Competition..?

[spitfire23bc]

I have a cheap Ibanez copy guitar body and neck sans electronics and am after some ideas of what to put in it.

The body has space for a H-S-H pickup arrangement, with space for a selector switch and two pots (and I really don't want to start drilling other holes!).

Any suggestions as to what I can do with this? In an ideal world I'd have an unlimited budget, but I'd like to keep this under £50 (that's right - you have to work in sterling ;D ) if possible.

Really, I'm looking for versatility in this. I have a few ideas which I'll throw into the discussion later.

Cheers guys

[darkcyde]

you could go push pull with both pots so that you could series-parallel wire the HBs

Im no expert by any means but personally I would also add an extra hole if room permits so that you could add another pot or even an on-on-on switch to get more options as well.
just my .02 I am sure more experianced forum members will have some more insight to pass on as well.

Mike

[UnklMickey]

my goodness!

the possibilities are staggering.

when you say selector, i assume you mean a 5-way blade?

if you limit the design to PAIRS of coils and in-phase combinations, you could fill the 5-way (superswitch) with hum-cancelling choices.

then at least one of the pots would have a DPDT push-pull to do series/parallel on the selected combo.

the wiring would be very straight-forward to sort out.

of course that would mean the "Gib-tone" (local series Neck HB) + (local series Bridge HB) would NOT be a possibility.



another way to look at this would be to have a 6-pole 2-position rotary instead of a tone control.

use standard HBs for the Neck and Bridge, and for the Middle, use a single-sized HB.

the rotary would be to put all HBs in local series, or local parallel.

then use the 5-way and a Push-Pull to implement your favorite 3-pickup Strat wiring scheme.


there are tons of different ways approach the concept you've laid out.

it's seems like it could be a topic of conversation for months.



unk

[spitfire23bc]

when you say selector, i assume you mean a 5-way blade?

Yes. I don't suppose there are 10-way blade switches are there!? anything more than 5 would be quite nice!

another way to look at this would be to have a 6-pole 2-position rotary instead of a tone control.

use standard HBs for the Neck and Bridge, and for the Middle, use a single-sized HB.

the rotary would be to put all HBs in local series, or local parallel.

then use the 5-way and a Push-Pull to implement your favorite 3-pickup Strat wiring scheme.

What advantages would that give over using a push-pull pot for the series/parallel switching and keeping the option for 2 pots?


I was thinking along the lines of:

- standard HBs for bridge and neck, single-sized HB for middle
- 5 way blade switch
- 2 push-pull pots (maybe 2 tone controls?) - one for series/parallel switching; one for coil-tapping one or more of the pickups


I did have a brief thought about the possibility of using 5 single-sized HBs, but decided that it would be somewhat gratuitous...!


Any thoughts on the coil-tapping? And, seriously, I'm totally open to suggestions - I want to make this something special, so the more options it has the better. I have no idea what sort of a difference coil-tapping or series/parallel switching make.


One more thought is that I rather like the Gibson tone mentioned!

[UnklMickey]

spitfire23bc said:

...I don't suppose there are 10-way blade switches are there!? anything more than 5 would be quite nice!...

lots of us have wished for that, but alas, no. (sigh)

the nice thing about paralleling rather than splitting, is that you maintain hum-canceling when that pickup is used alone or with another pickup that is hum-cancelling.

with more than 2 pickups, it is a bit of a challenge to combine split coils that are split "correctly". (opposite magnetic polarity when in-phase, same magnetic polarity when OoP)

single sized HBs will sound very similar to a SC when in parallel.

full sized HBs will sound a bit different, because the wider gap between the sensing regions.

using a single rotary (if it will fit) to change ALL the pickups from local series to local parallel gets a lot done with a single hole.

the pickups also maintain hum-cancelling.

the combinations of pickups can then be put in system series or system parallel with a separate switch.

a phase switch can also be implemented.

if each pickup is already hum-canceling, you don't need to worry about losing hum-canceling when you change the phase.

I did have a brief thought about the possibility of using 5 single-sized HBs, but decided that it would be somewhat gratuitous...!

not so much that, but it would put a serious strain on the budget limitation you imposed.

