An even more complicated Red Special-inspired wiring scheme!

[pastanomaly]

So, I want to make a baritone with 3 single coils with wiring inspired by 

• the JohnH version of Brian May's Red Special wiring that includes a master series/parallel switch
• Gretsch-style wiring with independent volume controls for each pickup and a master volume on the lower horn
• An optional 2nd output jack to which I can send the middle pickup (kinda like a bacci baritone dual output)
  

I'm very new to wiring in general (my practical experience is replacing two humbuckers and wiring in a bc rich with the help of a friend who knew what he was doing), so am not sure how I'm doing here. I'd like the on/off/on middle pickup selector to be a 3-position rotary switch placed on the upper horn, but I'm baffled by rotary wiring diagrams for some reason, so it's currently shown as a toggle. Also, DIYLC says I have too many connections and I don't think it does well analyzing two outputs anyway.

Thoughts?

[newey]

@pastanomoly-

Hello and Welcome to G-Nutz2!

Checking your diagram will have to wait as real work intrudes at the moment, although someone else may be along in the meantime. At first glance, the middle pickup On-Off-On switch looks like a slide switch in your diagram, not a toggle, in that you show 4 lugs on each pole. That part definitely doesn't look right, but again, I haven't checked it thoroughly.

Rotary switches vary in layout. To send the middle pickup to a separate output, or to switch it to the regular output jack, will require 2 poles, so it would be a double-pole, double throw rotary (DPDT). These can be had with a single "deck", that is, both poles are on a single layer. Or they can be a two-deck type with the second pole on a lower deck.

Just to give you a general idea of a 2 pole 3 throw rotary, here's a basic diagram (pardon my crappy quick drawing). "A" and "B" are the two common lugs, and they are shown connecting to lug #2, the middle position. Again, these vary, some will have the common lugs spaced around the outside rather than in the center. Also note that an On-Off-On DPDT toggle has fewer lugs-rotaries don't come as On-Off switches, or as On-Off-On; if you want a position to be "off", you simply don't wire it to anything. But hopefully this will help your understanding:

[pastanomaly]

Thanks newey ! Glad to be here. Thanks for taking a look at it. I'm not sure I've totally grokked the rotary but your drawing was helpful - I guess I didn't realize that A and B were the common lugs. Here's an attempt with a rotary:

[newey]

pastanomaly-

OK, let me take a look at this later today. But just a thought that might simplify your life considerably. Routing a rotary switch to the upper horn is a pain, you have long wire runs to get there from the middle pickup and then back through to the two jacks. Consider this instead as an easier option. There are jacks that are switched. You would wire the second jack for the middle pickup such that, when no plug is inserted into the jack, the output goes to the regular jack along with the other pickups/switching. Insert a plug into the second jack, and the middle pickup is switched over to the second jack. Then a simple minitoggle could be used to switch the middle pickup on or off. This would probably not need to go to the horn, avoiding a lot of routing and wire runs.

If you've never used a guitar with a rotary switch, they aren't great to switch "on the fly" while you're playing, as you have to use your fingers to turn the knob, while a toggle switch can be quickly flipped. And the rotary here is a bit of overkill- what you want can be more easily done with a simple DPDT On-On-On toggle (or on-off-on, either would work.) If you're set on putting it into the upper horn, it will be much easier to drill for a small toggle than to rout out a hole big enough to fit a rotary.

Just my 2¢ worth to consider.

[pastanomaly]

Hmmm, you bring up good points. That output wiring is kind of how Rickenbacker's rick-o-sound works right? I was looking into that. But I do like the idea of being able to switch quickly between using, for example, bridge+middle in series and quickly moving to the two output option - which the rick-o-sound style wiring wouldn't allow for if I understand it correctly.

I'm not opposed to a toggle switch...mainly just thought the rotary would look cool and be slightly less "Les-Paul-y". 

Just had a thought - if the middle pickup switch only switched between outputs that would also effectively be an "off" switch with no cable plugged into the second output, right?

[newey]

Just had a thought - if the middle pickup switch only switched between outputs that would also effectively be an "off" switch with no cable plugged into the second output, right.

