Pickup height adjustment

[Lozz196]

Am I going mad? I ask re pickup height adjustment, as I`m sure I`ve seen on here a thread which stated that lowering the pickup increases bass, and therefore makes the pickup seem louder.

Is this fact, or did I dream the above?

Please put me out of my misery.

[Ou7shined]

It certainly sounds like something you'd read on here..... utter tosh.

The closest I can think is that if you set the pup height too close to the string the magnetic attraction on the string can stifle the vibrations.
Generally pup height should be around 4-5mm away from the string while it is fretted at the upper frets (20,21,24) depending on your style of "attack".

Lowering it too far will just make it quieter.

[LawrenceH]

[quote name='Ou7shined' post='1190784' date='Apr 6 2011, 06:19 PM']It certainly sounds like something you'd read on here..... utter tosh. [/quote]

You should hear how loud my bass is when I take the pickups right out

But it does seem to change the tonal balance on top of the volume drop in my experience

[Ou7shined]

[quote name='LawrenceH' post='1190794' date='Apr 6 2011, 06:30 PM']You should hear how loud my bass is when I take the pickups right out

But it does seem to change the tonal balance on top of the volume drop in my experience[/quote]

[TRBboy]

I do believe that 73jazz said it on my 'Jazz bass dilemma!' thread recently.

[quote name='73Jazz' post='1187703' date='Apr 4 2011, 01:06 PM']Maybe you should adjust the height of the pickups, in my oppinion the most underrated thing to do in a setup.
You possibly have chosen the same height than with your pickups before, due to more output they have now more mids. experiment with it, if you screw the pickups more into the body, they get more bass[/quote]

I do pretty well disagree with this statement.

I always try to have the pickups as high as possible without the strings hitting them, no matter how hard I dig in, and without the magnets inhibiting the free vibration of the strings. I don't think that the pickup height affects the tone whatsoever.

[lonestar]

Last night at a rehearsal i dropped the height of my wizard thumper in my bitsa p bass about 4mm on the E & A string side.
Result is that it sounds great. Even volume across all strings and much tighter and " thumpier?" On the low notes.
Im really pleased and not a little surprised at the difference.