One more thought is that I rather like the Gibson tone mentioned!

when it fits, it should be used.

but to make it fit, some compromises often need to be made.


i won't be a full participant in your competition (vacation soon, and desire to leave some more space for our other members).

i'll just mention a few thoughts here and there, and let the others help you determine the final shape of this thing.



good luck all,


unk

[CheshireCat]

spitfire23bc said:

I have a cheap Ibanez copy guitar body and neck sans electronics and am after some ideas of what to put in it.

The body has space for a H-S-H pickup arrangement, with space for a selector switch and two pots (and I really don't want to start drilling other holes!).

Any suggestions as to what I can do with this? In an ideal world I'd have an unlimited budget, but I'd like to keep this under £50 (that's right - you have to work in sterling ;D ) if possible.

Really, I'm looking for versatility in this. I have a few ideas which I'll throw into the discussion later.

Cheers guys

If you could see your way clear to drill two small holes, you could do my UUSS Mod.



If you look in the diagram, it uses a 4P5T SuperSwitch (identical to a stratblade) and a 4PDT mode switcher. What isn't pictured is a phase inverter (ideally a 4PDT) and two splitters for the buckers in the N and B position. Now, if you use the N pickup as the main inverting pickup, then you miss out on OOP sounds with M/B combos. This is where the 4PDT p/i switch comes in. You use two of the poles to invert the N pickup as normal, and two of the poles to invert the M pickup for the M/B combos. Incidentally, this aspect isn't pictured here. I'm going to add the inverter and splitters to the mix so you can see everything on one page.

Those are two of the main switches (along with the SuperSwitch). The other two switches are basic splitters.

So, with this, you get the regular Strat options (in order) in the primary mode, plus the missing or lost combos in the secondary mode. The series and parallel options on the N/M and M/B combos are in the regular places at the 2nd and 4th position, meaning that you can simply toggle back and forth between series and parallel on those combos. In the secondary 3rd and 5th positions you get the N/B combos in series and parallel, and in the secondary 1st position you get ALL3 in series.

And, in addition to this, you get phase inversion in all combo positions (with just one switch no less), and both buckers are independently splittable.

The big advantage to all of this is that it is very intuitive. IOW, there aren't any weird combos of switches to patch in. If you want a bucker split, just flip the respective switch and split it. If you want a phase inverted sound, just flip the switch and invert it. Whatever combo you want, you got it, and the most you ever have to do to get to it is either just switch to the right position on the blade switch just like a regular Strat. If you want the regular combos, toggle the switch one way. The alternates? Toggle the other way.

The two toggles can flank the SuperSwitch, where it would be integrated straight into the wiring on the SS. The splitters can be handled with push/pulls on the vol and tone pots. Of course, if you have access to an S-1 Switch, then you can juggle it a bit. Given your potential application, I'd just say use basic push/pulls.

With all this, you can get all the Strat sounds, Gibson sounds, most of the PRS sounds, and so on.

Incidentally, what isn't available just yet are the compound combos, where two pickups in series run parallel to the third, or two parallel pickups both pipe thru a third one in series, and so on. Jury is still out on their value, so I didn't want to go to massive gyrations on what might end up being academic at best.

So, short of that, this is just about as versatile as you can get in terms of combo options. Now, if you want to start factoring in series vs. parallel wiring within each pickup itself, or phasing one coil against the other of the same bucker, well, that's taking things to a whole new level of complexity. I would start here with this first, and then gradually track into those facets.

Make sense so far?

Chesh

[jhng]

I can't resist putting my oar in on this one.

Picking up on Unk's comments, you could get a lot of versatility by having
a five-way,
a volume control with a push/pull for phase or tone cut, and
a rotary switch that changes the overall configuration.

You could have (e.g.) one setting that is SSS strat style, one setting that does the HBs in a Gibsony or Paul Reed Smith way, another setting for "T-Riffic wiring", another for "Brian May style SSS in series" wiring, another for "Fender SSH with an S1 switch" etc etc

I don't know what exactly would be doable, but in my experience once you have decided on the functionality you want there is usually a way to achieve it.

Hastings

[CheshireCat]

jhng said:

I can't resist putting my oar in on this one.

