P90 + PAF wiring solution?

[Pedroasfora]

What’s up guys.

I have an idea for my guitar that I feel can be done but I mustn’t be explaining it properly to my tech. I posted this on the gear page and they suggested I ask here for help.

Ibanez has the dinamix-9 switching where you can turn on the middle and neck single coils and wire them in series (as a humbucker), which makes me presume they are wired in parallel in a traditional strat position 4 wiring.

MY GUITAR is a strat and has a Lollar novel 90 on the neck and a PAF style in the bridge. What I want to do is have a push-push pot that, when the pickup switch is in the middle position, will wire the novel 90 and the paf (either one coil of it or the whole thing) like the Ibanez switch wires the two single coils:

It would make the P90 and the PAF act, technically, as one item, presumably wire them in series, and give me an extra version of the middle position.

Does anyone know how I can wire this? What my tech says is that since the P90 is a single conductor pickup I cant split it, but I’m not trying to do that. What I want is, when in the middle position, to change the relation between the pickups from series to parallel with a push-push knob.

Additional info:

The guitar will have a 3-way switch, and two tone knobs with push-push capacity: the middle would perform these functions and the other splits the PAF.

 

[GuitarDoc]

I think your guitar tech was right...you're not explaining it very well.
You have a Strat with a 5-way switch but you also say it will have a 3-way? In addition to the 5-way? Instead of the 5-way? What will you use the 3-way for?
You want to have all of the 5 position functions and want to add a push/push to change P90 neck and PAF bridge from series to parallel but only in the middle position when your middle pup only is on? That certainly makes no sense.
So you want all 3 pups on in the third position?
If you use the p/p to change from series to parallel you can't use it to add or remove the P90 and PAF in the third position. So you will need a 5-way super switch to do that.

 

[uOpt]

Hi there, good to see you again.

What exactly is the 3-way switch for? I assume basic pickup select is done via the 5-way blade switch.

The trick to series/parallel switch is that you need to put the pickup that has more than 1-conductor wire is series with the entire 5-way switch, or in other words you put that pickup in series with the entire rest of the guitar.

 

[solspirit]

Are you saying the the middle switch pos only works the push / pull tone pots?

 

[Pedroasfora]

I’m replacing the 5-way switch with the 3-way switch.

What I’m looking for is the following:

Pos 1 - Bridge PAF (splittable by lower tone pot)

Pos 2 - P90 + PAF (in parallel as usual when push-push is down, in series when it is up. Controlled by the middle pot)

Pos 3 - P90

I guess that would’ve been a lot more helpful right from the start, but that’s it. To my understanding, whenever there are 2 pickups selected in traditional wiring, they are in parallel, correct?

What I want is the option to wire them “the other way” with tone pot #2. If normal wiring is in parallel, then the tone pot would wire them in series when selected.

 

[uOpt]

I’m replacing the 5-way switch with the 3-way switch.

What I’m looking for is the following:

Pos 1 - Bridge PAF (splittable by lower tone pot)

Pos 2 - P90 + PAF (in parallel as usual when push-push is down, in series when it is up. Controlled by the middle pot)

Pos 3 - P90

I guess that would’ve been a lot more helpful right from the start, but that’s it. To my understanding, whenever there are 2 pickups selected in traditional wiring, they are in parallel, correct?

What I want is the option to wire them “the other way” with tone pot #2. If normal wiring is in parallel, then the tone pot would wire them in series when selected.

As I said, a series/parallel switch is implemented by putting one pickup in series with the pickup selector switch, aka the entire rest of the guitar.

It is not as straightforward as -say- a split or tap switch.

 

[jeremy]

i dont know if you can do exactly what you want, since when you put the pups in series it will bypass the 3way but a series parallel switch isnt that hard to wire up. youll want to make sure the p90 and the split coil of the bucker are in phase, well, unless you want that out of phase sound

 

[Pedroasfora]

Hmm… so, the solution would be to:

- Wire the PAF in series with the entire 3-way switch, split or not (the split option will be wired to the other knob anyway);

- and maybe have the push-push wired to “turn on” the P90 when the switch is in the bridge position? Or do the same but for the PAF when the selector is in the neck position?

i feel like maybe doing it “gilmour-switch” style might be more handy, according to what you have suggested, since I only have 2 pickups anyway.

 

[uOpt]

Hmm… so, the solution would be to:

- Wire the PAF in series with the entire 3-way switch, split or not (the split option will be wired to the other knob anyway);

- and maybe have the push-push wired to “turn on” the P90 when the switch is in the bridge position? Or do the same but for the PAF when the selector is in the neck position?

i feel like maybe doing it “gilmour-switch” style might be more handy, according to what you have suggested, since I only have 2 pickups anyway.

Your 3-way switch will be useless in series mode. One 3-way switch position will have no sound, the other positions will have no impact on sound.

 

[jeremy]

wire the paf to the split p/p switch, then wire the series parallel p/p, then the 3 way. when both p/p are "down" three way will work normally. when the series parallel/ p/p is "up" youll get one dead position on the three way, and the other two would be both pups in series. youll get the dead position since one pup is feeding into the other so youre lifting the connection to the three way for that up.

 

[Pedroasfora]

That’s not that bad of an idea, I get the extra sound and a killswitch in the end!

would there be any other way to wire this? If I had some other kind of switch, or something like that?

 

[jeremy]

if you had a 5 way super switch you could wire up one position to be series

 

[Pedroasfora]

if you had a 5 way super switch you could wire up one position to be series

I could probably do 1 - PAF 2 - Split PAF 3 - middle 4 - Series 5- Neck, right?

 

[uOpt]

I could probably do 1 - PAF 2 - Split PAF 3 - middle 4 - Series 5- Neck, right?

That will take some serious thinking around the 5-way superswitch.

Using a separate switch (on a push-pull) is much easier. For me, anyway.

 

[eclecticsynergy]

With a Superswitch I might do:
1 - PAF full
2 - PAF split + neck
3 - PAF full + neck
4 - PAF split with neck in series
5 - neck