Malik said: If you can operate some soldering irons you can change a pickup. Although, I rewired my old Squier Showmaster using only a pair of scissors and some black electrical tape. It was very fiddly, but I didn't have any irons handy. 😛
Bloody hell! That's crazy money! It seriously is about 2 mins work, honestly, you have to desolder and resolder two points, and it's not like you're working on a PCB where you have to be really carefull, you can do the messyest job in the world and it'll be fine, it's big things you're soldering to!
Seriously, we got taught to solder in school when we where like 12, it was compulsory, and that was on veroboard/stripboard, much harder (yet still very easy) than soldering pickup wires. The secret is to not be afraid, it's totally impossible to cause unrepairable damage to the guitar unless you have a fit or something and knock it off the worksurface and break it on the floor. Just give it a try and you will then cringe at the thaught of ever paying someone to do it. Hell, if you want, I'll dismantle my strat and make a step-by-step guide to doing it for you!
Hmm, thinking about it, isn't there something like that in the FAQ on this site? Maybe I'm imagining it, but if there isn't there really should be, I hate to see people wasting money like that.
Only time I would advise getting someone else to do it is if you're going from single coil to humbucker and need to route the body and don't own a router.
Good man! My first electric guitar came from a charity shop with no wiring and only one pickup, I just wired it strait to the input and had a wire running externally to the bridge to ground it. Quality Stuff!
DIY is the only way, and starting off with a crap project and no clue is the best way to start, because you're not afraid of breaking it, then you realise that you can't anyway when you know how it works.
