Pickup height

[Lucifuge]

No, not another "how high should my pickups be" thread...

Rather I'm wondering, when people talk about the distance of the pickup from the string, eg 1/8" or whatever, do they measure with the strings open or fretted at the last fret, as the strings can be quite a lot closer to the pickups when fretted.

[darkbluemurder]

I never measure - I just set the pickups to where they sound good to my ears.

Cheers Stephan

[Sancho]

I'm with Stephan. Measurements are pointless. Use your ears ;)

[Philly Q]

I never measure - I just set the pickups to where they sound good to my ears.

I got in trouble once when someone quoted pickup heights in tenths of millimetres and I suggested it was (possibly) rather unrealistically precise... so I'll keep schtum.

[Twinfan]

Fretted at the last is the usual measuring technique  :)

[Keven]

I'd like to thank twinfan for the first useful answer in the thread :)

[darkbluemurder]

Fretted at the last is the usual measuring technique  :)

What makes you so sure about that?

Cheers Stephan

[Twinfan]

Because that's the measurement Fender, Gibson and PRS etc give on their websites under their setup guides.

[Keven]

fretting the string at the last fret ensures the measurements are taken at the string's lowest distance between the pickup. imagine setting it to 3mm from the strings on open strings and having the pickup hit the low E everytime you palm mute!

[FELINEGUITARS]

Strings held down at the last fret for me

On humbuckers a quick way of getting them in place quickly is putting the X-Heavy BKP plectrum supplied with the pickups on top of the humbucker and raising the pickup till the pick just touches the underside of the strings

Then tweak to taste!

[Kiichi]

For a starting point I tend to fret on last fret, put and put one of my 2mm picks in there. From there I lower (and get back up to this point again) to until I find my favorite spot. That spot usually is 1-2mm away from where I started from, so quite a lot, but I like to try a lot of different hights, although I never have them close to the strings, to get an idea how this perticular PU will react to the changes, which helps me eventually finding the sweet spot.