Sloped P pups, the reason?

[red7flag]

My Yamaha 434, 435 and Fender Tony Franklin P has P pups that slant downward away from the center of the instruments. On my G&L LB-100, the P pup is level. Is there a reason or a change in sound as a result of the slant (not due to internal issues)? I assume there is a functional reason, but I can't seem to figure it out. Thanks in advance.

 

[DigitalMan]

Generally speaking it is to maintain equal distancing from the strings and (sometimes) to accommodate greater string travel.

 

[onestone]

Fingerboard radius. If you set your string height to a similar radius your E and G strings would be closer to the pickups. The slant will make up for that.

 

[bwildt]

The canting of the pickups allow then to follow the radius curve of the fingerboard and bridge. It's not a big thing, but some people like them set up that way, supposedly to create more equal distance between each string and the pickup poles. It is a bigger deal if an instrument has the more vintage 7-1/4 and 9-1/2 inch fingerboard radius. It's not as big of an issue with the flatter 12 inch radius fingerboards. Like everything else about setting up a bass, YMMV.

 

[red7flag]

Generally speaking it is to maintain equal distancing from the strings and (sometimes) to accommodate greater string travel.

That would make sense for the pup under the E and A string, but not for the pup under the D and G string that also slopes down toward the body and slopes more under the G string that is smaller. Maybe I am just misunderstanding your reply DigitalMan, if so I apologize.

 

[red7flag]

Radius would make sense to me. I had not thought about that. The earlier Ps probably had flat fretboards.

 

[brianrost]

No, older Fenders had very tight radius (so more curved) fingerboards. The trend over the years has been for flatter boards, larger radius.