cheap
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Post by cheap on Jun 25, 2016 18:53:52 GMT -5
The guitar was great out of the box. I've also had a very bad douglas corvus from them that I returned. But I'm very happy with the SX line. I have a bass from them as well that did have one low fret, but only noticeable with low action. The bass is just lovely. The furrian didn't have perfect frets, hence why I leveled it, but frankly it took me a long time to even be able to notice the uneven frets, they were very close to perfect. I also have a hadean 12-string acoustic from rondo which is pretty horrible as far as the frets and tuners go. Still, I like it for the price, which was just $100.
I'm a big fan of the stuff they sell but some of it does require work. I've heard good things about the newer douglas neck-throughs, people have said they have good frets, but I'd assume they need leveling anyways. Pretty much I assume every guitar I buy could use leveling, since it seems like you have to pay much more to be sure it won't. Well, my brother has an agile that had perfect frets out of the box, which is pretty crazy for a $300 neck through, but I figure he just got lucky. At the moment I'm keeping his guitars for him so I can say the guitar is a real home-run if you're not looking to do fret work. The SX guitars seem to be fine without fretwork but I wouldn't count on or expect it. They're like most fenders, they never see a level before they leave the factory. The agiles are actually leveled.
Now that I think about it, rondo was introducing a limited run of new sx basses that cost twice as much as mine but come with hipshot bridges and filed frets. Different tuners, too though I don't see the need. The lame thing about those to me was they had heel-adjusted single action truss rods. I much prefer the neck-adjusted dual-action ones.
I wish they would bring back some of the crazy strat configurations they used to have. Heck, even the p90 furrians, which were so popular the new shipment of BSB ones sold out within 3 days, don't show up that often. If they ever release a P-MM bass I'm buyin'.
Oh yeah, I also had a hadean 5-string neck through for a while. Truly atrocious pickups, and the neck wasn't perfectly straight, but pretty good value. I can't remember how much it costed exactly but I know it was cheap.
Overall douglas and hadean seem to have the strategy "offer insane features for cheap at any cost to quality" while SX offers mostly simple designs with good quality.
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cheap
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Post by cheap on Apr 2, 2017 23:22:22 GMT -5
Well, I've come back crawling. I decided to add a lipstick pup to this guitar. Took a lot of work to install it, and I mistakenly believed I could wire it up by myself fairly easily. I did not plan to have the lipstick be affected by the series/parallel switch. I'm pretty sure it should be possible to wire it in, but I've been unsuccessful. I've got a 2P2T switch to work with. I'm still essentially using the same wiring scheme as the Brian may series/parallel guitar. If anyone can help, I'd have my sanity to thank them for.
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Post by newey on Apr 3, 2017 5:49:42 GMT -5
I can't tell much from the photo except that one of the slide switches seems to be lacking any wires to it. Was that one to control the lipstick tube? So, a boatload of questions:
- Do you get any output from the lipstick tube pup at all? In any switch configuration? (and, did you test the pickup first?) - How do you have it wired in? Do you have a diagram of what you did? - How do you envision it working with the other switching, besides your statement that it bypasses the series/parallel switching? How will it be switched by the 2P2T (which I assume is the extra switch in the picture)
Without knowing more, I suspect that your problem lies in the series chain switching inherent in the BM design. Do you envision this new pickup being in series or in parallel with the others?
Easiest way I can envision adding this into the existing scheme is as a stand-alone pickup. Wire the switch as a simple on/off switch for the lipstick tube alone, then take the output from the switch straight to the volume pot "hot", bypassing all other switching. Then would then add the tube pup, in parallel, with whatever is selected by the other switching.
If the switch is a three-position type, both outer positions can be wired to be "on", with the "off" in the center position, thus eliminating a potential dead spot.
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cheap
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Post by cheap on Apr 3, 2017 14:09:46 GMT -5
Hi newey, and thanks for your time. Your assumptions about the picture are correct. The switch is a DPDT that I plan to use. I have tested the pickup, and it works on its own. Like you suggest, I plan to use it as a standalone pickup. However, when the pickup is wired that way, there's a problem when the guitar is in "series" mode. Instead of running the other pickups in series, and this one in parallel, only the lipstick pup winds up on, unless the lipstick in switched off. Then the circuit behaves normally. Sorry for the image, I realize it isn't very helpful. Really I just like posting images. Anyway, here's the BM diagram. My circuit is the same right now, though with some added doo-dads that shouldn't affect anything. Just in case I'm wrong, the things I added are a neck volume, a rotary switch for the humbucker, and a bass contour. The humbucker rotary switch is definitely unrelated to this problem. All those features work as long as the lipstick is disconnected. I'm going to go double check this behaviour right now, I'll let you know if I was wrong.
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cheap
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Post by cheap on Apr 3, 2017 15:11:23 GMT -5
Alright, so now I've double checked things, and my previous information was pretty wrong. If I could stop being clueless, I would. By wiring the neg to ground directly, and the pos to hot only when switched, the guitar works in every position, whether series or parallel, except for two. I cannot solo the pickup while in series, or while in parallel mode. In other words, the pickup does not work when all the other pickups are off. I think this is because when all pickups are off, hot gets shorted to ground. I don't know how to fix that, but I'll keep trying.
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Post by JohnH on Apr 3, 2017 15:28:11 GMT -5
You have found the issue, when all the other pickups are off, hot and ground are shorted, and that is a feature inherent in this wiring, ie it is needed to make it work.
So you can add this extra pickup in parallel with anything else that is on, but not use it on its own in that way.
But if you want to give it more independence, how about pick one of the other coils and use the new dpdt to swap the leads with the lipstick? Then you can operate it with the other switches and have it on, off, in series oop etc and also on it own. The question would be which one to swap it with, so you can use your current wiring to decide which coil you least want to combine the lipstick with, and use the dpdt to swap the wires with that.
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cheap
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Post by cheap on Apr 3, 2017 15:47:18 GMT -5
Thanks a million, John. It's tough to choose a pickup I don't care to solo. You've given me a lot to consider. I guess it'll probably be the middle humbucker, or the neck p90.
As is, I do have one pole of my DPDT switch still free. This is a long shot, but you don't suppose I might be able to use this switch to bypass the other pickups when the lipstick is on? While this gives me less options overall, I would be able to solo all my pickups, which is how I prefer to play most of the time anyway.
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cheap
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Post by cheap on Apr 3, 2017 15:51:37 GMT -5
Er, hold on John, I think I failed to see what you suggested. Now I get it, and I need to spend a few minutes staring at my guitar and diagram until I can fully grasp the possibilities. Your idea does seem wise. Also, I think I figured out that I can use the DPDT to bypass the entire circuit besides volume pots and solo the lipstick if I want. So now I've just got to think which option is best.
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Post by JohnH on Apr 3, 2017 16:12:27 GMT -5
I think you have it sussed. With what I suggested, you dont lose the ability to solo any one pickup. The only loss is the ability ti combine the lipstick with one other pickup that you choose to swap it with.
But the other idea has merit too, to go with one switch from whatever tangle of other coils the main switching selects to just one pure lipstick single.
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