All I know is 4 out of five Pink Floyders came from Cambridge. And that's okay with me.

While we're on the topic of staggered pole pieces, what is the preferred method for setting the pickup height for pickups configured this way?

I think back in the early 50's when the Strat was developed acoustic strings were being used

Said in an easy to understand way without getting too deep into physics:

Different spacing between strings and poles = different volume. Further away = lower volume. Closer to the string = higher volume.

To get a more even distribution of volume from one string to the other, the poles are set with different heights so that the different volumes of the different strings are equalized.

With all poles at the same hight, some strings might be louder than the others, giving you a poorly balanced tone when playing chords. You might have too many highs or mids in the overall sound of the chord you're playing.

Thatfore the height of the pole pieces is "staggered" = different heights. This is supposed to make every string sound equally "loud" = perfectly balanced tone when playing chords.

You won't hear a difference when playing single notes on single strings (guitar solo).

Note: if you set the entire pickup too close to the strings, the magnetic pull of the pickup might interfere with the strings vibration = slowing it down! TOO CLOSE = LESS SUSTAIN, which means the tone will die fast instead of ringing out ("singing") for a longer time.

In general you can say: staggered polepieces to balance the string tones, changing height of the entire pickup changes overall volume. It needs a patient player and quite some time to find the setup you like most.
PLEASE: do not push in the pole pieces!
1. if you don't hear a difference, maybe due to lack of experience(?) .... others will!
2. if you do it with the wrong pickup model, the pickup will be busted!

Some good posts here, particularly Smokin' Frets.

Just to add that the "stagger" of the polepieces on vintage Strats (and reissues from various places) was set to match the popular string sets of the day. So if you think back to the early 1950s when the Strat was designed that was probably a .012 guage set that likely also had a wound G string.

Staggered height polepieces went away circa 1974 on the Strat (there was only one model back then); they didn't come back until they came out with the first reissues in 1982. Then Fender used staggered polepieces on some CS pickups (like Texas Specials) but they didn't make a comeback on a more "basic" Strat until the American Series came out in mid-2000. In fact I remember Fender touting in the ads for the American Series that they were using a new stagger on the polepieces set more for modern .009 and .010 guage string sets (with plain G strings of course).

:lol:

Or hurt their thumb when the pole doesn't budge. Or, are you supposed to use a hammer and punch?

Very interesting. Question.
If I buy a Fender guitar setup at the factory with 11's
and I change to 9's, will the pickups need to be changes or adjusted?

Same question for humbuckers and single coils that have pickup covers,
if you take off the covers, will the pickups need to be changed?

Thanks for any response. Toppscore

First question: In theory.....YES!
Practically .....NO! Let's look at the .009 string in comparison to the .011 string:
From .009 to .011 the difference in string height from the pole pieces will be .002 inches divided by 2 = .001 inch from the lower edge of the string to the upper edge of the polepiece. Theoretically you not only would have to raise the pickup by a hundredth inch to get the same volume as with .011 gauge strings, you would also have to tilt the pu a tiny bit (raising the bass side) because with decreasing diameter of the strings from high E to low E, the difference in height will increase, resulting in a bigger difference in height at the low E string. This will result in a tiny, tiny bit less bass frequencies in the overall sound of a played chord. If you want those bass frequencies back, raise the bass side of the pickup. If you don't hear a difference in volume after changing the strings, then don't worry about it. Most people won't be able to hear such a tiny volume difference. I'd guess that everything smaller than something around a 1/25th inch (=1mm) in height difference can't be conciously HEARD, maybe 1/50th (=1/2mm) by some people but that's still twice as much as what we're talking about here.

The balance will stay the same from string to string because you usually don't mix string gauges (well, some people do!). If you don't mix them, the ratio of decreasing string diameter will be fairly even which won't change the overall balance very much, if at all. So there's no need for changing the staggering of the pole pieces. All you gotta do is raise the bass side of the pickup a bit, when changing from .011 to .009

Second question: Removing caps won't change anything regarding balance and volume. Since the pole pieces pick up the string, NOT the caps (they're either BETWEEN string and polepiece or the polepieces go through the cap) it won't change neither the balance nor the volume. It certainly can change the TONE in some cases, as well as feedback behaviour of the pickup, depending on cap material and design of the pickup (waxed or not waxed for example).

I have never figured our how to adjust the pole pieces on my Lace Sensors... Anyhow the only pickups that I have been able to push the poles up and down on where the Fender Japanese reissue pickups. I did it the first time by accident while cleaning a guitar. I always like the staggered looks, but often wondered if the staggeredness of the the pickups really made much of a difference. When one strums a chord, with any force, the strings vibration is not only being picked up by the pole under it, but the ones one ether side as well as the string vibrates and/or gets pull by the strum.

When one looks at the magnetic field of any pole magnet, it is easy to see that it will pick up a good sized area surrounding the pole almost as much as directly over the top of the pole— at least within a certain distance. Magnetic sources are inherently dipole sources - you can't really isolate North or South "monopoles". So I guess, while it was a novel idea in the 1950s, in practice it really, I do not think, amounts to much more than a cool vintage look, IMHO. I really like the TX specials which have the staggered poles and use them on a couple of my guitars.



BTW, here is how a Lace Sensor pickup works and one of the reasons I like them (I know, some of you hate them!):