Bill Lawrence Keystone mounting woes, any solutions?

Hi All,
I really like my Keystone Strat set, but the threaded mounting rivets in the plastic housing have given me trouble since day one. On a couple, the threads weren't cleanly cut or got pinched while inserting them in the plastic housing during assembly. This caused them to spin out of the plastic pickup housing. On a few of the others the rubber tubing seems to have bound and caused the same situation. I've read that others have had this same problem, (not the complaints about the screw heads being too small, that doesn't seem to be an issue for me) but was wondering if anyone has found a good solution for it yet. I'm thinking of removing them all together to try and see if I can fashion a better threaded base.

Like I said, I do really like the pups, the mounting method is just not good and the pup rides up off the threaded inserts. I just want to fix them, any ideas?

Thanks, Mike

Bingo! Although I love BL tone, these little screw/nut suckers, along with the non-standard neck pickup size have put me off the BL bandwagon (his neck pups with covers are a tad bigger than Fender, I needed to file down the opening in my favorite pickguard for an L-202TN, no need for that). The screw mounts on the neck pup are not an issue for me, since I pop em out and screw direct to body. But recently, after a long hiatus from BL pups, I got a set of L280's, and was VERY frustrated with the bridge pup, since the tiny nuts that clip into the pickup flatwork kept spinning, making height adjustment impossible. I assume that the material Bill uses for the flatwork will not allow standard screws to go right in, like on most vintage style pups, this is not an advance in engineering, IMHO, and I eventally just said screw it, and put them back in the drawer and went back to my previous pups, too much hassle, and not a good design IMO. The problem is, if you remove the nut thingys from the pickup, then the hole is too big to takle a standard tele bridge pup screw, and any fat screw that would fit, you'd need to open up the holes in the bridge plate. No thanks. :sad: To secure those tiny nuts in the pup hole, I think you'd need to super glue them or something, or maybe add teflon tape, but the darn things are so small, it's torture working on them, and then you drop one in the rug, goodbye.

I have some tiny clip in machine thread screw inserts, the kind they used to clip into car sheet metal panels (like inside the door shells to hold upholstery or side view mirror adjusters) in the 60's and 70's. I may try to see if I have any small enough that I can re-work to clip around the molded case. That's my only option I think. Unless someone else has a better idea. Adhesives seem to stick well to the metal but not the plastic casing. Had the inserts been designed with a spline like a vibrato pivot or tailpiece insert I think the spinning problem would have been eliminated. Hmmmm...

Hi All,
I really like my Keystone Strat set, but the threaded mounting rivets in the plastic housing have given me trouble since day one. On a couple, the threads weren't cleanly cut or got pinched while inserting them in the plastic housing during assembly. This caused them to spin out of the plastic pickup housing. On a few of the others the rubber tubing seems to have bound and caused the same situation. I've read that others have had this same problem, (not the complaints about the screw heads being too small, that doesn't seem to be an issue for me) but was wondering if anyone has found a good solution for it yet. I'm thinking of removing them all together to try and see if I can fashion a better threaded base.

Like I said, I do really like the pups, the mounting method is just not good and the pup rides up off the threaded inserts. I just want to fix them, any ideas?

Thanks, Mike

Sounds like something easily remedied with a carefully placed drop or two of Super Glue. I put in a set of Microcoils a few months ago and the threaded inserts in the bridge pickup presented no problem whatsoever, same goes for the L-298TL I installed in another guitar a year or two back -- and the Microcoil neck pickup came with sheet metal screws threaded right into the plastic, so no problem there either. I had no idea they were putting inserts in Strat pickups -- there are none in my old L-280SN or the older Strat Keystones in my son's guitar. The bottom line for me is every BL pickup I've ever had arrived with the screws and rubber bushings installed, so I always knew the job was doable if if I was patient and didn't force anything -- if you managed to spin the threaded inserts, the only reason I can think of is garden variety cross-threading.

The threaded inserts are like pop rivets sans mandrel and only with one shoulder, not clamped to the plastic. No cross threading on this end I can assure you of that. I really like the pups and will make them work. I haven't played this strat in a while. I thought I had it sorted, but when I opened the case one was lifted again, so I'm going to solve it once and for all. ~m.

edit. cya won't bond to the plastic housing.

[snip]
edit. cya won't bond to the plastic housing.

