Cobra P to M surgery underway

[coaltrain]

I got my M1 & M3 for my Cobra Special which has P pickups that I want to switch out. I figure this will be a good test to see if someday (when I get the funds) I can purchase a new TAG Cobra and put the Ps back in this one.

I did not not like how much space was around the M pickups so after kicking around some different ways to fill up the space I decided to use the covers that were on the P pickups and cut out the centers, which I hope Tom will sell me some new ones to keep with the original Ps. I am using a spring wire to hold the pickup covers in place. The only down fall is that I will have to adjust the pickup heights before I add the covers, which I will have to wait until I string the guitar to check. The good thing is that pickup heights don't really need to be changed once they are set.

http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k304/70NovaSS/guitars/DSCF1427.jpg

I did not get a chance to try out the new Ms yet because two minutes after I turned my amp on a tube went out and blew the fuse, which I have to go buy new tubes and fuses tomorrow.

[tom]

nice job. we have some black surrounds that mount to the pickup that fill in the space left from the p's. they move up and down with the pickup so adjustment is easy. yours looks cool too though.

[coaltrain]

Thanks Tom, if for some reason mine end up not working I'll have to get some of those pieces from you. I had been thinking about fabricating some chrome plated covers for these in the future if these pickups become a permanent addition.

Is it possible to buy the P covers to replace the ones I modified? If so do I just call you guys or do I have to go through a store?

Thanks
Jeff

[irish blues]

Jeff....way cool. You have inspired me to put m's in my cobra special....well, I guess I will wait to hear your opinion on the change.

[tom]

we just get the covers from duncan. they're "regular.
email me and i'll send you the rings.

[coaltrain]

I'll post a picture of the spring wire I made and how it works, it is pretty simple but it does take some time to bend and adjust the wire (plus a trip to a hobby store).

[coaltrain]

It is finished! The guitar sounds fantastic!!! I really liked the P pickups but in my current playing situation I could not have the hum they produced. The M pickups really are the ticket in a guitar like this, it can cover a lot of the same sounds the Ps did (without the hum) and more. I went with a M1 in the neck and an M3 in the bridge. Between the design of the Cobra, wedge neck pocket, and M pickups this guitar is the one I have been looking for over the last 26 years of playing and owning lots of guitars.

Here is the way I modified the covers.

http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k304/70NovaSS/guitars/DSCF1432.jpg
I first made plastic templates of the shape of the both M pickups. The pickups are the same short dimension but the M3 is wider (in the long direction). The numbers in pencil on the templates are the distances the template should be from the edges. I made small locating gauges from scrap plastic to the numbers I wrote on the templates to insure the templates were located exactly in the middle of the covers. I used double sided tape to hold the template in place and I scribed a line around the template into the top of the cover. I used a Dremal tool with a high speed steel cutting bit to cut out the center of the cover using a technique that involves a sort of controlled melting, it makes fast clean cuts in thick plastic.

http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k304/70NovaSS/guitars/DSCF1429.jpg
On the inside of the pickup covers I used some styrene plastic that I purchased at a hobby shop which is cut in strips of 0.060 square. The squares are set 0.040 away from the edge of the cover (which is the diameter of the wire I used to make the spring clip), I used a scrape piece of 0.040 wire as a gauge. The small piece of white plastic is a 0.015 thick piece of styrene that is cut with a taper on both the longer side to make a snap which holds the wire into the space between the wire and the pickup cover. I used super glue to hold the pieces in place, which required some roughing up on the smooth plastic pickup cover to give the glue some tooth to grab.

http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k304/70NovaSS/guitars/DSCF1430.jpg
Here are the wire clips, one for each side of the pickup. I used 0.040 brass wire. I was going to use spring steel but it is too hard to bend and make small adjustments to. The clips are slipped between the screw heads the hold the pickups down and the pickups. I measured the height of the pickups from the top of the mounting base to the top of the pickup and subtracted the thickness of the pickup cover to get the height of the bent wire. A dial caliper comes in handy for this.

http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k304/70NovaSS/guitars/DSCF1431.jpg
Here are the clips installed in the guitar. The spring wire should be close to the edges of the pickup opening so there in tension pushing outward on the pickup cover.

http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k304/70NovaSS/guitars/DSCF1437.jpg
finished product. I really like how clean this looks, no screws or spaces. They are actually easy to get off, but fill really solid in place. I had to adjust the neck pickup height after it was all done and it did not go as bad as I thought, I did have to tune the guitar down to get the cover out but once it is set I don't see me ever having to adjust it again. I was thinking that I could drill holes in the covers to allow a screw driver to get at the screws but I want to see how it goes without the screw holes first. I think these pickups look pretty cool this way, kind of like a little Music Man bass pickup.

http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k304/70NovaSS/guitars/DSCF1436.jpg

http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k304/70NovaSS/guitars/DSCF1435.jpg

http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k304/70NovaSS/guitars/DSCF1434.jpg