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I recently bought a GFS Mean 90 for the neck position to install in my Elite KV and i'm really happy with it; it does exactly what i expected it to do and it sounds great. I have a Duncan Invader in the bridge position and the look of an open-coil humbucker and a covered P90 didn't look right, so my ever-present hunger to mod the shit out of everything took over.
I know Schaller sell some nice-looking pickup covers, so i checked them out. For an Invader, you obviously need the 12-hole version, which comes in two flavours: neck and bridge spacing.
According to Seymour Duncan, Invaders are not F-spaced (they don't need to be due to the over-sized hex bolt pole pieces) and I measured the pole piece spacing at around 10mm with a small ruler, although i should have been less lazy and used some calipers. Anyhow, the Schaller diagrams state that the spacing on the pickups is: 9.8mm for the neck (diagram) and 10.4mm for the bridge (diagram). I wasn't sure which one to get, so i said fuck it and bought both just in case. The rest of the dimensions looked fine too so i knew that the cover would fit over the pickup.
The covers arrived, so i got to work. First i checked the pole spacing by just placing the cover over the pickup. Perfect fit but it turns out that the neck pickup cover (9.8mm hole spacing) fits both the bridge pickup and neck pickup, which indicates that Invaders have the same pole-spacing regardless of whether the pickup is for the neck or bridge. The bridge pickup cover (10.4mm hole spacing) didn't fit either one; the spacing was off.
So, lesson learned: if you're going to buy a set of Schaller covers for a set of Invaders. make sure you get a pair of 12-hole neck pickup covers for both the bridge pickup and neck pickup. Moving on...
First, i took out the pickup and carefully unscrewed the pole pieces with your standard-issue Allen key. It's worth noting that the pole pieces do not reach the baseplate of the pickup and the cover falls just above it, so you can't really solder it onto the baseplate. But with 12 bolts holding it there, i don't think it's necessary, nor do you need to add a blob of silicon or whatever onto the bobbin to hold it in place.
I let the pole pieces soak in some WD40 for a bit to get rid of any wax residue left on the threads and any other dirt that had built up over time. I sprayed a little WD40 on a microfibre to clean the bobbin too.
Then i just plopped the cover over the pickup, made sure everything was lined up nicely and started putting the bolts back in after cleaning them up with a paper towel. Note that i first installed the two corner pole pieces first to make sure all the holes lined up.
After putting all the hex bolts back in and putting the pickup back in the guitar. Looks badass!
I also took the opportunity to change the tuner buttons to some tulip-style ones:
I've got one more mod for this guitar and it involves a red push button and a bunch of wires. I'll probably do another thread about that when i get on with it over the next few days.
I know Schaller sell some nice-looking pickup covers, so i checked them out. For an Invader, you obviously need the 12-hole version, which comes in two flavours: neck and bridge spacing.
According to Seymour Duncan, Invaders are not F-spaced (they don't need to be due to the over-sized hex bolt pole pieces) and I measured the pole piece spacing at around 10mm with a small ruler, although i should have been less lazy and used some calipers. Anyhow, the Schaller diagrams state that the spacing on the pickups is: 9.8mm for the neck (diagram) and 10.4mm for the bridge (diagram). I wasn't sure which one to get, so i said fuck it and bought both just in case. The rest of the dimensions looked fine too so i knew that the cover would fit over the pickup.
The covers arrived, so i got to work. First i checked the pole spacing by just placing the cover over the pickup. Perfect fit but it turns out that the neck pickup cover (9.8mm hole spacing) fits both the bridge pickup and neck pickup, which indicates that Invaders have the same pole-spacing regardless of whether the pickup is for the neck or bridge. The bridge pickup cover (10.4mm hole spacing) didn't fit either one; the spacing was off.
So, lesson learned: if you're going to buy a set of Schaller covers for a set of Invaders. make sure you get a pair of 12-hole neck pickup covers for both the bridge pickup and neck pickup. Moving on...
First, i took out the pickup and carefully unscrewed the pole pieces with your standard-issue Allen key. It's worth noting that the pole pieces do not reach the baseplate of the pickup and the cover falls just above it, so you can't really solder it onto the baseplate. But with 12 bolts holding it there, i don't think it's necessary, nor do you need to add a blob of silicon or whatever onto the bobbin to hold it in place.
I let the pole pieces soak in some WD40 for a bit to get rid of any wax residue left on the threads and any other dirt that had built up over time. I sprayed a little WD40 on a microfibre to clean the bobbin too.
Then i just plopped the cover over the pickup, made sure everything was lined up nicely and started putting the bolts back in after cleaning them up with a paper towel. Note that i first installed the two corner pole pieces first to make sure all the holes lined up.
After putting all the hex bolts back in and putting the pickup back in the guitar. Looks badass!
I also took the opportunity to change the tuner buttons to some tulip-style ones:
I've got one more mod for this guitar and it involves a red push button and a bunch of wires. I'll probably do another thread about that when i get on with it over the next few days.
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