Pickup height

[BrandonJ]

Anyone know what the most optimal pickup height is? I’m having issues with my the output of my guitar and sustain. I have a Syn Custom w/ invader and sustainiac.

 

[Adin Shepherd]

The only guidelines I could suggest is that if the pickups are passive don’t have them to close to the strings. Passives have a much greater magnetic pull than their active counterparts and if set to close can cause issues with the vibration of the strings, which in turn, effect things like sustain.
I would suggest starting with them set at around 2mm from the strings and play a bit, set them a little lower and play a bit, repeat until you find a happy balance between output, sustain, tone etc.
If your pick ups are actives, check your battery too.
Hope this helps.

 

[BrandonJ]

They’re passive, I’ll set it at 2 mm and see what I get, thanks.

 

[Dan Shipway]

I tend to go for loudness and clarity but without over distortion or lack of play-ability (I use EMG Zakk Wylde for reference so being too high isn’t too much of an issue for magnetic pull) However you have a sustainiac so I would assume that the higher they are the better the effect.

 

[Calvin Phillips]

Syn says all his guitars have pick ups at different heights for different effects. Experiment a little see what you like.

 

[Jake Young]

Usually you can look up the factory specs of your specific guitar and they usually have a recommendation. I like my bridge pickup pretty close to the strings. Actually almost as close as I can get it without the strings touching it when really digging in. So when setting my height for humbuckers..I raise it, put my hand in palm muting posisition and push down pretty hard..if it’s too close I back it off..then repeat. Then I push down again and play. If it doesn’t touch when hard palm muting I play some open string real aggressively and make sure it doesn’t touch then.. Haha this approach works for me and the band I did the teching for 10 years. There’s a lot of factors that comes in to play but this will get you pretty close to where you need to be

 

[Noah Berends]

Regarding the Sustainiac, the height of either pickup will make a huge difference to how the Sustainiac functions. Bringing either the bridge or neck pup closer to the strings will make the sustain effect come in much faster and much more intense, and therefore a bit harder to control (fret buzz can also occur given real low action). When you give the pups more distance, the effect will ease itself in more and be easier to control and not as intense. I believe I remember from experimenting also that when you bring the Sustainiac closer to the strings the “normal” mode began to have some harmonic response without it being in the harmonic mode, so if you want it clean definitely give it a bit of distance. In my Sustainiac-loaded Schecter I keep the Sustainiac unit itself relatively around stock height and the bridge pickup just barely raised from stock (although mine is a Duncan FullShred so it probably has different subtle specs than the Invader).

 

[Jake Young]

I missed the part where you mentioned you had a sustainiac also…I owned a guitar with a sustainiac for about a year and struggled with finding a good balance between the two at first.. So I emailed Maniac Music (the guys who make the sustainiac) and also Syn’s tech Kevin to see if he had pointers…I posted their responses in a different thread that I just bumped back up so it would be easier for you to find! So it should be close to the top

 

[Jeff Pogan]

On the Syn guitars, Set the bridge pickup at 3mm and the neck (sustainiac) at 4mm and see how you like that.
Also make sure to adjust the pots in the back of th guitar for the Sustainiac gain to your liking!

 

[Erick Moreno]

On the Syn guitars, Set the bridge pickup at 3mm and the neck (sustainiac) at 4mm and see how you like that.
Also make sure to adjust the pots in the back of th guitar for the Sustainiac gain to your liking!

Might be a dumb question but where to you measure from to get the height?

thanks