How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

Stratcat

New member
How do you reverse the polarity on a Strat middle pickup to give make it noise cancelling in the 2 and 4 positions on a 5 way switch? Thanks for any info.
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

You can't. You would have to replace the magnets with the opposite polarity of what you currently have. If you mean reversing the current flow through the winding, that is as easy as switching the the hot lead with the ground when you connect to the switch and ground point.
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

You can't. You would have to replace the magnets with the opposite polarity of what you currently have. If you mean reversing the current flow through the winding, that is as easy as switching the the hot lead with the ground when you connect to the switch and ground point.

You are right,
When I switched the hot and ground wires, I got an out of phase sound, not hum cancelling.
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

becuase the polarity of the magnets also has to be reversed. The only way to do that without (trying) to remagnetize the pickup would be to flip the pickup upside down. And even then, you couldn't screw it in without getting really creative... And even then it wouldn't have the right stagger, and wouldn't fit under any conventional single coil cover. And, from what I hear (I've never tried to change to polarity of an alnico magnet), alnico, once it's magnetized, doesn't change polarity easily, and doesn't hold it's charge once it is reversed. I think Zhang has more experience with magnetics than I do though; he might have more to add on the subject.
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

Well, technically speaking you can put the pickup in upside down. Gives your originality points with the chicks.

Also, you could install a blind coil if you need an option to suppress hum and generally like the sound of two coils in parallel.
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

There is more than one way to do it however none of them (that I know of) can be done to an existing pickup w/o rewinding...just but a RW/RP pickup and be done...
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

You might be able to reverse the magnetic polarity by pulling the pickup out and running it back and forth between to neo disk mags, making sure that the S poles on the rod magnets are facing the S disk and vice versa.

Alnico 5 is a bit harder to flip than 2 or 3 but it can be done.
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

You might be able to reverse the magnetic polarity by pulling the pickup out and running it back and forth between to neo disk mags, making sure that the S poles on the rod magnets are facing the S disk and vice versa.

Alnico 5 is a bit harder to flip than 2 or 3 but it can be done.

So I am not crazy...

I know I read you could pass the pup through a pair magnets to reverse.
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

You might be able to reverse the magnetic polarity by pulling the pickup out and running it back and forth between to neo disk mags, making sure that the S poles on the rod magnets are facing the S disk and vice versa.

Alnico 5 is a bit harder to flip than 2 or 3 but it can be done.

Dooooo iiiitttttt Ayrton.... Doooo iiiiitttttt....
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

RP/RW middle pup's are readily availible so I can't quite understand why someone would want to try to reverse a magnets polarity, rig up an upside down pickup etc
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

I think it is unlikely that you can control the charge of all 6 magnets evenly enough for the polarity flip to work. You probably end up with a couple semi-dead ones. Might sound interesting, though :)
 
Re: How do you reverse the Polarity on a Strat middle pickup?

I think it is unlikely that you can control the charge of all 6 magnets evenly enough for the polarity flip to work. You probably end up with a couple semi-dead ones. Might sound interesting, though :)

Even-ness is not an issue. If you can flip one, you can flip all 6. It's the same as making sure all 6 are fully charged with the existing polarity. I'm just saying sometimes Alnico 5 will fight you a little bit, but A5 rod #1 won't fight you anymore than A5 rod #4 or #2 or #6, etc.

But you're better off just getting an RWRP out of the box.
 
Back
Top