SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

[GuitarStv]

OK, so I've ordered an SSL-2/SSL-2/SSL-6T set. Is there a cleaner/better way to wire them up for what I want here:

Master Volume

1 - Bridge - Tone 2
2 - Bridge + Mid (Parallel) - Tone 2
3 - Mid - Tone 1
4 - Neck + Mid (Parallel) - Tone 1
5 - Neck - Tone 1


This need a superswitch to avoid both tone pots loading the Bridge + Mid position and also to keep a tone control in every position. Then a push pull pot to for the bridge pickup.


So parts wise it'll be:
- 5 way superswitch
- Vol - 250k (1 nF and 100k resistor for treble bleed)
- Tone 1 - 250k w .022 uF cap
- Tone 2 - 500k push pull w .01 uF cap (actually, about 410k . . . the push pull pot I've got at home is waayyy off the original value).

- My volume knob should hopefully be usable without sucking away all my highs with the treble bleed
- The SSL-1s will see regular loading for pos 3/4/5 and should sound great for the regular SSL-1 thing.
- The SSL-5 will be a little bit brighter from the 500k (400k) tone pot.
- The SSL-5 should have usable range through all the tone settings (typically with a .047 or .022 cap I end up using the tone between like 10 and 9.)



So yeah, before I spend the effort drawing up a wiring diagram for this baby . . . is there anything obviously stupid that I'm doing here?

 

[AlexR]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

Is there any reason why (or tonal aspect you have heard on your guitars) that would make the separate tone pots and loading down an issue?? Personally I don't think I've ever switched pickups on a SSS strat and noticed any difference with the 2/4 posi's when I've had guitars wired with a bridge/mid tone share vs a neck/mid.
For mine, I keep the bridge on its own tone control whenever I wire new strats (or poke under the hood and rewire older ones). I always turn down the bridge tone, but never feel like middle needs a treble cut, so there is that aspect about leaving the middle with the neck tone pot.
Plus a lot of my strats feature 2 caps.......not only for flexibility of value choice, but it also means the two pots are not physically connected.

 

[GuitarStv]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

Is there any reason why (or tonal aspect you have heard on your guitars) that would make the separate tone pots and loading down an issue?? Personally I don't think I've ever switched pickups on a SSS strat and noticed any difference with the 2/4 posi's when I've had guitars wired with a bridge/mid tone share vs a neck/mid.
For mine, I keep the bridge on its own tone control whenever I wire new strats (or poke under the hood and rewire older ones). I always turn down the bridge tone, but never feel like middle needs a treble cut, so there is that aspect about leaving the middle with the neck tone pot.
Plus a lot of my strats feature 2 caps.......not only for flexibility of value choice, but it also means the two pots are not physically connected.

I've played traditionally wired strats where the 4 position (with both tones and the volume connected) sounded very dark to me. The bridge also sounds way too bright to me with that wiring, so I definitely don't want that. My concern was that if I do a tone on neck and mid and a tone on the bridge that the position 2 would be overly dark because it would then be seeing both 250k tone pots as well as the 250k volume.

I was tossing around the idea of neck tone/bridge tone with nothing on the middle position . . . but haven't tried the combo before and don't know if the mid would end up being too bright (and then never used by me). Maybe it wouldn't matter.

 

[Jacew]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

I would ditch tone control for mid pickup. That would simplify things a lot and I don't think it's bad thing to have bright middle along with bridge + neck and their respective variety with tone control.

I too suspect two tone controls loading 4 position would be way too dark.

 

[AlexR]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

In strats the only time I've found the notch positions dark is when I have had the 2 pickups poorly adjusted in relation to each other.......and I'm only ever about vintage pickups and clear tone.

 

[Jacew]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

In strats the only time I've found the notch positions dark is when I have had the 2 pickups poorly adjusted in relation to each other.......and I'm only ever about vintage pickups and clear tone.

Almost sole use of custom wirings with multiple volumes may have screwed my perception how standard strat wiring sounds like.

With two volumes notch positions can get too dark very easily.

 

[AlexR]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

Wow.....the LP's and SG's etc don't suffer this issue with my various guitars........do you use high output pickups or a lot of gain....that will muddy things quickly.

 

[GuitarStv]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

I would ditch tone control for mid pickup. That would simplify things a lot and I don't think it's bad thing to have bright middle along with bridge + neck and their respective variety with tone control.

I too suspect two tone controls loading 4 position would be way too dark.

Normally I'd just roll back the volume to control the tone if the middle pickup had no tone control attached, but I was worried that with the treble bleed the middle pickup would just end up too bright all the time with no tone.

Wow.....the LP's and SG's etc don't suffer this issue with my various guitars........do you use high output pickups or a lot of gain....that will muddy things quickly.

The 2 vol 2 tone wiring usually only has one 500k tone and one 500k volume pot loading each pickup, doesn't it?

The loading would be 250k ( 1/(1/500k + 1/500k)) ) for an LP with both tones and volumes on full.

With single coils, the pickups seem to like to get about 125k of loading. Everyone likes a strat neck, and that's typcially loaded to 125k ( 1/(1/250k + 1/250k)) ). When you add a second tone into the mix, then you end up with only 83K of loading ( 1/(1/250k + 1/250k + 1/250k)) which will drop the amplitude of the resonance peak quite a bit, making it sound duller.

My own experiments rewiring guitars with higher/lower value volume pots, show that it makes a big difference in the brightness you hear. This appears to be what others have found too. Look at what happens to the frequency response as you change the loading on a pickup:

 

[Clint 55]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

Just use no load toanz. Then you can pop to zero load from the toanz if you want.

