How To Optimize Your Pickup’s String Balance
Today, we’re discussing a commonly-overlooked task of adjusting your guitar pickup’s pole pieces and fine-tuning your string balance. We know – you’re obsessed with experimenting with your guitar, pickups, and other gear to find the right tone for you. Luckily, fine-tuning your string balance is one of the most straightforward experiments you can do! But, of course, there’s always more to learn, so let’s dig in!
Why Fine-Tune Your String Balance?
Because it’s fun, that’s why! Guitar pickups with adjustable pole pieces can fine-tune your string-to-string balance to achieve the most balanced tone out of your guitar. Doing so optimizes your guitar’s pickups to your guitar electronics and gear.
I don’t have adjustable pole pieces. What can I do?
You might think if you have a Strat or Tele pickup with staggered magnets, you can adjust the magnet heights to balance your strings. Don’t. Magnets glued into fiberboard will almost certainly damage or even destroy your pickup if you push the magnets out. Instead, ensure you have the correct magnet stagger for your guitar’s fingerboard radius and set your pickup height correctly – that’s all you can do.
Things to consider before adjusting your pole pieces
There are a few “best practices” when adjusting your pole pieces.
- Make sure you set pickup height correctly first. If you don’t set pickup height correctly and start adjusting the pole pieces, you can throw the entire pickup and tone out of balance. It’s best to get your pickups set to the correct height, then play with the string balance.
- Adjust in small increments, carefully listening after each adjustment. A little bit goes a long way! Start by adjusting the pole pieces in 1/4-turn increments.
- It should be the last adjustment you make. See #1. Make sure everything else is sounding good before experimenting with your string balance.
How to adjust your string balance:
To adjust your string balance from your guitar pickups, follow these simple steps:
- Set Pickup Height First
First, make sure you have the height correctly set on all pickups.
- Screw all pole pieces until flush with the top of the pickup
This ensures a uniform starting point for all pole pieces. Be careful not to overtighten the pole pieces.
- Plug your guitar into a clean amp on medium to low volume.
A low, clean amp will not color the tone, and allow you to hear the differences more clearly.
- Start playing and listening
Play a chord, plucking each note of the chord as evenly as possible. Listen intently for drops or increases in volume as you play.
- Adjust Pole Pieces
If you notice a drop in volume when moving to a new string, raise the string’s pole piece by turning it counter-clockwise by 1/4 turn.
- Rinse and Repeat
Repeat the previous step until you’re happy with the results.
At Fralin Pickups, we pre-set a stagger that looks something close to the image below. Notice how the pole piece screw heads are relatively close to the pickup (the closer, the better). Notice the D string pole piece is raised – this is because the core of the D string is the smallest core and thus needs the pole piece to be closer to the string.
Also, notice the B pole piece is the farthest away from its corresponding string. This is because the B string tends to sound loudest on the guitar, and adjusting the pole piece away from the string tames the volume.
Also, you can transform your pickup’s tone by adjusting the overall pickup height further from the strings and raising the pole pieces closer to the strings. Doing so gives the guitar’s pickup a more transparent, quieter, and acoustic tone. Cool!
Well, there you have it. Fine-tuning your guitar’s string balance can have a subtle yet powerful effect on your overall tone. Don’t overlook this simple step, and as always, keep tinkering!
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Following KLAUS HEYNE’s advice, I set the staggered so that the height of the slug and screw are as even as possible. The sound is tight and powerful, and the noise is reduced.
However, on the other hand, I feel that the acoustic resonance is reduced as the 12 magnetized pole pieces get closer to the strings. This makes me feel a slight gap between my hands and ears.
Even if it compromises the electrical benefits of the humbucker a little, I feel comfortable with a moderate step between the slug and screw. Each guitarist can enjoy adjusting to the sound they want.
This article may not be sufficient as a theoretical explanation, but it is sufficient as empirical advice. Thank you to TYLER and KLAUS for sharing the information.
(The staggered configurations offered by kinman and Lindy are very well balanced in regular gauge. Lindy is glassy and airy. Kimman is modern and dry.)
The whole concept of a Humbucker is hum cancellation and increased output by one coil being in series, and out-of-polarity, electrically and (of interest here) magnetically, with the other.
The more one coil responds differently to the magnetic force of the string than the other coil (by raising pole pieces, and moving them away from the identical plane of the screw-less pieces) the less effective the cancellation, the lower the output – all that with an audible effect, tending in the direction of the sound of a P90.
So I have a fundamental problem with your advice on adjusting pole piece height on Humbuckers where only one coil has adjustment screws. My experience has been that the more you un-equalize the height of the two coils in relation to the string, the more the magnetic fields of the two coils are deviating from Seth Lover’s patented ideal, resulting in a more glassy, less focused, less ballsy sound.
I am open to contrasting (scientifically based) views.
Thanks for explaining the how pole piece height is relative to overall pickup height and not just relative to the string. Regarding individual poles I’m curious if you’re assuming a wound G and saying its core is thinner than an unwound B? Otherwise I would have thought an unwound G has a thicker “core” by definition – and I’ve always felt it to be the loudest string by far with “out of the box” pickup settings.
On a PAF clone how close should the highest pole piece D be? Closer than around 1/16 or1/32?
I am looking to raise them on my Throbaks which have a minimum offset between the coils. But the pole pieces are all at differing heights I usually have the pickups at 1/16 all around but using your pattern they are all at different heights????
Many thanks.
Can you split the coils on the noiseless P90’s
Hey Darren, no, we cannot split these pickups, they are one continuous coil.
Question: I have a Nashville Tele with a with a Split Steel Pole in the bridge, and a steel pole 42 in the middle and neck. As you know, the pole pieces are adjustable, and I may tinker w the height per the article, but before I do, do you have the original height measurements of the poles for these pickups in case I want to put it back to the original height?
Hey Mark, the second image on the article is basically what we do to our pickups at the shop.
Actually I like to use a tire treadwear gauge for roughing in the pickup height before ear tuning, and I also utilize the tool for action adjustments.
Is there a metric measurement value for each of the screw out pole pieces from the top of the pickup surface? The pre-set stagger measurement would help as a starting point. Thanks!
After reading most of your articles, they all have basically the same message that there’s more than one way to skin a cat! Always keep your minds eye open.