself (a sound I never use myself). I wrote about this wiring scheme (with these exact pickups) here.

 

[Clint 55]

You can turn the pickup around. This puts the volume dip on the A string and it balances out more there because it's in the bassy area.

 

[JamesPaul]

I've never used the Five-Two. But turning the Five-Two would eliminate it's design goal of having the A5 magnets under the low strings and A2 magnets under the high strings. I'm not asserting that would be a negative as there are A5 and A2 Strat pickups. Only my observation.