Well that looks great. Let me just clear up a couple of doubts.
Thanks, and no worries.
You include two splitter switches. Presumably this would be to accommodate the possibilty of an HSH configuration, right?
No, not to accommodate an HSH. That's only if you
have an HSH, which I do. But, yes, the idea is to cover that eventuality if you have any humbuckers in equation.
The system is totally modular, and if there is something there that doesn't apply to you, then you don't need it, and can leave it out. That is, short of the Mode Switcher, which, if you left that out of the picture it would sort of defeat the purpose (but I'm sure you gathered that).
The phase inverter seems to be associated to the neck PU. I assume I could change it over to the bridge if I wanted to get B-M OoP rather than N-M.
No, you don't want to do that, and the Phase Inverter is
universal, inverting for
all positions, including both B+M and B>M (both modes of position 4).
What are Noc, Nic, Boc and Bic? The only thing that occurs to me is some reference to "in" coil and "out" coil.
Well, actually, "inner" coil and "outer coil". Usually in the case of Duncan humbuckers, the inner coils are the stud coils and the outer coils are the screw coils, as way of example. Those references are there to help clarify the splitters, since instead of doing the basic, rudimentary shunting splitters, I'm using coil bypass splitters. That wouldn't necessarily be evident and intuitive if I just mentioned it as an addendum, so at the request of several members I put them into the picture.
Are those 4PDT switches commonly available, or are they specialist pieces?
Commonly available? Pretty much. Mind you, you probably won't find them at Radio Sham, er, Shack, but as long as you go to a place like
Altex Electronics (specific to TX, but that website should give you an idea) or some place similar - basically the place where all the hardcore techies go - then you're gold. Fry's may have them. You could get them cheap thru
Mouser.com, but either way they're easily available.
Can you get them as push-pull's? If so, I assume it would theoretically be possible to combine the two splitter switches in a single 4PDT-PP switch. What is an S-1 switch (pardon my ignorance)?
To answer the first two questions, I'll answer the third. The S-1 Switch is Fender's answer to the non-existant 4PDT push/pull pot.
Basically, Fender players are either inveterate hotrodders, or they are anal about keeping everything stock. Now, there is a thin demarcation between those two camps, composed of people who want to hotrod, but want to do it while keeping verything stock on the outside. You'll notice this reality alluded to in the cadre of GN mods, where it explains what the appearance will look like.
Well, Fender and Gibson have learned the hard way that they can't jack with look of their classic designs, because that seriously cuts into the retro market, with it's doctor/dentist/lawyer demographic - guys who want to relive their youth by having the guitar that they (or their hero, Eric Clapton) originally had.
This is evident in many of the innovations Fender and Gibson have come up with over the years which were clear improvements over their orignal designs, but were received about as well as "New Coke" was in the early 80's.
So, here's the rub. How does a Fender innovate and introduce new options, while not changing the stock appearance of their guitar? Well, Fender hit it out of the park with this one. Instead of a DPDT push/pull pot, which doesn't have enough poles to do what they intended, they created a
4PDT push/push pot, with a stock knob that's been modified to have the center of it plunge in and out, but otherwise everything else looks completely stock.
That
4PDT push/push pot (which has been dubbed the S-1 Switch) is then coupled with a SuperSwitch, which looks totally stock on the top side of the pickguard anyway.
Well, as you can imagine, Fender is really big on this switch, and thus far won't release it on the open market as a part, and for good reason. They have desperately needed to get an edge on Gibson, and they have it with this. They have built a full line of guitars and basses around this one switch - the S-1 Series, adding this switch to all of their classic lines, effectively offering extra sounds and features while maintaining their stock appearance.
Ergo, the whole reason why you would trade in your beloved axe, or spend $1K-$2K outright for a new one, is a $20 Switch. Ergo
2, they don't want to sell a $20 product which would negate the need to buy a $2K product. (BTW, that $20 switch costs $1 to produce.)
Now, as it happens, I have two S-1 switches. I was very fortunate in that regard, that I was able to get two of the switches, which happened right when they came out and right before Fender clamped down hard on any of these little gems getting out.
Now, as for as a Universal splitter, I've toyed with that idea, and it's a good one, and you'll have the choice of either HSH or SSS. What you won't get the use of is SSH, or the shredder set-up. IOW, you'll lose splitting independence. Now, if you don't care about that and want to keep the splitting easy, then go for it. Absolutely. But if you think you might want to keep SSH on the table (and I've just seen too many top-flight guitarists do it to not think otherwise), then you might want to maintain splitting independence.
Now, that being said, I just got another idea which I will explore, something with a universal splitter, but accounting for all three possibilities, being SSS, SSH, and HSH. Hmmmmmmmmmmm . . .
All these ideas are so tempting, I'm actually thinking of trading out my 89 for my JB in the B position. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm . . .
Anyway, thanks very much. This is turning out to be a great "task-based" (reference for any educationalists out there) tutorial.
Thank you for asking!
Chesh
