EJ Strat with unbalanced output?

[dave mercier]

I just had a customer with an Eric Johnson strat. The D and G strings were quieter on the neck and bridge pickups but the middle worked fine. Has anyone ever seen this and what caused it to happen?

He said he bought it used. The guy he got it from said he had a setup done to it and it came back "sounding different". He's taking the guitar back to him but I was just curious about it.

[Jeff Highland]

Well there are these possibilities

-A problem with the strings

-D and G strings set too high

-Pickup hieight incorrect

-D and G polepieces pushed in

-D and G polepieces demagnetised

 

Probably one of the latter three

[dave mercier]

Hey Jeff

The setup looked fine. The poles on the D and G were set rather high on all 3 pickups. The poles demagnitising sounds about right. How does that happen?

[Pierre-Antoine Roiron]

Contact with a reverse polarity magnet. Considering the middle one is reverse polarity, a contact with a magnet bar along the 3 pickups would only demagnetise the front and bridge or the middle... not all three.

[dave mercier]

Wow! Thanks guys. I think you hit the nail on the head! I assume it's possible to REmagnitise the pickups then. I'll have to look further into this. Thanks again.