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Post by ashcatlt on Aug 2, 2007 0:21:51 GMT -5
I love this guitar. My Ric is jealous, and the poor LP is feeling like a bastard step-child. Well, you know Miss 330, if you'd kept track of your strat button we wouldn't be having this issue... Anyway, now I'm thinking about phase. I'm happy to see that the last post on this thread is the final configuration, so I didn't have to write a "refresher." Guess I could have linked... I only need to be able to choose between the two single coils on one of the pickups. Neck or Bridge, but not both and not Mid. So two of my pups have redundant positions. That seems to me like the exact number I would need to get all possible OoP (parallel) combos. I'd like to be able to maintain hum-cancelling in all possible positions as well. Now how do I do it? For some reason I'm leaning toward leaving the neck as is and rewiring so I can throw the mid and bridge OoP on position 5, so I guess that's what we'll work with for now. I'm thinking I need the opposite coil OoP from the one in the SC position. I've been scratching away for a while now, but am unable to make this thing (the schematic) do what I'm after. I think it's going to require a complete rethink of the way the switch accomplishes what it does, and that's why I keep you guys around... thanks for any advice
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Post by sumgai on Aug 2, 2007 15:43:27 GMT -5
ash, That schematic is bogus. (Sigh.) It has no output on positions 1 or 4, and postions 2 and 3 are redundant (Rhythm only). The Rhythm + lead is always hot, no matter what. The problems go one from there, need I keep it up? What were they thinking before they posted that thing? They were probably paraphrasing Alfred E. Neuman: "What, us proof-read our schematic for possible errors? No way!" Sorry, back to the drawing board for you. sumgai
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Post by ashcatlt on Aug 2, 2007 21:41:44 GMT -5
ummm.... It works exactly the way i expect it to.
Look again.
In position 1 both rhythm and lead hot are connected to the volume pot. lead cold is connected to signal ground (always), but rhythm cold is NC, so you get lead only.
In position 4 it goes signal ground > lead cold > lead hot > rhythm cold > rhythm hot > volume.
I'm not getting any noticeable ill effects soundwise from the hanging hot thing. When a pickup is in off position I short both coils, was the only way to get it to go all the way off.
Now the problem I'm having today is that I want an OoP position in place of the lead only. Unfortunately (as you noticed), one end of each coil is always connected to the output, can't find a way to swap them around inside the one switch and keep everything else working.
edit - sorry, had things a little backwards above, but fixed now.
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Post by CheshireCat on Aug 8, 2007 21:46:17 GMT -5
It's been awhile. What ever happened to that stepped selector switch vol pot thing?
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Post by ashcatlt on Aug 9, 2007 15:12:51 GMT -5
Was an interesting idea, but never implemented. Mostly because I didn't want to release my debit card info to yet another internet merchant. GuitarFetish takes PayPal, and you can call Mouser, but I wasn't so sure about the sources I found for the Mega-Switch.
Edit (more to the point of the question) - I decided for now I'd just use the standard 5-way as a kill switch, which I mentioned above.
So i built a passive volume pedal. Still working the bugs out. I used a pot out of my LP, and the Crybaby pedal won't turn it's full rotation, so I can't get it all the way off. I included also a "tone kill" switch. Step on the switch and it connects a cap (also from the LP, IIRC) to ground. Much like turning the tone pot all the way down.
From there it goes into an active buffer with selectable input Z. I can tell a very subtle (might be placebo) difference between the 500K and 10M settings.
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Post by michaelcbell on Aug 10, 2007 17:22:45 GMT -5
Just a thought: Why not replace your 5-way with a superswitch and use that for phase? pos1=on pos2=N OoP pos3=M OoP pos4=B OoP pos5=off
Of course, you could easily re-order those positions to taste. The one benefit of this is no extra holes and your rotaries still behave as you are used to them.
-m
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Post by ashcatlt on Aug 13, 2007 16:14:20 GMT -5
that's an idea i have been kicking around lately. still got that problem of actually ordering the superswitch, but...
i only really need to be able to choose OoP for 2 of the pickups, the third one is redundant. Which could leave me an open spot. could I use that for a system series position?
of course, I've still got redundant positions on my rotaries...
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Post by michaelcbell on Aug 14, 2007 6:26:46 GMT -5
Redundant positions are definitely annoying, but with a humbucker and only two poles (and given that you're not grabbing the beginning and end of the pup on those two poles) it seems like you're not going to get there with your current setup. Get some 4p5t rotaries and we're in business. With the 5-way phasing, I don't think that there are redundant positions, because you can only select one at a time, which makes having each option a necessity if you're interested in ALL the phase combinations.
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Post by michaelcbell on Aug 14, 2007 6:34:39 GMT -5
ash,
I'm having trouble figuring your scheme out (I'm thinking more on the system series concept). Could you post a drawing or even just a description of how the rotary is hooked up?
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Post by ashcatlt on Aug 14, 2007 23:57:18 GMT -5
Yeah, sorry. If I had the 4 pole rotaries I'd only need two of them to be flippable.
Each of the three rotaries is wired exactly like the 4-way tele mod that appears all over the web, including the link a couple posts up (the one sumgai said wouldn't work). The only difference is that in the 5th position I short each coil.
