Who here has tried complex/crazy guitar wiring schemes?

[guitguy28]

Sometime in the near future, I'd like to experiment with the wiring on
my Strat, I mean really push it as far as it can go.

At the very least, I want to add the bridge/neck and all 3 in parallel sounds, but I'd even like to add series combinations... and maybe even a pre-amp, a kill switch... or really just about anything.

So, who here has taken a Tele, Strat, whatever... and really gone crazy with wiring combinations, onboard preamps, etc etc etc.?

[mannish]

you mean on purpose :-) ....because I rewired one of my first builds this weekend with the new Stew Mac CTS pots and looking at the wiring I am still not sure what I was trying accomplish the first time around.

[Chris Scott]

Originally Posted by guitguy28

Sometime in the near future, I'd like to experiment with the wiring on
my Strat, I mean really push it as far as it can go.

At the very least, I want to add the bridge/neck and all 3 in parallel sounds, but I'd even like to add series combinations... and maybe even a pre-amp, a kill switch... or really just about anything.

So, who here has taken a Tele, Strat, whatever... and really gone crazy with wiring combinations, onboard preamps, etc etc etc.?

Most everyone that I know who's done this kind of stuff, seems to invariably revert back to stock, with maybe a coil cut with humbuckers.

It's not that you don't get different sounds, it's simply that most players who are playing in a band situation find all the extra bells and whistles pretty useless and distracting in a band setting, myself included.

ymmv, etc.

[stratotastic]

Originally Posted by Chris Scott

Most everyone that I know who's done this kind of stuff, seems to invariably revert back to stock, with maybe a coil cut with humbuckers.

It's not that you don't get different sounds, it's simply that most players who are playing in a band situation find all the extra bells and whistles pretty useless and distracting in a band setting, myself included.

ymmv, etc.

Totally agreed. Last thing you want during a performance is to have to constantly worry if this pickup is single coil, that tone control is bypassed, this pickup is out of phase with that other one, etc. Just a huge PITA.

This comes from experience--I wired up an H-S-H Strat with both humbuckers switchable to single coil, and reverse polarity from the middle for the usual strat cluck. Was a huge pain to wire up and troubleshoot (probably easy for someone that knows what they're doing) but after all was said and done, it was just a hassle on stage so I went back to stock, and just use my Les Paul for humbucker music.

[kugelblitz]

The pinnacle of my wiring madness was a Fender Blacktop Strat that I converted to H-S-H. My vision was to create a guitar with infinite options.

It had a P-Rails in the bridge and another in the neck, with a cool rails in the middle.

It had a 5 way super switch with the following positions:

1. Bridge only
2. bridge SC and middle SC
3. Bridge and neck
4. Neck SC and middle SC
5. Neck only

It had 2 push-pull pots which enabled the bridge and neck pickups to change in positions 1, 3 and 5, to:

- Series humbucker
- Single Coil
- P90
- Parallel humbucker

No matter where the oush-pulls were, positions 2 and 4 were always the same, to give quick access to the middle strat positions at all times.

Every position except 1 and 5 for SC and P90 were hum-cancelling. To do this, I had to use different coils of the cool rails for positions 2 and 4

This was a really difficult wiring scheme, which I had to work out myself after hours of looking through wiring diagrams and trying to learn how they worked!

Originally Posted by Chris Scott

Most everyone that I know who's done this kind of stuff, seems to invariably revert back to stock, with maybe a coil cut with humbuckers.

It's not that you don't get different sounds, it's simply that most players who are playing in a band situation find all the extra bells and whistles pretty useless and distracting in a band setting, myself included.

Yep, my guitar hit eBay shortly afterwards. Why? Although there were a lot of options, there were a lot of cons:

- There's a lot to be said about the simplicity of a stock guitar. I felt like I was playing a piece of technology, not an instrument. It sounds weird, but it just did't feel natural somehow.
- Although there was a great range of tones, the SC sound didn't sound as good as a strat, the HB sound didn't sound as good as a LP etc. It was a jack of all trades and a master of none.
- There were issues with output that meant that switching required adjusting the volume when switching from say, SC to humbuckers. Therefore it was difficult to make good use of these positions as it meant having to readjust volume constantly. Also the caps and pots had to be tuned to a kind of middle ground so that everything would work. So the SCs sounded a bit brighter than they should have, meaning that the toone had to always be adjusted. It was a PITA.

I really enjoyed building it - it was a great learning experience, but the most important thing I learned was to stick with a good guitar that does a couple of sounds well.

[Chris Scott]

Originally Posted by kugelblitz

The pinnacle of my wiring madness was a Fender Blacktop Strat that I converted to H-S-H. My vision was to create a guitar with infinite options.

It had a P-Rails in the bridge and another in the neck, with a cool rails in the middle.