No, unless you had a "dummy plug" to plug in/out. The switched jack, with no plug inserted, would send everything, middle and all, to the regular output; inserting a plug switches the middle to the second ouput. If you kept a dummy jack plugged into the second output, yes, then the middle would be off. But plugging/unplugging a dummy plug doesn't seem like a good way to turn the middle pickup off. That's why I suggested a separate switch. That switch could be a rotary as well, but to my mind, anyway, would be less practical in operation. If the look being less "LP-ish" is your thing, that's fine, I can't judge your aesthetics. De gustibus, as the Romans would have said.

[pastanomaly]

Ah, ok. Noted. Thanks for clarifying.

Yea, I do like the placement of the LP toggle switch...toggles evoke no feelings from me however. A chickenhead knob though... Anyway, I was trying to keep the middle pickup control physically separate from the other pickup controls just for clarity. But we'll see, I suppose I could end up having the middle pickup switch between the bridge/neck switches.

[JohnH]

I would think you could split off the middle to a seperate jack, using a three pole mini-toggle.

Two poles are at each pickup wire and send them either to ground and jack2 output, or back to where they usually are in the BM wiring.

The third pole is needed to repair the gap in the series chain, if M is doing its own output.

Possible neat simplification:
Do all that just with a two-pole mini-toggle, repurposing the M phase switch. Two phase switches will get you any out of phase tone, except for some of those dependent on feedback from a loud amp.

Now M can be permanently grounded and wired at the start of the series chain, so only one pole is needed to switch it to jack 2, and the other as above.

If you want the seperate volume controls they need to go straight after each pickup, before any switching. So each pickup with 2 wires in our original BM diagram is replaced by a pickup with volume, with two wires from it, not grounded.

That is how I'd suggest to think about it. But all those words need a diagram!

[newey]

JohnH is right about the series setting needing a 3-pole switch, I overlooked that this was in series.

[newey]

OK, pastanomaly, I've been looking at your latest diagram with the rotary, I'm not done tracing it all out yet but I think I see issues. It's a bit hard to figure the rotary switch as your diagram is of a 2P6T roary, you'll only need 3 throws. But then also, as JohnH noted, you'll need another pole, so it would have to be a 3P3T rotary. Never looked for one of those, I assume they exist as rotaries come in lots of types.

Anyway, as to the diagram: For starters, the rotary switch is supposed to be switching the mid pup from its own jack to the main jack. The second jack's "hot" wire (the red one) connects to one (and only one) lug of the rotary, which I will take to be position 1. The common lug for that pole has an orange wire, so that, when the switch is flipped so as to connect the second jack into the circuit, the second jack's hot conects to the orange, which in turn connects to both the 4P series parallel switch and also connects to the upper left-hand lug of the On/Off switch for the neck pickup. If the neck pickup is then switched "off", the orange wire connects to the green wire, which is permanently grounded. This would then short the second jack to ground on both ends (Hint Hint: your first diagram is closer because the DPDT toggle there switches both the hot and ground wires).

So, then, let's look at the other end of that orange wire, which goes to the 2 upper left lugs of the 4P. When the series/parallel switch has its upper lugs connected to the commons, that orange wire connects to nothing and the second jack is thus never connected with the SP switch in that position (well, it's shorted to itself at the other end, but we'll ignore that for the moment). With the SP switch flipped the other way, the orange wire connects to the red wire, which connects to the neck pickup phase switch and also connects to the neck on/off switch. If the neck pickup is switched "on", the neck pickup will then be connected to the second jack- not what you want- but againa, more basically, the orange wire also connects to the blue wire, which is grounded to the back of one of the pots. SO, here agian, the second jack is grounded to itself. There is no position where you would have output from the second jack.

Also, the goal was to have the middle pickup on the second jack via the rotary switch. The mid pup red wire goes to the 4P SP switch in one position, which connects to the green wire in what I'll call position 2 of the rotary. If the bridge on/off is "off", the green wire connects to the output via the master volume. If the bridge pickup is on, then the mid red wire connects via the bridge switch to the purple wire, which isn't connected to anything. Thus, your middle pickup switching is dependent on the position of the bridge On/Off switch. And there is no position of the rotary which connects the middle pickup to the second jack.

I think there are some further issues, too. But I stopped at those since, at this point, we're talking a total redo of the diagram anyway.

Rather than just having you post more diagrams, let's first firm up exactly how you want to do this, and then we'll help with a diagram.

[pastanomaly]

JohnH I think you've got it. So I could...

1) re-purpose the middle phase switch in the original BM diagram as a pickup toggle switch

2) do away with the middle phase switch completely and repurpose the original off/on as middle-output-1/middle-output-2/off (in some order)

Only option 2 requires a 3-pole switch(rotary or otherwise), yes?

I guess option 1 is the way to go. One more switch but simpler wiring.

"So each pickup with 2 wires in our original BM diagram is replaced by a pickup with volume, with two wires from it, not grounded."

That makes perfect sense but I have no idea how to diagram it, haha.

newey

Yeah, I think in trying to remove a phase switch from the original BM diagram trying to do option 2, I caused some big problems.

[pastanomaly]

Ok, it's been a minute, but here's another try to get this idea right:

[stevewf]

Hi. I'll jump in quickly to offer my interpretation of

Jul 30, 2024 15:06:31 GMT -5 JohnH said:

If you want the seperate volume controls they need to go straight after each pickup, before any switching. So each pickup with 2 wires in our original BM diagram is replaced by a pickup with volume, with two wires from it, not grounded.

On each of the individual volume pots, I think the "last" lug should have no connection.

In the snippet below:

I've circled the lugs of those pots, where the blue wires are connected.

Instead, the blue wires should bypass that lug. They'd go directly from their respective pickups to their respective switches. For each pickup, there could be a single blue wire instead of two, since the lug is bypassed.

And each pot would have onlt two of its lugs connected, leaving a lug with no connection (as opposed to the usual, grounded, volume pot).

Mind you, I haven't looked at any other part of the wiring diagram , just thought I'd better throw this in here.

[pastanomaly]

Aug 19, 2024 23:34:43 GMT -5 stevewf said:

Hi. I'll jump in quickly to offer my interpretation of

Jul 30, 2024 15:06:31 GMT -5 JohnH said:

If you want the seperate volume controls they need to go straight after each pickup, before any switching. So each pickup with 2 wires in our original BM diagram is replaced by a pickup with volume, with two wires from it, not grounded.

On each of the individual volume pots, I think the "last" lug should have no connection.

In the snippet below:

I've circled the lugs of those pots, where the blue wires are connected.

Instead, the blue wires should bypass that lug. They'd go directly from their respective pickups to their respective switches. For each pickup, there could be a single blue wire instead of two, since the lug is bypassed.

And each pot would have onlt two of its lugs connected, leaving a lug with no connection (as opposed to the usual, grounded, volume pot).

Mind you, I haven't looked at any other part of the wiring diagram , just thought I'd better throw this in here.

Ok thanks for pointing that out! That's what a friend said to me as well. I wasn't sure if they'd still function properly that way but good to have confirmation.

Another question that was brought up was the order of the individual volume pots and the phase switches...would the phase switches cause the direction of the volume pots to be backwards when flipped and cause volume spikes? Like...should the volume pots be downstream of the phase switches, or should they be as shown currently?

[stevewf]

Aug 20, 2024 9:12:31 GMT -5 pastanomaly said:

Another question that was brought up was the order of the individual volume pots and the phase switches...would the phase switches cause the direction of the volume pots to be backwards when flipped and cause volume spikes? Like...should the volume pots be downstream of the phase switches, or should they be as shown currently?

I believe that in this setup, the order won't matter for fundamental operation. The only caution I would offer is to try to avoid creating a "hanging from hot" situation when turning any of those pots down. In other words, make sure the pots are on the "hot/signal" side, and not on the "cold/ground" side of their respective pickups.

Doing it the "right" way I've described can be done with the pot on either side of the phase switch.... but caution -  that can also be said of also doing it the "wrong" way.

