Slight degaussing mounted pickup

[Guitarist]

I've read someplace that, with a neo magnet, you can slowly "brush" out some magnetic strength of your AlNiCo magnets by up to 20%. (Keep away from the other pickup/s while doing this.) This smooths down the power, which is a function of winds and magnetic strength. This can be done to a guitar while plugged in and dialed there and then, which is pretty darned appealing.

Any detail on the proper method to do this?

[jafo]

Yep. Run like poles together once or twice, play some music, and repeat until it sounds right to you. Run unlike poles together to strengthen.

Err, sorry if that sounded flippant... but as long as you only do this to one pup at a time (which you say), you can gauss and degauss to your heart's content; and it's done when it satisfies you. You could prolly make a jig and use a meter and get all technological if you like, but when you're doing it purely for sound, you need the immediacy of the above method. Each pup and axe are different, and measurements are only statistically optimal.

[Possum]

....

Use the neo to OPPOSE the magnets in the pickup. Push down, but not touching or you will totally flip the magnetic poles backwards :-) Push it down towards the pickup until you feel resistance then push it just a bit further, maybe test with a screw driver blade to test strength, then play and listen. Mostly what will happen is the weaker it gets you get a bit more sustain because the magnets in the pickup aren't pulling on the strings and much and killing sustain. To recharge the magnets put the neo attracting right on the magnets to recharge fully. You need a pretty strong magnet to pull this off, the tiny ones StewMac sells are too weak. One that will cover the full length of the pickup will be strong enough.

[FunkyKikuchiyo]

I've done this effectively with N42 1/2" cubes. It came in handy with my first set when I realized I did the phase incorrectly (d'oh!)... larger might make the fine tuning more graceful, but it was powerful enough that the poor little alnico didn't know what was coming. My lesson learned: if you don't want your alnico's charge to change, keep it far far away from any neo-ds.