 

[GuitarStv]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

Just use no load toanz. Then you can pop to zero load from the toanz if you want.

I thought of that, but really would only want the no-load tone to be on the bridge . . . but that's where my push-pull pot is. I guess I could drop the push-pull pot value down to 250k with some resistors and use it for tone 1, then buy a no load pot for tone 2.

Not sure if that makes more or less sense than just getting a superswitch and wiring it to connect the tones with no overlap. The wiring is going to be a little complicated, but I want playing the guitar to be as simple and straight forward as possible. Don't want to have to fiddle with the pickup selector and tone control mid-solo. I have enough trouble remembering to stand, breath, kick on a boost, and play notes all at the same time.

 

[Benjy_26]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

I always move the 2nd tone control to the bridge and leave the middle wide open. Sounds better in position 2, 3, and 4 to my ears.

 

[GuitarStv]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

Hmm. That's two votes for no tone on the mid. Maybe I should try it that way first.

 

[AlexR]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

Normally I'd just roll back the volume to control the tone if the middle pickup had no tone control attached, but I was worried that with the treble bleed the middle pickup would just end up too bright all the time with no tone.





The 2 vol 2 tone wiring usually only has one 500k tone and one 500k volume pot loading each pickup, doesn't it?

The loading would be 250k ( 1/(1/500k + 1/500k)) ) for an LP with both tones and volumes on full.

With single coils, the pickups seem to like to get about 125k of loading. Everyone likes a strat neck, and that's typcially loaded to 125k ( 1/(1/250k + 1/250k)) ). When you add a second tone into the mix, then you end up with only 83K of loading ( 1/(1/250k + 1/250k + 1/250k)) which will drop the amplitude of the resonance peak quite a bit, making it sound duller.

My own experiments rewiring guitars with higher/lower value volume pots, show that it makes a big difference in the brightness you hear. This appears to be what others have found too. Look at what happens to the frequency response as you change the loading on a pickup:

Certainly thats what the resonant peak does with the volume control, with the voltage divider effect......but adding in tone controls doesn't affect the peak the same way at all. You can clearly hear this as the effect on tone of rolling back the volume with the modern wiring is vastly more/different than simply switching from a no-load tone pot position to the regular 250k.

 

[GuitarStv]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

I don't entirely follow your argument. Increased total load on a pickup means brighter/sharper sound because the resonance peak of the guitar becomes greater as per the graph.

Let's say there's a 250k volume and 250k tone pot . . . their combined load is 125k ohms with both on full.

You can:
- Remove the tone pot . . . which would increase the load on the pickup to be 250k and make it much brighter.
- Remove the volume pot which would increase the load on the pickup to be 250k and make it much brighter.
- Roll the volume pot back to 125k, which would make the load on the pickup be 83k and make it much darker.



What you're describing (rolling the volume pot down sounding different than increasing the resistance of the tone pot to infinity) makes sense because rolling the volume pot back should darken the guitar. Removing the tone pot should brighten it. They change the load on the pickup in opposite directions, so it is expected that they would sound quite different . . . but that kinda proves the opposite of what you're claiming, right?

 

[Ayrton]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

I normally wire the second tone to the bridge alone. You can have it control the middle as well if you like.

 

[GuitarStv]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

Yeah, thanks. That's the initial wiring schematic I was considering, but wanted a tone control on the middle pickup without the extra loading on position 2. Consensus seems to be that no tone control on middle is necessary.

 

[Jacew]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

Wow.....the LP's and SG's etc don't suffer this issue with my various guitars........do you use high output pickups or a lot of gain....that will muddy things quickly.

It's not really about "muddy" tone, just losing the edge.

I don't use high gain. Really all sorts of real singles with 500k pots. That way notch positions don't suffer too much load which makes them sharper and spankier.

 

[AlexR]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

What you're describing (rolling the volume pot down sounding different than increasing the resistance of the tone pot to infinity) makes sense because rolling the volume pot back should darken the guitar. Removing the tone pot should brighten it. They change the load on the pickup in opposite directions, so it is expected that they would sound quite different . . . but that kinda proves the opposite of what you're claiming, right?

I'm saying your graph pertains to what the volume pot value does. Tone pots are different not only due to the fact they are a filter, but where they are connected....its why 50's wiring doesn't load the pickup as you roll the volume back, and why modern tone wiring only does so as you roll the volume away from 10.

 

[GuitarStv]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

I'm saying your graph pertains to what the volume pot value does. Tone pots are different not only due to the fact they are a filter, but where they are connected....its why 50's wiring doesn't load the pickup as you roll the volume back, and why modern tone wiring only does so as you roll the volume away from 10.

A no load pot provides infinite resistance at the top of the range. If the tone pot doesn't load the pickups when it's running at full value, why do no load pots exist?

There's a clear difference in the response of a pickup between having a 250k, 500k, and no tone pot.

 

[Jacew]

Re: SSS wiring question - am I planning anything stupid?

I'm saying your graph pertains to what the volume pot value does. Tone pots are different not only due to the fact they are a filter, but where they are connected....its why 50's wiring doesn't load the pickup as you roll the volume back, and why modern tone wiring only does so as you roll the volume away from 10.

I had same discussion about this with Teleplayer (if I remember right) here couple of weeks ago.

I learned that cap actually starts cutting frequencies much lower than you'd thought so it does make difference.