Semantics I know, but you generally want to put the pickup with the higher output in the bridge position. As Fender3x says, the string vibrate with a greater amplitude at the neck position compared to the bridge position, so fitting the same pickup in both positions will result in the bridge output being noticeably less than the neck position.Originally Posted by fender3x
You can balance outputs to some extent with pickup heights, but move a pickup too far away from the strings and it can sound , thin, weak and uninteresting.
So most pickup sets come in neck and bridge positions, with the bridge having more windings so that its output when installed is then similar to the neck pickup's. But a bridge pickup from a vintage style set may have less output than a neck pickup from a modern rock-orientated set, so you need to chose carefully when mixing pickup types.
If you do have one pickup louder than the other, then it is normal to have that louder pickup in the bridge, but you don't have to. You may use the neck pickup for most of your solo work, and use the bridge for cleaner, more jangly chord work.
Straight DC resistance isn't the only consideration, as the wire gauge also affects the DCR value as well as the number of turns. 43AWG wire is thinner than 42AWG wire (42 is the 'standard' pickup wire gauge), so is used for pickups where they want to fit more turns on the same bobbin size. But 43AWG has on average 27% more resistance per unit length than 42AWG wire, so two pickup made with a similar number of turns, but one with 42AWG wire and the other with 43AWG wire will have similar outputs, but the 43AWG pickup will have a higher DCR reading, and so appear 'hotter' than the 42AWG pickup. But the normal use of the thinner wire (apart from on physically smaller pickups like a Tele neck pickup) is to make overwound pickups.
So a humbucker with 10% extra windings of 43AWG wire, will not have a DCR that's 10% greater than the base humbucker with 42AWG wire, but 110% x 127%greater. So the base 8k pickup could have a 10% overwound variant with a DCR of 8k x 1.1 x 1.27 = 11.17k. That 11.17 k figure makes it seem a lot hotter than 10%!
Magnet types play their part as well. The stronger the magnet fitted to a given pickup coil, the higher the pickup output will be.
Increasing basic magnet strength goes Alnico 3, Alnico 2 (A2 is apparently stronger than A3 in rod magnet form but weaker in bar magnet form), Alnico 4, Alnico 5, Alnico 6, Alnico 7 (6 and 6 are rarely used for guitar pickups) and Alnico 8, Ceramic and then Neodymium. They will also add a slightly different tone to the pickup, so a maker can tune a pickup's sound by changing magnet type but increasing/decreasing the number of wire turns as appropriate to get the same output.
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