Two wires come from each switch. All the hots meet at one of the positions on the 5-way, with the common on that side going to the jack's hot. I think the grounds all meet on the way to the jack. I don't remember exactly how I wired the 5-way, but I think I managed the off positions by simply not connecting the other two positions. It occured to me a while ago that it would be better to ground the output in off position, but I haven't gotten around to it.
Now I'm wondering how you intend to select phase for three pickups in just four poles (on the superswitch). Doesn't it require 2 per pickup?
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Post by sumgai on Aug 15, 2007 2:28:53 GMT -5
ash, I hate to ask this, but could you please tell me which of those terminals are the common ones? Without an exact starting point for reference, my mind is whirling......... Thanks. sumgai
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Post by michaelcbell on Aug 15, 2007 8:08:44 GMT -5
Sumgai, After a lot of digging, I figured it out: the bottom left and top right are common, and it does work as ash describes, with the only problem being North hanging from hot in the south-only position. Ash, The way I see it, if the North beginning wire is constantly connected to hot and the South end wire is constantly connected to ground, shorting both coils will kill the guitar’s output. I’ll assume that I’m missing something and move on. The phasing works because you only need to be able to phase two pups to get the third pup out of phase, like if Neck and Mid are both reverse phase, then the bridge is effectively out of phase with the other two. The five-way wiring: section 1
Common - "Hot" to neck rotary 1 - Hot 2 - ground 3 - Hot 4 - Ground 5 - NC
| section 2
Common - "ground" to neck rotary 1 - ground 2 - Hot 3 - Ground 4 - Hot 5 - NC
| section 3
Common - "Hot" to mid rotary 1 - Hot 2 - Hot 3 - Ground 4 - Ground 5 - NC
| section 4
Common - "ground" to mid rotary 1 - Ground 2 - Ground 3 - Hot 4 - Hot 5 - NC
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Giving you: 1 - normal (on) 2 - Neck OoP 3 - Mid OoP 4 - Bridge OoP 5 - off
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Post by ashcatlt on Aug 15, 2007 13:24:56 GMT -5
Sumgai - I was pretty sure you were messing with me... Michael's got it right with the commons. Isn't that the way a standard strat switch is normally depicted?
Michael - I guess I should say that I short each coil in off mode. Doesn't kill the output because system hot and ground don't meet.
And that thing about the phase occurred to me just before I read your post. I do thank you for the table there.
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Post by michaelcbell on Aug 16, 2007 5:40:51 GMT -5
Ash, Short EACH coil. Got it. Sorry, something in my head was back in "normal" humbucker land where the coils are hardwired together. Happy Soldering! Sumgai, I've got your back.
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Post by sumgai on Aug 16, 2007 14:57:13 GMT -5
....... Sumgai, I've got your back. To quote a famous Damsel In Distress: "You've got me? WHO'S GOT YOU?!" Thanks. ;D sumgai
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Post by ashcatlt on Apr 18, 2009 1:57:51 GMT -5
Well, I've learned a whole lot from y'all since I started this thread. For those who have wasted spent wasted the time to read the whole thing - and especially for those who haven't - all thoughts of stepped attenuators and OoP options have been tabled, though after my work with the MiniStrat, I'm tempted. What I've got is 3 L'il Killers connected to 3 x DP5T rotaries. There's one for each, and they select the internal configuration of each pickup. These are combined in parallel and stop by the standard 5-way strat switch on their way to the jack. Until tonight, the 5-way gave System On in positions 1 and 2, and System Off everywhere else. I've had a couple of issues with this. 1) The System Off positions of the 5-way were susceptible to the cable-as-antenna issue. B) I've recently noticed that touching the blades of the pickups causes a whole bunch of noise. Since my completely unconventional (read: wrong) style has me resting one or another finger on a pickup fairly frequently, I can't have this. Well, tonight I fixed these issues, and added a little functionality to boot! If you have bothered to follow the whole thread, you'll notice that a page or two back I disconnected the pickup shield wires from the rest of the circuit. After opening it up, I noticed that I had in fact removed the rest of the shielding as well. I had a whole bunch of aluminum foil connected to nothing! So, I connected all those pickup shields together, to system ground, to the body of the strat switch (which contacts the foil), to one end of a .047uf capacitor (I think it's a surface mount mylar), and to the lug on the strat switch where the middle pickup would normally go. I disconnected the hot output from the pickup switches from the "bridge lug" of the strat switch and moved it over to join the jack tip at the common lug. I connected the other end of the cap to the "neck lug". Now the humbucking positions are almost silent. The SC options are much quieter. There's not so much noise when I touch the blades of the pickups. The #1 position is full on. 2-4 are dead silent (amp shorted) System Off. Position #5 is like turning a tone pot all the way down. I'm especially proud that it seems to have worked perfectly fine, and I didn’t have spend hours trying to figure out where I messed up this time. * *Much unlike this post, which I've now modified for spelling and content 62 times
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Post by newey on Apr 18, 2009 7:37:04 GMT -5
Well, when one revisits a post after 20 months' time, one wants to get it right! ;D
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe this was your first post on the board way back when, right?
In the intervening time, you've acquired God status and become a valued contributor to the board. You've outlasted others like Michael McBell who originally contributed to the scheme under discussion.
Congrats on getting this done to your liking. You are not alone in resting your fingers on the pickups, either, I do the same thing often.
When last we heard, some 20 months ago, your Ric was jealous and your LP felt like a bastard step-child.
Both must be positively suicidal by now . . .. ;D
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