Phase Reverse Switch in a Squier 51

[Johnny Nightslayer]

Hey guys, its been quite a while since I've posted here.

I recently acquired a Squier 51 guitar in fabulous condition, except it is missing a neck pickup. It also has a SD Phat Cat where the bridge HB should be.
I am about to put a single coil into the neck, wired the same as in the Wiring Diagram.
The volume control is a push pull pot. Normally it was used to coil tap the HB, but I want to use it as a phase reverse switch. I've done quite a bit of reading about doing this, but I'm still a bit confused. Here is the best Source (Scroll down) I found for wiring a phase reverse switch. The first part makes sense, soldering the wires in a criss cross manner and soldering their outputs exactly where the bridge pickup leads were supposed to be. I'm not so sure on the next part. It says to solder both pickup leads to the areas marked on the diagram. Prior to this guitar, I had never dealt with a P-90, and it appears to only have one lead. Right now, part of the Phat Cats cable is soldered to the side of the DPDT switch, and the actual end of the lead is soldered to the 3-way switch.
So, I'm not exactly sure what to do. Any input on this would be greatly appreciated.

-John

 

[DrNewcenstein]

Re: Phase Reverse Switch in a Squier 51

Hmm. Which Phase Reversal diagram are you looking at on the "Source" site? Phased with itself or with another pickup?

Here's the SD diagram:
http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/wiring-diagrams/schematics.php?schematic=phase_switching_for_hb

In this diagram, black is the hot output and green+bare is the ground.

The PhatCat you have appears to be wired for 2-conductor operation (hot and ground, no split). If you want phase reversal with another pickup, whether it's a 2-conductor or 4-conductor pickup is of no consequence to the phase reversal operation, since phase reversal in this case is merely swapping the ground to the hot and hot to the ground, and then vise-versa.

You would need to unsolder the ground from the side of the switch and place it instead on the switch terminals as shown in the diagram, then the proper terminal from the switch to a similar ground point (side of switch, back of pot, etc).


Does this particular pickup have a metal braided shield, and that's what's attached to the side of the switch? If so, you might have some trouble getting it attached to a terminal - or at least just one terminal and not 2.

Solder a short wire to the braided shield to reach the switch terminal, then wrap the braided shield in electrical tape to prevent it from contacting any other ground source.

Follow the diagram as indicated and you're good to go.

 

[Johnny Nightslayer]

Re: Phase Reverse Switch in a Squier 51

I was looking at the diagram to reverse phase with another pickup, not with itself.

Thanks for the link to the SD diagram, it was a lot more helpful.

Yes, there is a metal braided shield, and that is what is attatched to the side.

This makes complete sense now...I think I'll be alright from here. I think its going to sound pretty good when I am done...I'm putting a Texas Special in the neck.

Anyway, thanks again for the help.

 

[Johnny Nightslayer]

Re: Phase Reverse Switch in a Squier 51

Mostly everything seems to be working. The only thing I am confused about is that when I have just the PhatCat selected, I only get signal when the push pull pot is in the 'up' position. The same is true for when I have both pups selected. When the push pull pot is in the down position, I get nothing. When I have just the Texas Special selected, I get signal either way.
Before I put the Texas Special in, this was not a problem. Hopefully I didn't screw anything up...
The only thing I did differently than the wiring diagram is that I put the ground from the TS on top of the DPDT switch instead of on the side, like in the Squier diagram. I used the same size wire for all of it except for the criss cross section that goes to the hot output, I had to use smaller wire for that.

 

[super rad stuff]

Re: Phase Reverse Switch in a Squier 51

^i'm guessing that you just hooked a lead from the braided wire up to your phase switch. when you do that your pickup's baseplate isn't grounded anymore, so you don't get any signal. what you should do to fix this is to get probably about 2ft of 4 conductor wire and just hook the separate leads into two wires and the baseplate to the bare wire. ground the wire to the bridge and hook the two leads into the phase switch.

or if you wanna do it the ghetto way, just hook three different 22awg wires to the pickup in place of the braided single and wrap them in foil, with the foil grounded to the baseplate:lmao: