Jon Bell

A wider magnet will sense a larger area with more harmonics giving a warmer tone. A thinner magnet will sense a smaler area and give a brighter tone.

I always find that I spend the most time tidying my tools when I've got a boring job I'm trying to put off.

Some humbuckers are designed with alnico slugs for polepieces rather than the ferrous studs attached to a bar magnet used on most humbuckers. This should make the split tone more like a true single coil. Adding covers will reduce the highs a little bit. Jon

1d 2 - 4,3,2,1 3 - b 4 not much 5 a 8 online

Removing the covers will add a bit of high end to the tone, it's very subtle though. Pickups without covers are often set a bit closer to the strings too, this will also affect the tone and outout.

That is a really cheap pickup! But I think you'd find it wouldn't be much of an improvement over your stock pickups (it might even be worse!). I think at that price some corners must have been cut. Maybe you could try looking on ebay for secondhand Duncans or Dimarzios?

That is a really cool looking guitar! But maybe ebay isn't the best place to sell your guitars? I think people are often after a bargain on ebay and reluctant to pay realistic prices for more expensive items. Also going back to what was mentioned above I've also found my pickups sell slower in the Jan / Feb period. I think a lot of folks are still recovering after Christmas.

I wouldn't use tape. It works really well the first time but the quickly gets gummy and sticky and its a nightmare to clean. Maybe a cigarette paper wrapped around the thread would work?

You can pour a material into your inlay cavity but it's difficult to get good results. Your edges will need to be spot on otherwise the inlay material will show up any slight errors. It is difficult to get it flat and neat too. I'd stick with cutting out the inlay shapes using an jeweler's saw like Clavin mentioned above. You could try using plastic for your inlay - its cheap and easy to work with and can give good results.

In my experience the heavier a machine is the better it performs, it usually means it is sturdier and more accurate. It's not always the case but if you're comparing two similar models it can be a good rule of thumb.

How does the unfinished neck feel? Do you have any worries about it's stability? Very cool looking guitar!

In answer to the original posters question you can do what you are suggesting but you will need some different magnets. Cheaper single coils have a ceramic bar magnet attached to the six steel poles. You could replace this with an alnico magnet but not a standard humbucker type. The magnet needs to have it's poles on the 7mm x 63mm face, a standard humbucker magnet is magnetised so that the 2mm x 63mm face on the side is the pole. It would work, just not very well. Jon

Absolutely, if you've got a question just drop me a PM or my email address is on my site.

I would remove the old wires from the pots and solder the new pickups there. It will look neater and it also means your old pickups will still have plenty of wire left if you ever use them again. Just make sure to keep track of where the original wires were attached and don't let the pots get too hot.

For anybody in the UK there is the Totnes School of Guitarmaking. http://www.totnesschoolofguitarmaking.co.uk/