HSH with Dimarzio Area middle for hum-cancelled splits?

[sumitagarwal]

I don't think I've seen this question asked/addressed elsewhere so I wanted to try here.

I have an HSH guitar where I'd like to use a stacked pickup in the "S" slot both to have hum-cancelling when I just have that pickup selected, but also so I can "borrow" the bottom coil to cancel the hum from the split humbuckers (especially to get a nice neck single coil sound without hum).

I've seen diagrams for 5-ways that auto-split the middle to the top coil for hum-cancelling 2 and 4 notch positions, but nothing in terms of splitting the middle to the bottom coil to provide cancellation for split humbuckers.

Any thoughts or experience with this?

FWIW my focus is on a wide range of classic tones, but conceptually that shouldn't matter. Going for the usual Strat neck, LP bridge, Strat notch tones, etc sounds

[Teleplayer]

Area pickups are south magnetic polarity, which is good if you want to combine the top coil with a coil-split humbucker for hum-cancelling in 2 and 4 notch positions (I have done this). However if you want to use the bottom coil in series with a coil-split humbucker, it would NOT be hum-cancelling as the winding direction will be wrong. It would probably still work if you reverse the connection polarity of the Area bottom coil, although it needs more complex wiring. I think it would be easier and simplify the wiring if you choose a stack single coil with North-up magnetic polarity, like STK-S4 Neck version.

[sumitagarwal]

Area pickups are south magnetic polarity, which is good if you want to combine the top coil with a coil-split humbucker for hum-cancelling in 2 and 4 notch positions (I have done this). However if you want to use the bottom coil in series with a coil-split humbucker, it would NOT be hum-cancelling as the winding direction will be wrong. It would probably still work if you reverse the connection polarity of the Area bottom coil, although it needs more complex wiring. I think it would be easier and simplify the wiring if you choose a stack single coil with North-up magnetic polarity, like STK-S4 Neck version.

Thanks for the insight!

I should sketch this out, but I really want to go for maximum versatility. The guitar is a Killer Marquis (I believe it's built on the ESP's E-II bench) with a lot of switches and knobs I can enlist in service of this: a 3 way switch, 2 mini switches (one looks like a quad throw? It bypasses all knobs but keeps the pickup selector live), and four knobs which I can replace with push-pulls.

I'd like hum-cancelling access to the following:

• Neck outer coil with middle bottom coil
• Neck humbucker
• Neck inner coil with middle top coil
• Middle stack
• Neck humbucker with bridge humbucker
• Middle top coil with bridge outer coil
• Middle bottom coil with bridge inner coil
• Bridge humbucker

Which is... a lot

[Teleplayer]

Some of the above combinations with middle pickup would be series, but also some parallel combinations.

They are all good ideas.. How about a 5-way "discrete" fender switch, and 1 Toggle switch?

I can't offer you a wiring diagram at the moment, but it would be a nice challenge for someone!

[sumitagarwal]

Some of the above combinations with middle pickup would be series, but also some parallel combinations.

They are all good ideas.. How about a 5-way "discrete" fender switch, and 1 Toggle switch?

I can't offer you a wiring diagram at the moment, but it would be a nice challenge for someone!

Thanks for the comment! Unfortunately it's a 3-way toggle, not a blade switch. I'm considering a Free-way switch, but I'm not sure there's enough space in the switch route to fit one, and also I figure the existing four knobs, 3-way, and 2x 2-way switches really *should* be sufficient..