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Hi Folks,

If you ever need to fix a humbucker, or turn a 2 conductor into a four for splitting and what not, this may help you if you are unfamiliar.

It is my attempt to clarify what should be really obvious in a situation where one too many conventions have been allowed to exist SEE HERE.

So you have a humbucker in bits, the bar magnet lays staring up at you from the bottom of the ice cream container...hmmm so legend has it that the south pole of the magnet should face the adjustable pole pieces or in their absents, that the orientation of the magnetic poles for the neck and bridge pickups are usually reversed.

OK, to do this we are going to need to determine the polarity of our magnet before we just jump in and start cutting and soldering and putting it all back together.

Well, that should be simple enough now that we know and understand the NBS convention from the link above. First we dig through the draw and find just the tool for the job... that cheap little $2.00 hiking compass that you never did use.

We take our compass over to our bar magnet, now how does this go again?...Ah yes, the needle in the compass is marked with "N" on the tip of it's North Magnetic Pole. It is marked this way because of the "opposites attract" rule.

This rule means that this north end of the needle will be attracted to Earths Magnetic South Pole which is located in the direction of the planets true North.

That is the bit that causes confusion for some, Earths Magnetic Poles are the reverse of it's geographical poles, the south is in the north...silly old planet

Therefore, the "North" end of the compass needle will always point to the South Pole of your bar magnet, not north pointing to north as it would seem some assume.

I know that to most of you whom would have bothered to read this, what I have written is all very basic stuff. But sometimes, it seems even when we know something already, when were faced with such a simple choice, it can be very easy to succumb to the power of suggestion.

After all a pointer marked "N" IS pointing to that side of your magnet, so a simple assumption can lead to a simple mistake. That simple mistake can lead to hours of head scratching and still more incorrect assumptions about the causation of what is now a very thin sounding weak electric guitar.

Just thought I would share.

Cheers all Kim

Kim, you've helped me with a project that's completely unrelated to guitars. Thanks!

I'm building a stirrer for a reaction vessel that has to operate at up to about 400 atmospheres, the hassle was in finding the polarity of the magnets. It was going to involve electromagnets and a multimeter. A compass! Now why didn't I think of that? Thanks mate!

Your most welcome Paul, glad I could help.

The compass is truly a very handy thing. Not only can it tell you the polarity of a magnet it will also give you direction in life. But for me, I think the best thing of all is that they make the very best bait when your trying to catch Swedish backpackers or boy scouts, either of which do a tremendous job of weeding the garden once tamed

Cheers

Kim

Kim,

Have you considered the confusion that would rule if you were working
on humbucker pickups during a magnetic pole flip? When this happens,
for a period of time there are actually multiple sets of poles present over
the earths surface.

Cheers Martin

Don't let Jimmy Page hear about that one Martin