---

Edit: Oops, I think I got that last bit wrong. I now think that the pot has to go on the "far" side of the switch, relative to the pickup. I mean like ground -> pickup -> switch -> pot -> onward. I realized that on the "near" side, the hot and cold purposefully (and definitively) get flip-flopped by the phase switch, so it's not possible to put a pot on one or the other on the near side.

[pastanomaly]

Aug 20, 2024 10:52:34 GMT -5 stevewf said:

---

Edit: Oops, I think I got that last bit wrong. I now think that the pot has to go on the "far" side of the switch, relative to the pickup. I mean like ground -> pickup -> switch -> pot -> onward. I realized that on the "near" side, the hot and cold purposefully (and definitively) get flip-flopped by the phase switch, so it's not possible to put a pot on one or the other on the near side.

Yeah, that seems to be the case. Then the volume pots can be wired as normal as well.

[stevewf]

Aug 21, 2024 20:17:19 GMT -5 pastanomaly said:

Yeah, that seems to be the case. Then the volume pots can be wired as normal as well.

Actually, I think the reasoning still applies for lifting the ground off of those two pots. The idea, I think, is to avoid loading the active pickups with these pots.

It's about three things: loading the pickups, the pot taper, and the pot when fully CCW (rolled completely off).

Scenario 1: Let's say they're 500K pots, with the lugs grounded. Even when fully "on", they're allowing some current to go from hot to ground, so whatever pickups in the system are active (not just the ones associated with the pots), can lose signal, even when the pots are fully "on". It's the usual with volume controls: overall signal gets lower, and more so in the treble range. With two such pots, there'd be that much more loading. Switching off the pickup by using the toggle makes this problem go away, but as long as the switch is "on", there'll be some loading. The high value (500K) of the pots mitigates this, but at the cost of smooth taper (most of the rolloff will happen at one end of the pot's rotation).

Scenario 2: Even higher value pots (1M), grounded lugs. There's less loading, but worse taper.

Scenario 3: 250K pots, grounded lugs. Lots of loading, which dulls the sound. The taper will be better.

Scenario 4: 250K pots, third lug not grounded. No loading and good taper. But the pots will never completely shut off the pickup; some signal will trickle through.

Scenario 5: higher value pots (500K or 1M), lug not grounded. No loading but poor taper. The pots will shut (more) the pickups off, but still not completely.
[Edited for completeness]

At least, that's what I think would happen!

[newey]

stevewf-

I believe in your number 5 scenario, you omitted that the third lug would be ungrounded

[gckelloch]

Aug 22, 2024 10:41:43 GMT -5 stevewf said:

Aug 21, 2024 20:17:19 GMT -5 pastanomaly said:

Yeah, that seems to be the case. Then the volume pots can be wired as normal as well.

Actually, I think the reasoning still applies for lifting the ground off of those two pots. The idea, I think, is to avoid loading the active pickups with these pots.

It's about three things: loading the pickups, the pot taper, and the pot when fully CCW (rolled completely off).

Scenario 1: Let's say they're 500K pots, with the lugs grounded. Even when fully "on", they're allowing some current to go from hot to ground, so whatever pickups in the system are active (not just the ones associated with the pots), can lose signal, even when the pots are fully "on". It's the usual with volume controls: overall signal gets lower, and more so in the treble range. With two such pots, there'd be that much more loading. Switching off the pickup by using the toggle makes this problem go away, but as long as the switch is "on", there'll be some loading. The high value (500K) of the pots mitigates this, but at the cost of smooth taper (most of the rolloff will happen at one end of the pot's rotation).

Scenario 2: Even higher value pots (1M), grounded lugs. There's less loading, but worse taper.

Scenario 3: 250K pots, grounded lugs. Lots of loading, which dulls the sound. The taper will be better.

Scenario 4: 250K pots, third lug not grounded. No loading and good taper. But the pots will never completely shut off the pickup; some signal will trickle through.

Scenario 5: higher value pots (500K or 1M). No loading but poor taper. The pots will shut (more) the pickups off, but still not completely.

At least, that's what I think would happen!

I think you are correct. The signal from the pickup with 250k in front will be low enough that any more R won't be significant, and it can still be turned off with the switch. I'd use 250k pots and leave the last lug open. It also offers much better blend control than a V divider.