Did I mix up the pickups?

[wshines1892]

Have you ever gotten to the end of a pickup change, and then had the oh crap moment of thinking you may have put the neck pickup into the bridge position, and neck into the bridge position? Well I just did. The trouble is that I can't remember which case which pickup came out of. Is there an audible difference?

If it helps, the pickups are SD quarter pounders for jazz bass. As it is, the lead formt he neck is red, and the lead from the bridge is white.

 

[snyderz]

Are the pickups exactly the same length?

 

[wshines1892]

To my knowledge, yes.

 

[jkramer5]

According to the specs at the S.D. site the bridge pickup would be the longer of the 2.

Not buy much but it shows the Neck pickup as 3.6 and the bridge as 3.705

I dont think they are created to sound different, but the physical layout of the pole pieces and where they lay under a given string if installed in the opposite location (b pup in neck location) could cause a sound difference.

 

[line6man]

Unless the set was made for a MiM Fender, the pickups will be different in length, which means that the pickups physically cannot be swapped, as a bridge pickup does not fit in a neck route, and vice versa.

 

[FunkMetalBass]

According to SD, the difference is a 10th of an inch. Unless the routing is perfect, that's a reasonable enough margin of error for it to potentially happen.

They very well could be created to sound different. Typically, the bridge pickup is wound to emphasize the bass frequencies that are lost due to physical limitations of the string vibration. This may or may not be the case. But, try it out; see if you like it.

 

[SGD Lutherie]

According to SD, the difference is a 10th of an inch. Unless the routing is perfect, that's a reasonable enough margin of error for it to potentially happen.

The bridge pickup is 94.7mm (3.73"), and the neck pickup is 91.7mm (3.61"). The mounting tabs on the bridge pickup are 40mm (1.57") apart (center to center) and at the neck they are 38mm (1.49").

You will not get the bridge pickup to fit in the neck pickup rout, unless it's one of those big square routs. Likewise, you will have trouble getting the neck pickup to fit at the bridge rout because of the mounting tabs.