Les Paul Pickup Slant

[phlip]

I eventually got around to setting up my Les Paul yesterday and I noticed that my Rebel Yell in the bridge position is slanting quite heavily neck to bridge, IE it's a good 5-6mm higher on the neck side. Now tbh I can't remember the stock pickups being like this beforehand..
Is this normal or is something up?

The guitar has rather new Original Gibson Pickup rings installed recently to replace a cracked on so they're fine.

[Philly Q]

Is the RY covered?  It may be that the cover is pushing against the wall of the cavity, making the neck side tilt upwards.  If you push down on the neck-facing edge of the pickup, can it move at all?

If that is the problem, you'll need to remove a bit of wood from the bridge-facing side of the cavity.  I had to do that to fit a Riff Raff in my SG.

[phlip]

Is the RY covered?  It may be that the cover is pushing against the wall of the cavity, making the neck side tilt upwards.  If you push down on the neck-facing edge of the pickup, can it move at all?

If that is the problem, you'll need to remove a bit of wood from the bridge-facing side of the cavity.  I had to do that to fit a Riff Raff in my SG.

It is covered, and that sounds like a job I don't want to have to do. My previous covered stock pickups didn't do that  :shock: Bugger I've just got it all polished and strung up nice before i noticed too.

I'll try pushing on it and see what happens.

[Philly Q]

Yeah, the BKP covers seem to "flare out" at the bottom a bit more than some.

[lulusg]

Phlip, shouldn't be able to have a problem. Did you fit them yourself ?

[hunter]

sometimes this can also happen if you put 53 mm pickups in 50mm guitars

but I have no remedy for that case other than underfilling the lower side with foam or sth ...

[phlip]

Yeah I did fit it myself same as the pickup it replaced and many more over the years.

Surely the spacing is a difference in the bobbins (and matching cover) the actual humbuckers are the same size or have I misunderstood this bit of info for the past 20 years..

Anyway I managed to improve things and the slant is only slight now, the neck facing edge of the Pickup ring had moved and popped into the cavity, moving the pickup towards the bridge. With this corrected I still can't wiggle the pickup but at least it's lying flater now.

[lulusg]

You know your stuff Phlip. Best to you man!