Humbucker Bar Magnets?

[GroundhogKen]

Hi, this is my first post here. I usually hang out at tube amp forums.

When you guys swap out the magnets in humbuckers, where do you get them?
Stew-Mac only seems to have pre-charged A5s, but I might want to try Alnico II or 3 as well.

Thanks.

Ken

 

[Al.C]

Re: Humbucker Bar Magnets?

Ken you can try here. I have purchased several magnets from here with no problem
http://www.ampge.com/components.htm

Welcome.

 

[GroundhogKen]

Re: Humbucker Bar Magnets?

Thanks Al.C

I've ordered some A5s from Stew Mac for now.

I also read some other threads that pointed me tp this place:
http://www.allstarmagnetics.com/magnets/specialty.asp

The guy at AMPGE is on miltary assignment from now until Christmas. Thanks for the link though.

I'm looking to try the exact same thing that this guy did:
https://forum.seymourduncan.com/showthread.php?t=53460
I have the same guitar and pickups. I want to change the Duncan Designed HB103s to Alnico. I'm also looking to try a lighter wound PAF-style set like Jazz neck/Seth bridge.


Ken

 

[GroundhogKen]

Re: Humbucker Bar Magnets?

Magnet Swap Report in Korean Hamer SATF with Duncan Designed HB103s:

DD HB103B (~16K)
DD HB103N (7.7K)

Removed ceramic magnets and replaced them with A5 from StewMac.

I swapped out the bridge magnet first and compared the new bridge alnico 5 with the stock ceramic neck. I had previously preferred the tone of the lighter wound neck pickup, but putting the alnico maget in the bridge pickup sweetened it up a lot and reduced it's output. Now I noticed that the neck pickup was really boomy sounding, so I changed its magnet as well.

The guitar sounds much better now. I can use the higher sensitivity input on my '66 deluxe reverb. Before the pickups hit the input so hard, I could hardly control the sound. I used to use the lower gain input and put the bass control near zero. Now I can turn the bass up to about 2.5 - 3 and I can drop the treble below 10.

The neck pickup still makes a better clean tone, but I admit that the bridge sounds darn good with I crank the amp up. At least it sounds mighty good compared to when the pickups had the ceramic magnets.

I don't know if it matters, but the ceramic magnets in both pickups were cracked. I had to take them out in chunks as I lifted them out of the potting.


Ken

 

[gripweed]

Re: Humbucker Bar Magnets?

Magnet Swap Report in Korean Hamer SATF with Duncan Designed HB103s:

DD HB103B (~16K)
DD HB103N (7.7K)

Removed ceramic magnets and replaced them with A5 from StewMac.

I swapped out the bridge magnet first and compared the new bridge alnico 5 with the stock ceramic neck. I had previously preferred the tone of the lighter wound neck pickup, but putting the alnico maget in the bridge pickup sweetened it up a lot and reduced it's output. Now I noticed that the neck pickup was really boomy sounding, so I changed its magnet as well.

The guitar sounds much better now. I can use the higher sensitivity input on my '66 deluxe reverb. Before the pickups hit the input so hard, I could hardly control the sound. I used to use the lower gain input and put the bass control near zero. Now I can turn the bass up to about 2.5 - 3 and I can drop the treble below 10.

The neck pickup still makes a better clean tone, but I admit that the bridge sounds darn good with I crank the amp up. At least it sounds mighty good compared to when the pickups had the ceramic magnets.

I don't know if it matters, but the ceramic magnets in both pickups were cracked. I had to take them out in chunks as I lifted them out of the potting.


Ken

Is it possible that you broke them? Ceramic magnets are very fragile!

 

[GroundhogKen]

Re: Humbucker Bar Magnets?

Yes, it's possible, but I was very careful when I took the pickups apart. The neck pickup had wax lines along the cracks as if the cracks were there since potting time, but I can't tell for sure.

I'm not pointing fingers, could very well have been my fault.

I'm really happy I took the ceramics out. For a $12 upgrade, I feel like it was a $50 improvement in tone.


Ken

 

[beaver]

Re: Humbucker Bar Magnets?

are there other mods a noob can do?