P22 pickup issue

David Eaton

New Member
Joined
Apr 27, 2012
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219
This is my 2012 P22, purchased as a NOS guitar in 2014:


In the summer of 2015 I noticed that the bridge pickup was offset, it was not this way when I purchased the guitar. It looked basically like this:




You can see the pickup has shifted towards the treble strings, and you can see there's no damage to the top, so it wasn't from an impact. I pulled the pickups and found that the "ears" were bent at odd angles:




I used a pair of needle nose pliers to straighten the "ears" and put the pickup back in the guitar.




About three months later, the same thing happened. I don't play the guitar much, so I didn't mess with it again until this weekend. All the pics except the bottom two were taken this weekend. The bottom two were post-repair job pics from summer of 2015.

I've never had this happen where the pickups would move side to side as the ears bent. Even more puzzling is that the guitar was built 4/2012, I took delivery 4/2014, and it was another 15 months before anything happened. Then, three months before the problem reappeared.

I bought the guitar for a pretty specific use, and I'm not doing that anymore, though I do like the guitar, so it hasn't been a huge problem but I'd love to know if i) anyone has an idea what might be causing this and ii) whether there is a better fix than using pliers to straighten the pickup mounts. I hope it doesn't happen anymore, but, man, it's got me puzzled.

Thanks in advance.
 
Were you playing Heavy Metal?




:)

I donno what originally happened to bend the legs, and it could even have been before you got the guitar, but the metal may have been effected enough from that first impact that its weaker and drops again over time just with gravity?

Needs sorted though, and I reckon PRS will help you out under warranty for free

Nice guitar
 
There might be something wrong with the positioning of the bolt holes. It seems when you tight them occurs a pressure to the pickups legs. I might be wrong of course but it is best to show it to a luthier :).
 
Is it a stock prs case? Do you put it away with the strap still on it? Is there something in the case that is pushing on the pickup when you close it up?.

I've been playing guitar for 30 plus years and have never seen this happen.

Are the height screws stock? Are you stacking cases on top of cases?

That just doesn't happen by itself.
 
It's hard to tell but do you have your bridge pickup set high and really close to the strings?

This issue has me very curious.
 
The set up was what came with the guitar, I never adjusted it. I've been in contact its PRS and they've been great.

I thought about issues with contact, but I can't think of what could hit the pickup hard enough to move it without leaving a mark on the top.

As I mentioned to Shawn, my mom allays said I was special....
 
I don't think it would take a blunt force to move that pickup like that. I think if your case was weak and something was stacked on then maybe that would gently push it over or like I said, something in the case when closed.

I am very curious about this,
 
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