Picking up on Unk's comments, you could get a lot of versatility by having
a five-way,
a volume control with a push/pull for phase or tone cut, and
a rotary switch that changes the overall configuration.

You could have (e.g.) one setting that is SSS strat style, one setting that does the HBs in a Gibsony or Paul Reed Smith way, another setting for "T-Riffic wiring", another for "Brian May style SSS in series" wiring, another for "Fender SSH with an S1 switch" etc etc

I don't know what exactly would be doable, but in my experience once you have decided on the functionality you want there is usually a way to achieve it.

Hastings

That's a brilliant idea in theory, however there is one problem with it. I personally love the idea of using a SuperSwitch, and even a SuperDuperSwitch (pet name for the 8P5T MegaSwitch that Gunter Eyb has available by special order) coupled with a Rotary, perhaps something along the lines of a Grayhill multi-pole, multi-position number. That would be really cool, and something that I've been meditating on. Something that could cover all the bases and even incorporate all the splitting and phase inverting of my current system.

One problem, tho: unless it is perfectly intuitive, and with absolutely no redundancies, then you'll be running into some serious logistical concerns.

The one thing you want to avoid like the plague is "patching", where you no longer are turning intuitive options on and off with the flip of a switch (i.e., either a pickup is split or it's not ~ the splitter is flipped one way or another), but rather are having to remember all sorts of odd combinations of settings to remember where everything is. Patching, incidentally, comes from "patch cards", which were the first basic application of binary in the earliest computers, where basically it was a punch card with a code on it that made buggerall sense to you just looking at it, but made perfect sense to the computer you were plugging the card into. In the same sense, instead of flipping the switches you want to turn on the particular options you wanted, like a patch card you'd be flipping on a specific sequence of switches which would look totally random to the casual observer, but made sense in context to the particular way you wired up your schematic. This can be problematic in terms of practical, intuitive application.

So, for instance, what if you are playing on setting 4/7 - which is M/B OOP with B split - and you want to go to the setting for N/B InPhase with N split? First, you have to remember where that is, or which setting is the most practical if that particular setting ends up being redundant, and then you have to switch your SS and R from 4/7 to 2/10 or some such change up. Well, for one thing, this would be tricky if you were going from the verse sound to solo sound in a live setting, and you only had an instant to pull this off. Accurately rotary-switching from a middle position to a middle position on a 16 position or 11 position rotary would tricky enough as it is, let alone that switch along with then blade-switching the SS.

Even if you worked in a half rest in that passage of the song or something where your bassist could do a fill or something to give you time to switch, that would still be tricky at best. As mentioned in another thread (with said thread conceptually so titled), you ideally want to side-slap whatever controls you had, or at least grab'n'rip (or smash) them.

Perhaps in a studio setting you have more time to work with, but only if you were in your own studio and you had all the time in the world to fiddle with your own settings (and weren't paying for studio time), but if you were a session musician, I don't know how many gigs you'd have if all the other session players, and not to mention engineers and not least of all the featured artist, had to wait around for you to work on your sound. Sure, if you have three or four main sounds memorized, and those are the ones that only ever use in session work, then that wouldn't be an issue, but otherwise you might want to consider just getting a Variax, which essentially does what you are suggesting. But if it's in your nature to experiement, and not have set sounds for certain applications, then that would be problematic. If you weren't on the first call list, then that would be a problem.

Another problem that I see with this Blade/Rotary approach I see crop up all the time with stuff like the ChromaCaster and FatoCaster, specifically gross redundancy of tones. You only seem to get one or two extra tones (sometimes three) per setting on the rotary. That's a lot of wasted space to my way of thinking. There's a bit less random patching than what could otherwise be the case, but I would hate to either a) have all those wasted options (due to redundancy), or, b) increase the level of complexity and sheer volume of things to remember, and the directly proportionate lose of intuitiveness in switching.

Now, this all said, I like the idea of having "one setting that is SSS strat style, one setting that does the HBs in a Gibsony or Paul Reed Smith way, another setting for "T-Riffic wiring", another for "Brian May style SSS in series" wiring, another for "Fender SSH with an S1 switch" " and so on. I think that is a rather ingenious way of approaching it. Granted, there would be a great deal of redundant position options, but that would be intuitively overshadowed by the different mindset that each choice of options would afford, thinking in terms of strat settings in one mode, Gibson options in the next, and so on.

