Wiring Old Metal Fatigue

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zimbodel

New member
I am trying to figure out if the wirng color scheme used in circa 82-85 is the same as currently used.?
The pickup is 4-wire + ground
Wire colors:
1) Black,Red,White,Green,Bare.

The pickup sounds incredible as a single coil (both coils are great).
Unfortunately it is the most horrid sounding humbucker.

I followed the modern wiring for a standard (series) humbucker..
https://www.stewmac.com/video-and-id...g-pickups.html

As mentioned, both single coils sound spectacular., but the humbucker configuration wired like on SD's page above sounds horrid.
It sounds like out of phase+sewage.

Anyone know if there was a change in the use of the colors in early 80s pickups ?

Fine, I can switch them around until I get rid of the atrocious sewer sound, but rather want to know if there is any knowledge of how these old fatigues were connected as intended.
 
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I suppose the first step would be to check with the meter to make sure the wiring isn't all screwy. The Metal Fatigue is an interesting pickup- sort of a double screw JB, named after Allan Holdsworth's Metal Fatigue album. I know he used double screw neck 59s in the bridge in the last part of his career, though.
 
do you have a meter? check black and white and see if you get 8k or so. same with green and red, 8k again?
 
What pickup ? "Metal Fatigue" as my original post show, both in the title and the body.

The metal Fatigue was a sort of also-can-do "Borrow" from the Tim Shaw, Dirty Fingers (1978) which was the first to use full-size double screw poles, which SD then also adopted. Dirty Fingers was an answer to Dimarzio's SD.

Coils are both 7.8 kOhm
As I mentioned both coils sound spectacular as single coils. They work properly as I reported.
However, using them as a humbucker by the modern wiring instructions ... really suck.


All I want to know is if someone know if the Original early Metal Fatigues were wired by modern wiring diagram as SD published according to the link I gave in my original post.

Also, were the original Metal Fatigues (early 80s) specified as series or parallel humbuckers ?
 
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They were standard series wired humbuckers and used typical SD wiring color codes.

Also, they weren't called the "Metal Fatigue" back then and are ultimately equivalent to a double-screw JB, rather than something like a Dirty Fingers
 
Thanks for the confirmation.

That is exactly how i wired it. so if that is the case;
Then it is robably the worst humbucker I ever used.
I will most likely remove it from my Charvel Holdsworth and rather use a Dirty fingers which is a way-way nicer humbucker and way more usable.

The only thing I will miss is the single coils, that is really nice and unique, but as a humbucker it is seriously offay nasal crap. It seems to me as if one coil was wired incorrectly and colors were swapped so if wired as a humbucker they will be out of phase. This always happens at least once in any company, so I will figure that out.



If I didnt mention metal fatigue no one would know what I am talking about. In retrospect their modern also-can-do reissues are caleld metal fatigues referring back to holdsworth's use. Double screw JB , no one will even know what I am talking about, so "Metal Fatigue" it is.
SD suddenly also using full-size screw poles on both coils is a direct dirty fingers lift, sorry.
 
That's fair. Tonally, dual screw coils rounds out the tone a bit, takes off the edge and punch slightly compared to slugs.

While the flavor of the pickup may not be your thing, I have a hard time believing that it would sound particularly "bad". Definitely check the internal wiring if you can. How'd you come across this pickup anyway?
 
It was in the Holdsworth Charvel I bught long ago.
In single coil mode it is truly some of the best single sounds I heard, very unique. Beats every vintage and modern strat I have.
Now that you confirmed it should be the same wiring scheme, I will rewire irt as if a coil was accidentally switch during production and see if it works better.
That is all it can still be.

Do you maybe know when SD started punching the seymour duncan logo on the backplate of humbuckers ?
 
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Post a pic of that Charvel...I've seen his Ibanez models, but not the Charvel. Can you tell me about it?
 
the early, non CS "metal fatigue" was the AH-1, and as noted is essentially a double screw JB. you said it sounds "out of phase", does it also seem low output for a 16k humbucker?
 
Superpete, that is good information thanks.
Mine has a small sticker on the back just like the old SSl-1's from the late 70s that was in a 63 strat I bought way back then.
The sticker says AH!BJ if I read it right.

