Replacement pickup magnets

Fatfingers

In case anyone's after any, I've just bought four - two alnico 2s and two alnico 5s - for slightly more than eight quid delivered from www.cermag.co.uk

They came very quickly too. They're for a pair of Chinese humbuckers.

suspiciousminds

Are these a block of magnet that replaces the one underneath?

thermionic

I have a great guitar book that dates from the early 80s, it mentions that you can buy high powered ceramic magnets to replace your weedy alnicos for greater output. Funny how things change!

Fatfingers

Yes - the ones I bought are for humbuckers, but they also supply the small bar magnets used in single coil pickups.

t1000

I used some magnets from cermag in some Chinese p90s and it made a massive improvement

suspiciousminds

Cool.
Much of an improvement?

t1000

I thought so mind you I did rewind the pups as well but the magnets that came with them were ceramics. 

OilCityPickups

Nowt wrong with ceramics used in the right pickup designs for the right purpose. What you find when you make pickups for a living is that good pickup makers choose ceramics when they will benefit the design ... bad ones choose ceramics as they benefit the profit margin!

There are many alternatives now ... from alnico 8 and even 9 to hybrid magnet designs. Just some experimentation required for your own ideal sound :-)

suspiciousminds

Hmm, i had the original pickup on my fender bronco rewound a couple of years back - would it be worth changing the poles too?