I have an old BL pickup housing somewhere around here and plan to check this out -- aside from slippery stuff like nylon and teflon, I've yet to encounter a common plastic that doesn't like Super Glue. Are the inserts brass or steel? If they're brass and look like pop rivets, they could have somehow gotten distorted out of shape, but since the pickups are shipped with the screws installed it can't have been by very much -- maybe just carefully flaring the entrance end by a hair with a tapered tool like a scratch awl would help.

I am hearing the effects of cross threading the screws into the pups. If you are not gentle the first time you can actually cut your own threads when inserting screws, and this is not a good thing. If there is any resistance at all, STOP and back out the screw and then try again. It should go easy. Resistance is futile and expensive.

No, as a matter of fact you are not. I guess I'll have to post pictures of the setup. As someone who has been taking things apart and putting them back together again since childhood (much longer ago than I care to admit) I can assure you that they were not cross threaded. Had that been the case I would have just ordered replacement parts from Shannon and fixed my mistake. I have several guitars with BL pups and like them very much, this is my first go around with this system, as all the rest are buckers. ~m.

On another note, polyurethane adhesive seems to bond the metal to plastic fairly well.

I am hearing the effects of cross threading the screws into the pups. If you are not gentle the first time you can actually cut your own threads when inserting screws, and this is not a good thing. If there is any resistance at all, STOP and back out the screw and then try again. It should go easy. Resistance is futile and expensive.

This is especially likely if the threaded inserts are brass, which is quite a bit softer than the stainless steel screws.

I have an old BL pickup housing somewhere around here and plan to check this out -- aside from slippery stuff like nylon and teflon, I've yet to encounter a common plastic that doesn't like Super Glue. Are the inserts brass or steel? If they're brass and look like pop rivets, they could have somehow gotten distorted out of shape, but since the pickups are shipped with the screws installed it can't have been by very much -- maybe just carefully flaring the entrance end by a hair with a tapered tool like a scratch awl would help.


On the one that seemed to come out upon install the defect was on the flared bottom end if any. The screws were inserted in the pups when they arrived if I remember correctly, but in that one it most definitely couldn't have been through the bottom. Once the insert had started to spin it was useless, it is smooth walled, not cast into the housing. These being Keystones do not have separate covers, but are bonded in, so your cover may indeed be of a different material than mine.

This is especially likely if the threaded inserts are brass, which is quite a bit softer than the stainless steel screws.

The inserts are ferrous metal.

Can you stick the screws directly in (straight) and easily turn them by hand when they're not in the guitar? In terms of the surgical tubing, it's easy to cut if you don't need that amount of length.

yes, after running a tap through to chase the threads on the problems inserts. If this adhesive holds they should be fine I think, looks good so far. yes I did cut down the tubing, I think the second insert that came out was because of the tubing, compressing it (downward pressure to keep from marring the screw heads/pick guard) no more tubing for me when it goes back together though.

Hi everyone, and just wanted to add some information here. Bill asked me to read the thread because what our customers say is important to him!

FYI - Bill first designed a molded insert to use with his pickups as far back as the 70's at Lawrence Sound Research. My first experience was in the late 90's when we began offering our products direct, and we experienced customers who were doing their own wiring setup with Teles. The string grounding became a common problem for our newbie do-it-yourselfers. Bill decided to add the screw insert so when the blue wire was soldered to ground and the insert touched the bridge - voila! String Grounding completed.

Our screw inserts are custom made, and our current version is like the one that Bill introduced at Fender with the SCN pickups. I reminded him that we changed to non-magnetic screws for most of our pickups, including the Tele bridge pickup. In the 70's, Bill had custom made screws but not today, so he asked me to order sample screws from a different supplier to compare with the current screw.

Bill also asked me about the fixture to press the insert into the pickup in our production. Bill made, in house on his lathe, the parts for the screw insert arbor press. He'll look at it again and decide if he needs to make new parts..... and maybe out of a different material.

There are customers who complain to me that certain pickups of ours DON'T have the screw insert because they want the stable, straight mount into their guitar that the inserts offer! :smile:

All the best,

Becky

Thanks for chiming in Becky. This is actually about a Keystone Strat set, not a Tele set, so it has nothing to do with the grounding etc. Just trying to work out some issues with the press in screw threaded inserts walking out. It seems that the bonding will hold, but I'm going to give it a day to cure. I'll actually be talking to you all soon as I need to order another set of 500's. Peace, Michael

Very cool! Bill mentioned several areas which I overlooked to address, and here's a brief synopsis of what Bill may want to add here: the insert itself, the insert pressed into the Strat cover - and including the cover material, mold design with shrinkage, and even the effect from external substances - plus more! :razz: Stay tuned.....


Becky