How do you change the baseplate of a pickup?

[Orange Tortex]

I want to wood mount my pickups because I don’t want to use pickup rings, I like how wood mount looks better. The problem is one of the pickups I want is long legged. So how do you go about changing the baseplate? I can’t find any good videos on how to do it. Does it change the tone? The specific pickup in question is the SD ‘59 Model (SH-1n)

 

[ragamuffin]

I did this a while back to change a Duncan Seth Lover from long leg to short leg for the same reason. I used a Mojotone short leg baseplate

If your pickup has a cover you'll have to desolder the cover from the edges of the baseplate. Then you basically unscrew the four little screws on the bottom of the baseplate, pull it off and screw the new one into place. It's really not too complicated, especially if your pickup doesn't have a cover.

Some people say that the baseplate material affects the pickup tone, but I don't have any personal experience with that. Baseplates are generally either nickel-silver or brass. Seymour Duncan uses nickel-silver baseplates, so stick with a nickel-silver replacement and there shouldn't be any major change in tone.

Finally, Seymour Duncan offers what they call "shop floor custom" pickups available through authorized dealers and I'm pretty sure you can order a short legged 59' as a shop floor custom this way for little to no up charge. I haven't ordered a shop floor custom myself, but I've heard of a lot of people doing it through Mike's Music Shop aka banjomikez on Ebay. I think it would be worth shooting them an email to find out as it would mean one less thing to go wrong and it wouldn't void the Seymour Duncan warranty.

 

[TBurst Std]

PS: for a clean and quick way to desolder a cover from a baseplate:
Get a single edge razor blade. Heat it up and draw it through the joint. A lot cleaner than heating the joint directly and no risk of solder going where you don’t want it.

 

[Orange Tortex]

The three sizes I can find for baseplates are 49.2mm, 50mm, and 53mm. What is that measuring? What size would I need for the ‘59? (Specifically the (SH-1n))

 

[stratamania]

The measurement refers to the dimension from centre to centre of the polepieces that would lie under the E-e strings.

Measure it to check the dimensions of the SH-1N that you have.

 

[ragamuffin]

The three sizes I can find for baseplates are 49.2mm, 50mm, and 53mm. What is that measuring? What size would I need for the ‘59? (Specifically the (SH-1n))

It's the pole piece spacing. Your 59' (and most Duncan non-trembuckers) are 49.2mm.