Trimming pole heights

[vansinn]

My Filmore StratCat is outfitted with Wilkinson pickups with poles staggered in reverse order, to mimick how Hendrix sounded, playing lefthand on a righthand Strat.
While this sounds very cool, the A pole a quite low, resulting in too little gain, but is resolved by supergluing a tiny neodym magnet underneath it.
However, the low E pole sticks up way too high, making this string bounce through way too much.
Nope, tilting the pup can't be done enough to compensate.

I'm thinking it should be possible to hook up the pup in a vice, using some hollow tool th support the pickup base around/under the pole, and gently apply pressure to drive the pole some 1-1½ mm down.

Any experience with this?  Are poles generally stickyfied to the base/lid and maybe likewise to the windings?

[Harley Hexxe]

Hey Sinn,

    I'm not completely sure about this, but I think when they put the poles through the bobbin, they use epoxy to hold them in place. Placing heat on this will make the epoxy brittle and break off. You may want to be careful about this.

[rnolan]

Maybe email Wilkinson ? I was going to suggest you remove the pole pieces from the middle pup (unless you really want/need it) to make it a hum cancelling coil.

[vansinn]

Yeah, considering the likelihood of epoxy bonding, I think too I shouldn't mingle with that low E pole.
A better approach is trimming it a touch down using my rotary grinder for sharpening knives and tools - as long as I take it easy, to not introduce heat, which will damage the magnetic field strength.

Nope, not going to buy a new [maybe different] pickup; it's just one pole on two pickups needing a trim; not a problem on the bridge pup. I'll find a way..