If you approached it from that standpoint, and, in the process, addressed every possible combo arrangement as represented in that scenario, then that would make a great deal of sense, and could very well work.

Assuming you go in that direction, I'd make an additional suggestion. Work in a rotary setting, in addition to the Strat, Tele, LP, PRS, BMRS1, and so on, a special setting for the compound combos, such as "(B+M)>N" and so on. It would be interesting to have a clean way of ringing those in. In fact, it might take two rotary settings, but it might still be worth it, since all of this stuff is on the table anyway.

Incidentally, in response to all this, it's gotten me thinking. I was toying with the idea of ringing in a PRS Mode Switch on my UUSS, where it would invert the split coils of the buckers, where they would go from outside coils to inside coils. That would help include the PRS settings. I think that would make everything complete, including the PRS and Ibanez combos.

Also, important to note, while working on this, keep in mind what Strat, LP, PRS, BM, Iby, and so on, actually means. Strat simply means three single coils, with adjacent pickups being combined in parallel. LP simply means N and B humbuckers either by themselves or combined in parallel. Brian May simply means the same thing as the Strat options, but N and B can be combined, and the pickups can be phase inverted. PRS is the same as LP, only we can do either series and parallel combos, and we can choose between coupling the outer and inner coils. Ibanez is the same thing as the Strat options, only it's HSH instead of SSS, and the adjacent combos use the inside coils of the humbuckers combined with the middle single coil.

If you could account for all these options with a few simple toggles, then you'd effectively have all of these options, without redundancy, and everything kept intuitive and simple.

Anyway, it's something I'll play with.

Chesh

[spitfire23bc]

Wow...

That's an awful lot to have in one guitar. Very tempting...

I'm on my parents' dialup connection at the mo, so I'll have a proper read of that offline and try to understand it all! ;D

[CheshireCat]

spitfire23bc said:

Wow...

That's an awful lot to have in one guitar. Very tempting...

I'm on my parents' dialup connection at the mo, so I'll have a proper read of that offline and try to understand it all! ;D

No worries.

Incidentally, that's what I have in my guitar, and that's only the mag pickups. That doesn't include the piezo, midi, and sustainer system, along with the eq, octave dividers, qdd2 distortion unit, with four types of distortion.

[jhng]

I agree with Chesh about the risk of ending up unable to remember how to get from one sound to another.

I was envisioning setting the guitar up so that you use the rotary to change "mode" and would only really use the fiveway mid song.

The modes I would suggest (some of which have been done by others) would be:

Mode 1 - Standard strat with all single coils.
Mode 2 - Gibson. But with "outer coils in series" and "outer coils in parallel" in positions 2 and 4 (so a bit PRS too).
Mode 3 - Fender S1 Strat alternative mode with a variation (all single coils): [NxM], [Nx(M+cap)], [NxMxB], [Bx(M+cap)], [BxM].
Mode 4 - Something using the HBs in parallel rather than series config. [N(par)], [N(par)+B(ser)], [N(par)+B(par)], [N(ser)+B(par)], [B(par)]

Not sure how much of this are doable. But always best to decide what to aim at first.

Hastings

PS - Chesh - I have a dim memory that you play a particularly eccentric (but very cool) rectangular guitar. Is that still the case? It would be interesting to see a picture to see how all the controls fit in.

[CheshireCat]

jhng said:

PS - Chesh - I have a dim memory that you play a particularly eccentric (but very cool) rectangular guitar. Is that still the case? It would be interesting to see a picture to see how all the controls fit in.

You mean this?:

[sumgai]

Holy Bats, GuitarMan!

Bo Diddley would go apesh1t trying to play that thing!

When I grow up, I wanna guitar just like that!


sumgai

[CheshireCat]

sumgai said:

Holy Bats, GuitarMan!

Bo Diddley would go apesh1t trying to play that thing!

When I grow up, I wanna guitar just like that!

Merci.

[jhng]

That's the one!

Very cool, and not as crowded as I had suspected.

Hastings

[CheshireCat]

jhng said:

That's the one!

Very cool, and not as crowded as I had suspected.

