Can I Remagnatize One Emmons Single Coil Pickup Pole?

[Bill Rowlett]

I have an Original Emmons Push Pull single coil C6 pickup that has one dead pole.

Is there a way for me to remagnetize the pole?

I have a spare pickup but would obviously love to fix the one in the guitar if I could.

Also, if I do have to swap it out, any recommendation on a pickup maker that I could send it to for repair?

Thanks,

Bill

[Donny Hinson]

The short answer is no. Sometimes, a magnet can be replaced, but it's a crapshoot as to whether or not the windings get damaged. There were a very few speaker rebuilders that had a magnetizer, and that could demagnetize and then remagnetize the magnets without removing them, but i don't know of any that are still around. The usual fix is to replace the pickup, or send it to a rewinder for repair/rewinding.

Hope that helps.

[Cody Stewart]

Re-maging a pickup is simple. There are a few tutorials on how to do it on YouTube. I used a slew of small round rare earth magnets from harbor freight. A stack on each side of the pickup pole piece. Just study up on polarity. I would recharge all of them so they are equal in strength.

[Rich Ertelt]

I have a '60 strat, have had it 49 years. A few years back, I noticed some strings seemed lower in volume, but it was pickup dependent. I built a homemade guass meter, and tested, and found 4 or 5 poles there were low, maybe a few more that were just a tad low. I talked to a winder I respect who does great pickups. He said get a strong neo magnet and remagnitize them. It is what a lot of smaller winders use, apparently.Got one online, it was probably 5 or 10 bucks, used the meter to check polarity and just laid it on top of the pickup, moving it to make sure I touched all the pole pieces. I then remeasured. The low ones went up, the highest ones did not change.

That was 6 or 7 years ago, no issues since.

Before really strong neo magnets, it would not have been easy, you need something with some pull. Now, neo worked like a charm.

[Brett Lanier]

Rich, so did you do it without taking the pickup out of the guitar? That would be really convenient for permanent style guitars, since it’s so much work just to pull a pickup.

[Michael Kiese]

Hi,

Here's a great 1.5 minute video Lindy Fralin made explaining how to do exactly this, using a pair of magnets that cost "a buck or two a piece".

I think it will solve your problem.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ig-t5wx3iyw

Hope it helps!

[Rich Ertelt]

Rich, so did you do it without taking the pickup out of the guitar? That would be really convenient for permanent style guitars, since it’s so much work just to pull a pickup.

It was on a vintage strat, so just took the strings off. The pickups are far enough apart that it wasn't a problem. I just set it on top, and the lower magnets, just moved it to that side to the magnet would touch each pole piece.

There was a time when you couldn't get magnets strong enough to do this, had to be done with a strong eletro magnet. The other day, my wife dropped a little coin battery in the couch and couldn't get it out. I got the neo magnet out and got it out. Just a small bar magnet. I keep it on my tool chest in the garage, and I can barely pull it off, lol. REALLY strong.

[Rich Ertelt]

Hi,

Here's a great 1.5 minute video Lindy Fralin made explaining how to do exactly this, using a pair of magnets that cost "a buck or two a piece".

I think it will solve your problem.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ig-t5wx3iyw

Hope it helps!

I'm not sure what exact magnets he is using.
You can get neo magnets for like a buck or two.
The one I got was 18 bucks when I got it 10 years ago. I just looked at it, it has a pull of 103 lbs, the ones on Amazon about 18.
Not sure how strong you actually need for a pickup magnet, but that one I have is Crazy strong. Great for finding dropped screws in the grass when I'm putting something up outside, lol.

I know for a fact this one works.
https://www.magnet4sale.com/n52-ndfeb-b ... th-magnet/

[Michael Kiese]

I'm not sure what exact magnets he is using.
You can get neo magnets for like a buck or two.
The one I got was 18 bucks when I got it 10 years ago. I just looked at it, it has a pull of 103 lbs, the ones on Amazon about 18.
Not sure how strong you actually need for a pickup magnet, but that one I have is Crazy strong. Great for finding dropped screws in the grass when I'm putting something up outside, lol.

I know for a fact this one works.
https://www.magnet4sale.com/n52-ndfeb-b ... th-magnet/

Aloha Rich,

Dude, you can get everything on Amazon these days. I got a set of ridiculously strong neodymium magnets on Amazon for $12. I use them to recharge the horseshoe magnets of my Rickenbacher steels.

Oh yeah, those crazy strong magnets are handy dandy. My dang mailbox kept getting blown open by the wind, so I put a couple of small rectangular neodymium magnets on the lid, and boy you really got to use some force now to pry it open.. Even my mailman noticed. Lol. Hey, if I got kudos from a mailman, must be doing something right. That man is a connoisseur of opening mailboxes, lol.

Specifically regarding remagging pickups, it helps to magnetize/align their north and south poles at the same time. You don’t “have to”, but I think it’s good practice. So I prefer the method Lindy uses in the video. For that you need 2 separate magnets.

Using that 103lb force neodymium mag you have to recharge pickups would work, but it’s like bringing a bazooka to a fistfight. lol. But it would work. lol.

Here is the link for something similar to what I bought to recharge my horseshoe pups:
https://a.co/d/2j6dP3G

Here is a link to something similar to what Lindy is using in the video:
https://a.co/d/cDAbCTl

Both are less than 10 bucks. lol.

Enjoy!

[Rich Ertelt]

I'm not sure what exact magnets he is using.
You can get neo magnets for like a buck or two.
The one I got was 18 bucks when I got it 10 years ago. I just looked at it, it has a pull of 103 lbs, the ones on Amazon about 18.
Not sure how strong you actually need for a pickup magnet, but that one I have is Crazy strong. Great for finding dropped screws in the grass when I'm putting something up outside, lol.