It had a 5 way super switch with the following positions:

1. Bridge only
2. bridge SC and middle SC
3. Bridge and neck
4. Neck SC and middle SC
5. Neck only

It had 2 push-pull pots which enabled the bridge and neck pickups to change in positions 1, 3 and 5, to:

- Series humbucker
- Single Coil
- P90
- Parallel humbucker

No matter where the oush-pulls were, positions 2 and 4 were always the same, to give quick access to the middle strat positions at all times.

Every position except 1 and 5 for SC and P90 were hum-cancelling. To do this, I had to use different coils of the cool rails for positions 2 and 4

This was a really difficult wiring scheme, which I had to work out myself after hours of looking through wiring diagrams and trying to learn how they worked!



Yep, my guitar hit eBay shortly afterwards. Why? Although there were a lot of options, there were a lot of cons:

- There's a lot to be said about the simplicity of a stock guitar. I felt like I was playing a piece of technology, not an instrument. It sounds weird, but it just did't feel natural somehow.
- Although there was a great range of tones, the SC sound didn't sound as good as a strat, the HB sound didn't sound as good as a LP etc. It was a jack of all trades and a master of none.
- There were issues with output that meant that switching required adjusting the volume when switching from say, SC to humbuckers. Therefore it was difficult to make good use of these positions as it meant having to readjust volume constantly. Also the caps and pots had to be tuned to a kind of middle ground so that everything would work. So the SCs sounded a bit brighter than they should have, meaning that the toone had to always be adjusted. It was a PITA.

I really enjoyed building it - it was a great learning experience, but the most important thing I learned was to stick with a good guitar that does a couple of sounds well.

There's only two "mods" I've implemented on my stuff that I find useful, over and above finding the most suitable cap value(s) for a particular guitar, and running the Strat bridge pickup through the tone pot, and they are;

Push/push pot for mid/bridge tone pot (Strat) to engage neck pickup - this gives "bridge/neck" and "all" engagement - the former is quite usable, giving a "Tele-esque" tone with the former, while the latter is too close to the 2 and 4 positions sonically to be of any real value.

-AND-

RC network "mod" on the volume controls of my LP and 335. This can, provided you get the right combo of cap/resistor values, make riding the volume, especially on the neck pickup, an amazing thing indeed - no more mud while comping, and the interaction of the vol/tone controls really opens up possibilities with overall level control.


...again, just my take on it from a practical pov.

[BarryE]

I put in the Deaf Eddie switch in my strat (no longer have it, was stolen) that I was very happy with, gave me all the regular options along with neck bridge, all three pickups, all three in series, bridge out of phase with middle and a couple of others. Lots of choices and many were usable in different situations. If I get another Strat I will do that again.

[Crimson Queen]

I wired my Strat to cut out the tone knobs automatically in second and fourth position.

[Go Cat Go!!]

Originally Posted by BarryE

I put in the Deaf Eddie switch in my strat (no longer have it, was stolen) that I was very happy with, gave me all the regular options along with neck bridge, all three pickups, all three in series, bridge out of phase with middle and a couple of others. Lots of choices and many were usable in different situations. If I get another Strat I will do that again.

I wired up a couple of strats this way. It's a great mod for $30. It's not that hard to drop in either. It was one of my first soldering jobs.

[Lone Bear]

You may want to look into the switching system on Brian May's guitar. Three single coils, each has an on/off switch and each can switch polarity.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=mlP06xycVAc

[SLBlues]

Originally Posted by BarryE

I put in the Deaf Eddie switch in my strat (no longer have it, was stolen) that I was very happy with, gave me all the regular options along with neck bridge, all three pickups, all three in series, bridge out of phase with middle and a couple of others. Lots of choices and many were usable in different situations. If I get another Strat I will do that again.

Plus one - except I still have mine. I am just a hack but like many of combinations of pickups available with this set up.

[Turbo Gerbil]

I do it the easy way with the Duncan triple shot rings on my Humbuckers. I love the variety of sounds available.

[Rock Johnson]

Originally Posted by Turbo Gerbil

I do it the easy way with the Duncan triple shot rings on my Humbuckers. I love the variety of sounds available.

Yup. I have triple shots on one of my guitars and they're fun.

I've been thinking about putting Triple Shots on my Les Paul. It has a piezo and a coil split already, so I'd probably repurpose the coil split into a phase switch. As it is I can get 13 different tones out of my LP instead of just 3...

With the triple shots, let's see... a bit of quick math tells me there'd be... 4 neck only tones, 4 bridge only tones, 16 tones in phase, 16 tones out of phase, for 38 tones all total, from the magnetic pickups alone.

Add the piezo into the mix and you'd double that (each of the tones above + piezo) for 76 tones, plus one pure piezo, and you'd have 77 tones.

From one Les Paul.

Cool.
Cool.

[guitaristanyc]

I had Jimmy Page wiring installed on two Les Pauls and a similar wiring scheme for a Tele with a 5-way switch. I liked the added tonal options, but by means found them to be a necessary part of my sound. All my guitars are stock at the moment.

[tsar nicholas]

I have a Jaguar -- that is some nutty wiring right there