Hastings

Nope, not at all.

In fact, I was worried about it when I started upgrading, but fortunately I planned things carefully and lagged behind by a completion rate of 80% at any given time. IOW, I didn't do anything that would force me to commit to a certain mod, so I could change things if I needed to. Also, I did a lot of extended research, thinking deep and several moves into the game in terms of how the mods would work together.

Interestingly enough, there are two new switches on the upperleft bout (or corner, technically) and some Warrior/PRS style archtop control contouring to create lo-pro control access. That was a bit touch and go, but fortunately it worked out well. It initially had a convex contour when I broke ground, which looked terrible, and was the first time I feared I actually jumped the shark on my Utah, but then I reconceived it and recarved them into concave contours and it looked great. I'll see if I can get some pics up.

Not only that, if I decide to impliment a coil inverter, that would make an additional switch. I am seriously debating it, but I think I'm getting to the point where I think I'm done. ;D

Chesh

[spitfire23bc]

Chesh, that guitar is making my head explode

I'm also liking your UUSS mod. Any chance of a complete circuit diagram? I really have no idea how to do it.

I do have room to fit in a couple of toggle switches (assuming they're not too huge) between the pots and blade-switch.

Cheers

[vonFrenchie]

That guitar is pretty much a cross between Bo Diddly, an airplane %pit and Ywgie Malsteen. Are those EMG, Seymour Duncan and Fender pickups?

*EDIT* It wont let me say %pit. Thats kind of funny. So you know the %pit is there the pilot sits.

[CheshireCat]

vonfrenchie said:

That guitar is pretty much a cross between Bo Diddly, an airplane %pit and Ywgie Malsteen. Are those EMG, Seymour Duncan and Fender pickups?

*EDIT* It wont let me say %pit. Thats kind of funny. So you know the %pit is there the pilot sits.

Really? I thought the c0ckpit was were the c0ck sits. Funny that. (Of course I'm referring to poultry.)

Actually, that isn't a Fender pickup, but another Duncan pickup, a Duncan Antiquity Tele, but very astute of you otherwise.

As far as completing the circuit, I'm working on that. The toggles shouldn't be terribly big. Rather small I should think.

[vonFrenchie]

Ill a.... take that EMG pickup as a reward for my astuteness. And, knowing you... you didnt have to say that you werent referring to poultry. ;D

[CheshireCat]

vonfrenchie said:

Ill a.... take that EMG pickup as a reward for my astuteness. And, knowing you... you didnt have to say that you werent referring to poultry. ;D

Well, funny thing. If I really start digging on that Coil Inverter idea I had, I might be tempted to put the JB back in the Utah, only in the B position instead of it's original N position, tho of course the Utah Jr. will need a pickup, but otherwise that EMG would be freed up.

It's tempting, but the EMG has been in that position for 15 years. It's so part of the Utah's identity. Hmmmmmmmmm . . . .

Still, for completeness sake, I think I'll see about completing the circuit with a Coil Inverter. As you may have noticed, I added the other bits as well, with labeling in addition.

[vonFrenchie]

Is it an HZ?

[CheshireCat]

vonfrenchie said:

Is it an HZ?

Nope. 89.

[vonFrenchie]

89? Jackpot

[CheshireCat]

vonfrenchie said:

89? Jackpot

Eh . . . . "jackpot" why?

[vonFrenchie]

the emg 89's are single and humbucking pickups all in one. you cant split most active emg's.... you can with the 89

[CheshireCat]

vonfrenchie said:

the emg 89's are single and humbucking pickups all in one. you cant split most active emg's.... you can with the 89

Correct . . . and again I ask "why?". *jealously clutching my 89*

[vonFrenchie]

Well... that basically means they are the ultimate tweaker's active pickup.

[CheshireCat]

vonfrenchie said:

Well... that basically means they are the ultimate tweaker's active pickup.

Well, pretty close.

[spitfire23bc]

OK, Chesh - your UUSS mod has me totally converted. Just one question... is it possible to put in a master tone pot? ie: one that can roll off treble one way and bass the other, and acts on the complete signal out of the guitar, rather than just from an individual pickup?

And where would said tone pot be wired in?


(ok so that's more than one question )