Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

ErikH

Well-known member
This weekend I had the chance to put Franky through the paces with the new pickup combo and the Virtual 3rd Humbucker wiring. As I mentioned in my post in the Guitar Forum, the pickups are a DiMarzio Super Distortion and PAF Pro. I ran across Artie's mod while looking for other simple wiring ideas. This one is really easy and you don't have to do anything to the face of the guitar at all as long as you have the switch already. A standard 3-way wafer switch is all that is needed (and two 4-conductor pickups of course).

I'm really impressed with this mod. There is no dropout going through the 3 positions. It's a nice change from the typical both humbuckers on in the middle. The measured DC resistance is between 11-12k with mine although YMMV with different pickups. I do notice some interesting strat-ish qualities with it too when rolling back the volume. It still cuts through really well, sounds great with chords, and most of all, it's not muddy. Clean or dirty, it plain out works.

Now, if you wanted to, you could just flip the neck pickup around so that you'd have both inner coils on while in the middle position and yet still retain the noise cancellation. I have mine set to be the bridge inner and neck outter. There's still a little bit of noise like you'd hear with normal splitting but that could be from the hugely mismatched coils too. It doesn't bother me though because it is so little. Not a big deal.

Overall, I'm real happy with this mod. I like it much more than both humbuckers full on in the middle. I encourage anyone who is remotely interested in a different sound from the middle position of your 3-way switch to try this. But it has to be a Fender-style wafer switch. This won't work with a Gibson-style toggle.

http://www.neighborhost.com/images/Virtual3rd.png

Note: The 3-way wiring in the diagram is as if the neck pickup is at the top with the switch mounted in the pickguard. Trust me, I found that out the hard way. Luckily it was with the screwdriver test before screwing the pickguard down. ;)

Great job with this one, Artie. And thanks for the cool mod. :bigthumb:
 
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

Great job with this one, Artie. And thanks for the cool mod. :bigthumb:

Thanks Erik, but once again, to give credit where credit is due, I'm fairly certain that this is what PRS has been doing for years with their rotary switch. I just showed another way to do it.

What exactly does the middle position sound like? I'm not clear on this one.

Its pretty simple really. Its just the screw coil of the neck in series with the stud coil of the bridge, to form a "virtual 3rd" humbucker instead of the normal both-humbuckers-in-parallel tone. Its just a bit more refined, clean, and less muddy. You gotta try it. :)

Its like the best part of the neck combined with the best part of the bridge.
 
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

A few questions:

-Can the bridge screw coil and neck stud coil be used in this mod
-What's the screwdriver test
-Are Duncan color codes used in the linked schematic
 
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

A few questions:

-Can the bridge screw coil and neck stud coil be used in this mod
-What's the screwdriver test
-Are Duncan color codes used in the linked schematic

-Probably. Artie could answer this better. It may just be swapping the wires around.
-Tap the pole pieces with a screwdriver and listen for what one is active through the amp. That way you know you have it wired right (for the most part) before tightening everything down.
-Yes, those are Duncan color codes in the diagram. I had to translate the colors around a little for my DiMarzios.
 
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

I'll second the yea's for this mod (though I figured it out on my own without Artie's help :p :) ). I really like the tone of the virtual humbucker. It either sounds like the neck bucker with more snap, or the bridge bucker mellowed out, depending on your perspective.
 
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

-Can the bridge screw coil and neck stud coil be used in this mod

Sure. Look at the diagram that Erik linked to in his first post. Note the top-left little diagram shows the bridge pup on top. Just place the neck on top instead. Remember, that diagram shows electrical connections only. You obviously place the pups physically where they belong.

Fritz6 said:
-What's the screwdriver test

Erik covered this, but there's another screwdriver test also, that uses a meter. If you have a pup, and you don't know what it is, or what its polarity is, connect the red and black leads of a meter to its wires. Place the meter in its lowest DC volts scale. Now, while watching the meter display, bring a screwdriver up against the pole pieces. Then yank it away. If the meter shows a slight positive voltage as you bring the screwdriver close, and a negative voltage as you yank it away, then the black lead points to the Duncan-oriented ground lead and the red meter lead points to the hot lead. If you get the opposite, then black is hot and red is ground.

Fritz6 said:
-Are Duncan color codes used in the linked schematic

Yes. Always. In all my diagrams. ;)

Artie
 
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

Thanks Erik, but once again, to give credit where credit is due, I'm fairly certain that this is what PRS has been doing for years with their rotary switch. I just showed another way to do it.

Yeah, but I never knew about the PRS rotary switch. I had no idea it did that. You're the first one I've heard about this such a thing from. :)

No problem with the two tone controls sharing the cap either, other than the behavior I told you about. I rarely roll them back anyway so it's no big deal. I can save a .022uf cap for a pedal mod. ;)
 
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

Necro bump. Trying to decide to use this wiring or to use tele wiring putting the full hbs in series then rolling back my master spin a split. Wonder if anyone has the virtual hb diagram.
 
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

Necro bump. Trying to decide to use this wiring or to use tele wiring putting the full hbs in series then rolling back my master spin a split. Wonder if anyone has the virtual hb diagram.

I had never heard of this "virtual 3rd humbucker" but my last topic here might answer to your request.

If ever my "finding" is involuntarilly reinventing the wheel by repeating what ArtieToo (or other guitar techs) had found before, no need to say that all credits must go to the first author(s) of what came to my mind. :-)

EDIT after having seen the schematic below: my last topic was indeed rediscovering the same thing, but achieved with a mini ON ON ON switch. :-))

https://forum.seymourduncan.com/showthread.php?334667-Neck-HB-split-HB-s-in-series-Bridge-HB
 
Last edited:
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

Wonder if anyone has the virtual hb diagram.

Here you go! I have had this saved for years but never got around to trying it. I don't have any HH guitars with a blade switch at the moment......

Virtual3rd.jpg
 
Last edited:
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

Interesting question. I need to study this some more, but it does look like neck black could go straight to "3", and bridge green could go straight to "A". Let me study that some more.
 
Re: Review: Virtual 3rd Humbucker

Ok . . . I had to redraw that to remind myself. That connection must be there. Here, I drew it the "new" way. Note that when the neck pup is selected, the bridge pup hangs out on the "hot" side of the circuit as a giant noise antenna. The purpose of the 3-to-A connection is to short out the bridge when it isn't selected, thus making it silent. I knew there was a reason for doing it that way. :)

bad_alt.jpg

P.S. And thanks metlking for digging up that diagram. I could have found it eventually. But it could have been a long eventually. ;)
 
Last edited:
Back
Top