No, both coils show the same resistance and neither sounds weak on their own.

I went back to some of AH early recordings when he recorded with the red charvel. I should have noticed it but that ofay sound is there sometimes.
He only sporadically used that sound and soon abandoned it and was never heard again in any subsequent records. Since the RoadGames/MF albums came out, Those particular solos annoyed me due to that ofay pigeonholed pickup sound sporadically.
It now seems to me, that is how it is supposed to be awful or not. That horrible squeech noise always bothered me during the those years. But luckily it was used very sparingly. I always thought it was the Lab amps doing it, but now know better.

It is clear to me that Alan used single coil mode a lot with this pickup as I can reproduce that very accurately which is the majority of his Charvel recorded sound.
He either must have dropped the pickup soon after or wired the coils in parallel for humbucker mode. He was the eternal fiddler with gear, so the latter probably happened.

A usual JB doesnt sound at all like the Metal Fatigue in humbucker mode. I had a few JB's and can remember what they sound like.As I can remember his spruce goose and the white Charvels had straight up JB's in them. I will have to go look to make sure.
 
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What you want to do, (with your meter), is put the red lead on the black wire, and black lead on the white wire. Bring a screwdriver up against the coil and the meter should spike positive. Yank the screwdriver away, and it should spike negative. Repeat with red lead on the red wire and black lead on the green wire. Spike positive, then spike negative. If you get anything different, then one coil is connected backwards.
 
Thanks ArtieToo, Spot-on.
I will check today and I suspect that a coil had its wire color swapped and therefore then out of phase when connected in HB mode.
I made a small pickup test-coil long ago, I place on a pole of a pickup and can then look at the phase difference between the two coils applying the same signal to the two pickup coils feeding the single coils with a generator and measure with a scope. That reorders the wiring quickly. Or when connected as a humbucker, if I dont get common-mode-rejection with the two test pickup coils connected over the poles, then it is not in humbucker mode and there is an internal wiring color misswire or such.

I will do it sometime today.
That said, if you seen my previous post, it seems that is just how these older MF's sound wired as a series humbucker.
 
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zimbodel said:
Thanks ArtieToo, Spot-on.
I will check today and I suspect that a coil had its wire color swapped and therefore then out of phase when connected in HB mode.
I made a small pickup test-coil long ago, I place on a pole of a pickup and can then look at the phase difference between the two coils applying the same signal to the two pickup coils feeding the single coils with a generator and measure with a scope. That reorders the wiring quickly. Or when connected as a humbucker, if I dont get common-mode-rejection with the two test pickup coils connected over the poles, then it is not in humbucker mode and there is an internal wiring color misswire or such.

I will do it sometime today.
That said, if you seen my previous post, it seems that is just how these older MF's sound wired as a series humbucker.
Click to expand...

That's cool. I did something similar quite a few years ago. I used an old relay and disassembled the armature part. I would just apply a signal generator to the coil and hold it close to the coils. Not sure what ever happened to it. Probably in a junk box somewhere.
 
I haven't actually seen a vintage example of this pickup, so if you get a chance, post a few pics!
 
ArtieToo;

Your suggestion is superior when traveling by far. Just need to have a handheld scope with a capture function, or it absolute makes old time needle multimeters indispensable for this. One of those cases where the old technology beats the new.
 
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zimbodel said:
Superpete, that is good information thanks.
Mine has a small sticker on the back just like the old SSl-1's from the late 70s that was in a 63 strat I bought way back then.
The sticker says AH!BJ if I read it right.
Click to expand...

yeah the AH1BJ
Allan Holdsworth model, bridge, wound by MJ

I have the same pickup!

I'm not as knowledgeable on the wiring stuff as ArtieToo but what he is saying is spot on.
 
SuperPete;
How do you describe the sound in Humbucker mode? if you can maybe compare with a known pickup everyone knows such as a Gibson paf/TTop etc
Does it in any way sound very nasal ?
If you know, did you connect it series or parallel ? You can check which pickup wires/colors are soldered together.That would tell you.
I understand that you dont want to do it to avoid hassle and crap if it is currently in a guitar, but in case its out it would be nice to know.
 
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