Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

[maup]

Hello all (excuse me for my not good english).

I have a Fender Blacktop HH like this one in the link, and in the photo below:



I like the guitar in general but I don't like much the neck humbucker, which is too "muddy" and dark, while the bridge humbucker is ok, also the combinations of split coils in positions 2 and 4 seems to me too weak and dark, so I made up my mind to make some changes.

What I am going to do is to buy a new HSS pickguard, keep the original bridge humbucker which sounds ok for me, and add two noiseless pickups (SD or DiMarzio) in middle and neck positions for a more brighter tone.

I tried to find wiring diagrams on line but couldn't figure out a proper solution.

I don't want to make complicated split coils combinations, push-pull knobs, etc, I would like to have the 5 way switch to do this:

Position 5: Neck
Position 4: Neck+Middle
Position 3: Middle
Position 2: Middle+Bridge
Position 1: Bridge

About the knobs, I have now 1 volume and 2 tones (one for the neck and one for the bridge pickup), I would like to keep this functionality.

I did some wiring in the past but I am not an expert, so I am asking you here if you see any problem in my project or if you have any suggestion or advice please let me know.

Also if you know where I can find a clear wiring diagram I'll appreciate that a lot.

Thanks

 

[Benjy_26]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)



This *should* work for you. It shows regular single coils in the neck and middle, but you can wire up your stacks to function in the same manner.

 

[Downrazor11]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

...I like the guitar in general but I don't like much the bridge pickup, which is too "muddy" and dark...

What I am going to do is to buy a new HSS pickguard, keep the original bridge humbucker which sounds ok for me...

Keeping the bridge pickup doesn't make much sense to me, given you think it is too dark/muddy.. If you have ~$50 to spend on a used bridge humbucker there are plenty of good alternatives..

 

[Benjy_26]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Keeping the bridge pickup doesn't make much sense to me, given you think it is too dark/muddy.. If you have ~$50 to spend on a used bridge humbucker there are plenty of good alternatives..

Good point. Another option may be to try the neck humbucker in the bridge with a pair of noiseless singles.

 

[maup]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Keeping the bridge pickup doesn't make much sense to me, given you think it is too dark/muddy.. If you have ~$50 to spend on a used bridge humbucker there are plenty of good alternatives..

Good point. Another option may be to try the neck humbucker in the bridge with a pair of noiseless singles.

Hello and sorry but I mistakenly wrote "bridge" instead of "neck". What I wanted to write is that I don't like muck the neck pickup which is muddy and dark, while the bridge pickup is good. (I made correction also to my original post).

 

[maup]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

This *should* work for you. It shows regular single coils in the neck and middle, but you can wire up your stacks to function in the same manner.

Thank you for the diagram. So I just could connect each of the stacked single coils in serial, as well as the bridge humbucker, and then connect as they were single coils to the 5 way switch.

 

[GreatOz]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Just a note, for Seymour Duncan, "regular" Stacks and Stack Plus have two different wiring schemes. In "regular" Stacks, the "hot" wire (the one being soldered to the switch) is black and in the Stack Plus models, the "hot" wire is white.

 

[Benjy_26]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Thank you for the diagram. So I just could connect each of the stacked single coils in serial, as well as the bridge humbucker, and then connect as they were single coils to the 5 way switch.

You are welcome!
Exactly.

 

[maup]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

You are welcome!
Exactly.

Brilliant! Thank you very much.
After all it's an easy setup but couldn't figure out by myself or watching to diagrams...

 

[Benjy_26]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Brilliant! Thank you very much.
After all it's an easy setup but couldn't figure out by myself or watching to diagrams...

I'm the same way. I can wire anything up, but when it comes to guitats, I'm dead in the water without a schematic or diagram.

 

[GuitarDoc]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

By convention, switch position 1 is bridge pup, position 5 is neck pup.

 

[maup]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Just a note, for Seymour Duncan, "regular" Stacks and Stack Plus have two different wiring schemes. In "regular" Stacks, the "hot" wire (the one being soldered to the switch) is black and in the Stack Plus models, the "hot" wire is white.

Thank you for the info, I am wondering if when you buy new pickups they comes with specifications and installation instructions...

 

[maup]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

By convention, switch position 1 is bridge pup, position 5 is neck pup.

Thank you I didnt know that, I always called them the opposite maybe because the bridge position is "upper" It looks the first to me

I edited the original post.