I know for a fact this one works.
https://www.magnet4sale.com/n52-ndfeb-b ... th-magnet/

Aloha Rich,

Dude, you can get everything on Amazon these days. I got a set of ridiculously strong neodymium magnets on Amazon for $12. I use them to recharge the horseshoe magnets of my Rickenbacher steels.

Oh yeah, those crazy strong magnets are handy dandy. My dang mailbox kept getting blown open by the wind, so I put a couple of small rectangular neodymium magnets on the lid, and boy you really got to use some force now to pry it open.. Even my mailman noticed. Lol. Hey, if I got kudos from a mailman, must be doing something right. That man is a connoisseur of opening mailboxes, lol.

Specifically regarding remagging pickups, it helps to magnetize/align their north and south poles at the same time. You don’t “have to”, but I think it’s good practice. So I prefer the method Lindy uses in the video. For that you need 2 separate magnets.

Using that 103lb force neodymium mag you have to recharge pickups would work, but it’s like bringing a bazooka to a fistfight. lol. But it would work. lol.

Here is the link for something similar to what I bought to recharge my horseshoe pups:
https://a.co/d/2j6dP3G

Here is a link to something similar to what Lindy is using in the video:
https://a.co/d/cDAbCTl

Both are less than 10 bucks. lol.

Enjoy!

Wow, 6 N52s for 8 bucks. The price has dropped a lot in the last 10 years.
The one I got was recommended by the winder who made my tele and some of my strat pickups, Don Mare, if I remember. They were harder to get back then. Thing is crazy strong.
I know I have some vids on using two magnets, I wonder if something this strong, if it would make a dif. Maybe something I need to look at.

[Michael Kiese]

I know I have some vids on using two magnets, I wonder if something this strong, if it would make a dif. Maybe something I need to look at.

Rick Aiello would know better than me. That said, my understanding is that there is a ceiling to the amount of magnetism an individual permanent magnet has.

For example, given a magnet “X” which has a max flux density of 100 gauss that has weakened to 50 gauss. It can be recharged with another magnet that is 1,000 gauss or 5,000 gauss. Both strong magnets will recharge and align the poles of magnet “X” to 100 gauss. In other words, the 5,000 gauss Neodymium magnet cannot charge magnet “X” beyond 100 gauss.

Put differently, a 5 gallon bucket can only hold 5 gallons of water, no matter how much water you have to fill it. Water isn’t magnetism, but it’s a close enough example to understand the concept at our level.

So those little magnets that Lindy uses in the video are more than adequate to do the job.

When magnets push against each other, they weaken each other.

What likely happened to that one magnetic polepiece in the emmons pickup, is that it came into contact with another stronger magnet. That likely messed with its magnetic field, and weakened it.

Sometimes guitar players use magnets to clean metal flakes or shavings that are on their polepieces. That actually demagnetizes the polepieces. It’s better practice to use a brush or tape to clean a pickup. That’s why Lindy made this video. People call him all the time with this problem. He’s showing us how to fix our pickups on our own without having to send them to him. What a great guy.

[Rich Ertelt]

I know I have some vids on using two magnets, I wonder if something this strong, if it would make a dif. Maybe something I need to look at.

Rick Aiello would know better than me. That said, my understanding is that there is a ceiling to the amount of magnetism an individual permanent magnet has.

For example, given a magnet “X” which has a max flux density of 100 gauss that has weakened to 50 gauss. It can be recharged with another magnet that is 1,000 gauss or 5,000 gauss. Both strong magnets will recharge and align the poles of magnet “X” to 100 gauss. In other words, the 5,000 gauss Neodymium magnet cannot charge magnet “X” beyond 100 gauss.

Put differently, a 5 gallon bucket can only hold 5 gallons of water, no matter how much water you have to fill it. Water isn’t magnetism, but it’s a close enough example to understand the concept at our level.

So those little magnets that Lindy uses in the video are more than adequate to do the job.

When magnets push against each other, they weaken each other.

What likely happened to that one magnetic polepiece in the emmons pickup, is that it came into contact with another stronger magnet. That likely messed with its magnetic field, and weakened it.

Sometimes guitar players use magnets to clean metal flakes or shavings that are on their polepieces. That actually demagnetizes the polepieces. It’s better practice to use a brush or tape to clean a pickup. That’s why Lindy made this video. People call him all the time with this problem. He’s showing us how to fix our pickups on our own without having to send them to him. What a great guy.

Oh, yea, sure I understand all that. I got the strong magnet because one of my fav winders said get this. 10 years ago, I wasn't seeing neo magnets like that, cheap, on amazon. Could have been there, but I couldn't find them. And it's really handy to have around. I drop a screw in the yard recent, putting something up, got the magnet out, swept around a bit, bingo. It wasn't getting away from This one, lol

I actually have a gauss meter I built. It isn't calibrated but it works great comparing before and after. And new and old magnets.

[Michael Kiese]

I actually have a gauss meter I built. It isn't calibrated but it works great comparing before and after. And new and old magnets.

You built your own gauss meter? That's cool! How did you do it?

[Rich Ertelt]

I actually have a gauss meter I built. It isn't calibrated but it works great comparing before and after. And new and old magnets.

You built your own gauss meter? That's cool! How did you do it?

https://www.coolmagnetman.com/magmeter.htm

It isn't calibrated, but for testing pickups, it really isn't critical, especially with other pickups to compare to.

[Michael Kiese]

I actually have a gauss meter I built. It isn't calibrated but it works great comparing before and after. And new and old magnets.

You built your own gauss meter? That's cool! How did you do it?

https://www.coolmagnetman.com/magmeter.htm

It isn't calibrated, but for testing pickups, it really isn't critical, especially with other pickups to compare to.

Great link! Mahalo nui.