yontz
New member
I happened across something that seemed interesting to spice up the middle position.
Ive been using JB/Jazz for about a decade now, after swapping pickups obsessively many years ago. But Ive never been really happy with the middle position. To me it sounded ok clean, but more Jazz than JB . As I add grit the definition seems to die away and started sounding more like the Jazz on its own but less focused.
I theorized that the Jazz was shunting the JB more than the JB was shunting the jazz. I figured why not try to fix that a little.
So I temporarily added a 25K linear pot in series with the Jazz for the middle position only. After fiddling a bit I figured a sound with a better mix (for me at least) was audible at about 10k and was best at about right at 20K. I removed pot and added a 20K.
The difference is huge. The middle position is now much more defined and balanced. With a lot of gain dialed in, as I go from neck to middle to bridge, I hear three distinct sounds. The phasey middle position is stronger.. more like an old SG with identical neck and bridge pickups. Its been a couple weeks and I still like it more than anything else I've tried to wire up for the middle.
If anyone wants to try it its pretty easy to wire on a 3 way tele style switch. Wire bridge pickup as normal. But on neck pickup, solder the neck pickup right to the lug for the neck switch position, then bridge from the neck position to the middle with a small resistor. The resistor will be ignored in positions one and three, but in position two it will be in series with the neck pickup.
Ive been using JB/Jazz for about a decade now, after swapping pickups obsessively many years ago. But Ive never been really happy with the middle position. To me it sounded ok clean, but more Jazz than JB . As I add grit the definition seems to die away and started sounding more like the Jazz on its own but less focused.
I theorized that the Jazz was shunting the JB more than the JB was shunting the jazz. I figured why not try to fix that a little.
So I temporarily added a 25K linear pot in series with the Jazz for the middle position only. After fiddling a bit I figured a sound with a better mix (for me at least) was audible at about 10k and was best at about right at 20K. I removed pot and added a 20K.
The difference is huge. The middle position is now much more defined and balanced. With a lot of gain dialed in, as I go from neck to middle to bridge, I hear three distinct sounds. The phasey middle position is stronger.. more like an old SG with identical neck and bridge pickups. Its been a couple weeks and I still like it more than anything else I've tried to wire up for the middle.
If anyone wants to try it its pretty easy to wire on a 3 way tele style switch. Wire bridge pickup as normal. But on neck pickup, solder the neck pickup right to the lug for the neck switch position, then bridge from the neck position to the middle with a small resistor. The resistor will be ignored in positions one and three, but in position two it will be in series with the neck pickup.
Last edited:
