pickup height/loudness problem HELP!!

Hi All,

I just put a new set of pickups in my SG. They are GFS VEH, but that's not my issue.

I've set the action where I like it, and intonated. I set the height of the neck pickup where it sounds really good to me. I tried to volume match the bridge pickup and I've got it as high as it will go and it just sounds wimpy. the volume and gain are nothing close to the neck pickup. I don't think this is something easily remedied by raising the pole pieces, I think they'd have to go pretty high.

My action isn't super high, and I'm wondering if there's something I can do to raise the pickup higher than it will now like clipping the size of the springs? Is it maybe a solder problem? I really don't think this is it, since I've been soldering for 15 years at work.

Any help you might suggest would be appreciated.

Thanks,
JC

hi again,

on closer inspection, it looks like there are only a couple of strands making contact to the pot, the others are broken off. i know it needs to be resoldered, but is this a definite source of the low output? i'll resolder it tomorrow, but would feel better if i knew. The wires on these pickups are pretty small.

JC

Is it possible that you have the pickups in the wrong positions? Typically, pickup sets are made so the bridge pickup has a higher output than the neck pickup. Put a meter on the pickups and see what you get for dc resistance. If the reading you get from the neck pickup is higher, then you accidently put the bridge pickup in the neck position. We've all done it at one time or another.

The steel screws in common humbuckers won't really make any difference in volume, just brightness. For the "pole pieces" to make a difference they'd have to be magnets, like on a Strat pickup. Humbuckers have steel screws, (not pole pieces) and will probably just make the pickup sound brighter if you raise them.

I just checked the GFS website and read this at the top of the humbucker pickup page.

"Each listing is for a Bridge pickup, matching neck pickups may be ordered at the bottom of each pickup page."

Just checking to make sure you got a neck specific, and bridge specific pickups. If you ended up with two necks or two bridge pickups, that would also explain your problem.