Pickups,Magnetizing and De-magnetizing, is it possible?

Manfred-Klose

Is it possible to de-magnetize your pickup when it leens against your amplifier?

Quote from harmony central:

"Alternating currents from transformers have stray magnetic fields strong enough to demagnetize the magnets in your pickup. Pickups can be demagnetized by soldering guns (the type that have coils) if too close to your pickup when soldering. Leaning a guitar against an amplifier with large transformers can also demagnetize the magnets in your pickup."

Here is the full thread:
http://acapella.harmony-central.com/archive/index.php/t-1138875.html

AlanRatcliffe

Possible, but extremely unlikely. You need a real powerful magnet in close proximity to change the gauss of a permanent magnet significantly.

FenderBender

Gotta agree with Alan on that one. Magnets are one of the toughest components utilised in many current electrical and electronic consumer goods. I can recall hundreds hanging around on fridge doors, blackboards, steel tables, lockers etc after being removed from defunct equipment before it is dumped or recycled. I have monitored many industrial servo motors containing permanent magnets that are used in harsh environments (close to arc welders, vibration, high RFI, EMI, humidity and temperature) and have only witnessed magnets being damaged due to oxidation, excessive temperature or excessive mechanical shock. Regarding pickups, I reckon their casings, coils and mounting hardware would succumb to years of being knocked around and splashed with beer at gigs long before the magnets' gauss would be cooked.

Considering that no two acoustic axes or axemen will ever sound or play exactly the same and that we electric axemen colour sound even further by adding pickups, amps, interfaces and DAWs with variable gain controls, vintage amp modeling, speaker cabinet simulation and a myriad other effects in their signal process paths, my opinion is that a few Gauss here and there is of little significance.

Hats off to the OEMs that float their serious afficionado type customers' boats by offering to refurb or regauss magnets free of charge.
Blegh to the angry harmony posters. IMO they should spend their valuable time using their damn pickups instead of wasting it splitting hairs and hurling insults at each other. As for me its back to GR3 to satisfy my addiction ?