Favorite wiring for HH with a 5-way super switch?

ragamuffin

ragamuffin

New member
So I have a strat-ish guitar (a homemade Albert Lee style) with a Custom (rough A5) in the bridge and Seth Lover (four conductor, rough A4) in the neck, wired with a 5-way super switch, currently as position 1: bridge series 2. both outside coils, 3 n+b, 4 both inside coils, 5 neck series. Positions 1, 3, 5 sound great, but 2 and 4 sound pretty weak, hum, and are just not great.

What other kinds of options do I have for wiring position 2 and 4 with the super switch? Could I get a n+b out of phase position? Maybe bridge in parallel (since it's the hotter pickup)? Maybe(a little crazy, but I do have a bass cut knob so I could tame it) n+b in series? Ideally I'd like all positions hum cancelling on this guitar.
 
Mincer has a wiring scheme that makes 2-4 hum-cancelling. I think if you just do screw from one and slug from the other, it gets hum-cancelling? If you want that to be inside/outside coil positions along the string, I think you can just rotate one of the pickups. But I haven't done that wiring yet, so need someone else to chime in...
 
beaubrummels said:
Mincer has a wiring scheme that makes 2-4 hum-cancelling. I think if you just do screw from one and slug from the other, it gets hum-cancelling? If you want that to be inside/outside coil positions along the string, I think you can just rotate one of the pickups. But I haven't done that wiring yet, so need someone else to chime in...
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That's correct. Mag flip isn't necessary. But its understandable that someone would want to do it when rotation of the pickup means that a logo now is upside down and looks weird.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk
 
I just went through that same thing last week. Mincer's thread has the correct wiring diagram in post #76. Flipping the magnet and reversing the black and green wires on one pickup will give you hum cancelling and correct phase in every position.
 
Yes, the scheme that Jack & Artie helped with keeps all 5 positions hum-cancelling, but requires a magnet flip. I have several guitar with this now. I've tried other schemes, but I just like this one so much.
 
Thanks guys! So to be clear I need to flip the magnet AND reverse black and green on one pickup to get hum cancelation?
 
I had a setup where positions 2 and 4 were the humbuckers in parallel. I liked it quite a bit.
 
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^ Yes.

The way this works is like this.

What you're trying to create is a reverse wound reverse polarity (RWRP) pickup. Think of that as two 180 degree turns back to back, ending up pointing back in the original direction. The overall phase of the pickup turns 180 degrees from the reversed wire connections, then another 180 degrees from the reversed magnet polarity, ending up back in phase.

For hum canceling, the coil wires have to be connected in opposite directions. They don't have to be wound in opposite directions but the way the windings are connected does. That's the RW part.

If you flip the connections but keep the magnet polarity the same way around, your pickup will be out of phase. So you need to flip the magnet as well. That's the RP part.

In single humbucker mode, the two coils in each humbucker still work together to cancel out hum because they're RWRP with respect to each other.

With two humbuckers together, they're in phase with each other because the manufacturer has done the RW and the RP parts to the modified humbuckers internally. One humbucker unit is wired the straightforward way, the other is wired RWRP overall, and as explained above, comes back into phase.

Single coil on either humbucker doesn't matter. You're only using one coil, you won't get humbucking.

Where it gets interesting is when you take one coil from one humbucker and the corresponding coil from the other, e.g. two south coils. Now the modified humbucker single coil inthe RWRP humbucker unit acts just like a RWRP single coil with another, regular single coil in the unmodified humbucker unit. What you've done is to create a stretched out humbucker.
 
So I did the magnet flip and green/black swap and I'm liking this wiring much better! Not only is the hum quieter, the 2 and 4 positions seem to be stronger and more usable.
 
Mine is a PRS rotary switch, but it’s bridge humbucker, one coil from each in parallel, one coil from each in series, the other coils in parallel, neck humbucker.

All 5 have their own distinct sound and all are useful.
 
I love ibanez' 5 way hh switching.

Neck bucker series
Neck bucker parallel
Both buckers
inner coils parallel
Bridge bucker

I tried all sorts of different combos over the years. These 5 work great for me..
 
Juanhanglo said:
I love ibanez' 5 way hh switching.

Neck bucker series
Neck bucker parallel
Both buckers
inner coils parallel
Bridge bucker

I tried all sorts of different combos over the years. These 5 work great for me..
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Does this require flipping a magnet? How can you get the inner coils parallel with it still cancelling hum (or does it?)
 
Mincer said:
Does this require flipping a magnet? How can you get the inner coils parallel with it still cancelling hum (or does it?)
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No mag flip required. No inner coils (nor outer) involved. The two pickups aren't split at all. Each pup is either wired In Parallel or wired In Series in this scheme.

[Edit]: oops. I missed that Position 2 is both inner coils. Yep, either a mag flip needs to be done, or rotation of 1 pup plus wiring the rotated pup so that the South coil is the lead coil instead of North coil by default. The Ibanez guitars that this wiring scheme comes in as stock, has one pup already set up specially as i described. Where it comes stock, the Ibanez guitar is using that proprietary Ibanez 5 way switch, the 3PS1SC5.



Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk





d07cb13599775581df792116469e6b59.jpg
 
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Mincer said:
Does this require flipping a magnet? How can you get the inner coils parallel with it still cancelling hum (or does it?)
Click to expand...

No magnet flipping required.

The inner coils are North coil from one and south from the other so it is hum cancelling.

As far as how it happens? That magic is hidden behind the secret metal box. Lol

seriously though, all you have to do is hook up wires to the switch like a standard 5 way. Everything is internal. I don't think there is any other combos you can do with it either..

I have swapped in plenty of pickups, both neck and bridge by themselves and together, and have yet to flip a magnet.

They have a nice feel to them as well.
 
Juanhanglo said:
No magnet flipping required.

The inner coils are North coil from one and south from the other so it is hum cancelling.

As far as how it happens? That magic is hidden behind the secret metal box. Lol

seriously though, all you have to do is hook up wires to the switch like a standard 5 way. Everything is internal. I don't think there is any other combos you can do with it either..

I have swapped in plenty of pickups, both neck and bridge by themselves and together, and have yet to flip a magnet.

They have a nice feel to them as well.
Click to expand...

Oh that's very cool! Thanks for the clarification!
 
Normally inner coils would both be slug coils, so for aftermarket pickups I think a mag flip is required.
Stock pickups would come already flipped.

I have the same switch position assignments in a Showmaster, with a 4-wire 59N and a Pearly Gates Plus.
The 59N is mag flipped from the factory. The positions are all handy and useful.
 
Jack_TriPpEr said:
No mag flip required. No inner coils (nor outer) involved. The two pickups aren't split at all. Each pup is either wired In Parallel or wired In Series in this scheme.

[Edit]: oops. I missed that Position 2 is both inner coils. Yep, either a mag flip needs to be done, or rotation of 1 pup plus wiring the rotated pup so that the South coil is the lead coil instead of North coil by default. The Ibanez guitars that this wiring scheme comes in as stock, has one pup already set up specially as i described. Where it comes stock, the Ibanez guitar is using that proprietary Ibanez 5 way switch, the 3PS1SC5.



Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk





d07cb13599775581df792116469e6b59.jpg
Click to expand...

I have installed pickups with that switch and discussed with Dimarzio. A mag flip is not needed but for asthetics some might choose to
 
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