 

[GuitarDoc]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

The switch's lever points in the opposite direction as the actual contacts. In other words, the contact lugs on the switch for the bridge pup are closest to the neck pup and are effective when the switch lever is pointed toward the bridge pup.

 

[maup]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Hello to all... well I removed my strat pickguard (surprisingly I never done before...) and I found out that it has a 5 way Fender Super Switch mg: it has a 24 poles and a really (for me) complicated wiring. Exactly this one.

After many researches and study I think I understood the wiring system and I tryed to elaborate my own wiring diagram, trying to save all the possible parts, so in the end I will remove the neck HB and add 2 Di Marzio Area 58 noiseless single coils, and rewire all in a different way.

Plus I added the "treble bleed mod" which is suggested by Di Marzio diagrams.

Here is my diagram, excuse me because I am not an expert but I think it is enough clear.

Do you think that it is a working diagram or do you see any mistake or problem?

I did some wiring in the past but actually this is the first time that I elaborate and modify a guitar.

Thank you very much.

 

[maup]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Just a note, for Seymour Duncan, "regular" Stacks and Stack Plus have two different wiring schemes. In "regular" Stacks, the "hot" wire (the one being soldered to the switch) is black and in the Stack Plus models, the "hot" wire is white.

Thank you for the specification.

I choose in the end to buy DiMarzio Area 58 and I saw that they have different color for wiring than Seymour Duncan and Fender HB too.

In the DiMarzio Area 58 the "hot" is red while the "ground" is green, and the "inner coils" are black and white.

In the Fender Hot HB the "hot" is red, the "ground" is black and the "inner coils" are white and green.

 

[Xeromus]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Check out the ObsidianWire HSS kit. I plan to put one in my next build. I recently installed the Blender circuit model into another strat, and I really like it.

 

[Jack_TriPpEr]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Hello to all... well I removed my strat pickguard (surprisingly I never done before...) and I found out that it has a 5 way Fender Super Switch mg: it has a 24 poles and a really (for me) complicated wiring. Exactly this one.

After many researches and study I think I understood the wiring system and I tryed to elaborate my own wiring diagram, trying to save all the possible parts, so in the end I will remove the neck HB and add 2 Di Marzio Area 58 noiseless single coils, and rewire all in a different way.

Plus I added the "treble bleed mod" which is suggested by Di Marzio diagrams.

Here is my diagram, excuse me because I am not an expert but I think it is enough clear.

Do you think that it is a working diagram or do you see any mistake or problem?

I did some wiring in the past but actually this is the first time that I elaborate and modify a guitar.

Thank you very much.

View attachment 99058

This diagram puts both coils of bridge humbucker in parallel with the middle pickup in Position 2. Normally, just the inner coil of the humbucker is combined with the middle pickup. Is that what you really wanted to do?

Now also, if you do want to use only the bridge inner coil in position 2, you will also have to split the middle pickup and use just the main coil of it with the bridge inner coil... otherwise you will have 60 cycle hum from the bridge inner coil.

 

[maup]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

Check out the ObsidianWire HSS kit. I plan to put one in my next build. I recently installed the Blender circuit model into another strat, and I really like it.

Thank you for that, I didn't know those kit existed, they look great and well made. I'll think about it for the next project For now I want to keep all existing parts and have some fun understanding the functionality and wiring system of the guitar.

 

[maup]

Re: Turn Strat from HH to H +S (Noiseless) +S (Noiseless)

This diagram puts both coils of bridge humbucker in parallel with the middle pickup in Position 2. Normally, just the inner coil of the humbucker is combined with the middle pickup. Is that what you really wanted to do?

Why should be the bridge HB splitted? I mean is there a problem? I am asking because this is the first time I wire/modify a guitar by myself...

Right now the original Fender HH setup is like that (at least seems to me like that):

Pos. 1 Bridge HB
Pos. 2 Combination of innet split coils
Pos. 3 Both HB (parallel)
Pos. 4 Combination of outer split coils
Pos. 5 Neck HB

Is Pos.3 seems that there are the two HB in parallel working togheter. So I thought to make

Pos. 1 Bridge HB
Pos. 2 Bridge HB + Middle Noiseless SC (parallel)
Pos. 3 Middle Noiseless SC
Pos. 4 Middle Noiseless SC + Neck Noiseless SC (parallel)
Pos. 5 Neck Noiseless SC

Is that a problematic choise? What could be the cons (and pros) of this particular setup?

Thanks a lot for all the info