Splitting a humbucker with a pickup selector?

[operative451]

Hi! Me again! BTW, you people are fab, ya know that? *note to self, check meds, whatever i'm currently on is working!*

So. With reference to 'Project make flying v sound nice'. If i convert a two pickup bass to a single pickup, can i use the existing pickup selector switch (now redundant) as a coil split switch? The new pickup that's going in has the requisite 4 wires. if i connect each humbucker coil seperately to where the two pickups were connected before, does that mean instead of giving me 'neck - both - bridge' it will give me 'top coil - both/humbucker - bottom coil?

Thanks!

Edited April 14, 2016 by operative451

[luckydog]

Yes, but only if the two single coil PUs are made as a mirrored pair, ie magnet sense AND winding sense reversed on one of them relative to the other - that is what makes a humbucking arrangement.

If the PUs are identical, it won't buck hum but will otherwise work.

To check what you've got, see if the magnets attract when the PUs top surfaces are brought together, that means the mag sense is different and you have a go-er. If so, coil sense is just down to which way round you connect the output leads, so trial and error it will sound thin the wrong way round - HTH !

LD

PS: Hope I understood what you mean to do, neck/bridge/humbucker from 2 single coil PUs ?!

Edited April 14, 2016 by luckydog

[Norris]

Yes. A 4-wire humbucker will give you the option to connect it any way you like. There probably won't be huge amount of difference between the top and bottom coil in single mode as they are close together i.e. in the same package. Most of the neck/bridge tonal differences comes from the physical distance between them (for similar specification pickups such as on a Jazz).

[BigRedX]

Yes you'll get get a humbucking combination with both coils on (provided that you wire them up the right way around) but only with the coils in parallel and not the more useful, and tonally different series configuration.

You can get quite different sounds out of two pickups close together but only if they are wound differently which the two coils of a single humbucking pickup will not be.

I'd consider replacing the pickup selector toggle switch with one that is capable of giving you the more useful single/series/parallel combination.

Edited April 14, 2016 by BigRedX

[operative451]

Thanks! It's going to be a 4 wire humbucker rather than two single coils. But i can see where i was a bit confusing there! I'm just being lazy and trying to do the minimum of soldering..

[luckydog]

My bad, I missed the other thread - oops. I get it now, neck PU is 4 wire humbucker. Fun project !! +1 if you can figure a way to get coils to be switchable in series that opens up tone possibilities maybe.....

LD

Edited April 14, 2016 by luckydog

[Paul S]

I don't know if this is at all relevant but I fitted a DiMarzio Model One 'mudbucker' pickup to an Epiphone EB0 that had all sorts of options to wire up with a little toggle switch. Here are the instructions: [url="http://www.dimarzio.com/sites/default/files/diagrams/4Conductor.pdf"]http://www.dimarzio.com/sites/default/files/diagrams/4Conductor.pdf[/url]

[operative451]

That's actually super useful, thank you!

[BigRedX]

Right having had a look at the bass in question (from the link in the other thread), which of the two pickup positions are you planning to keep?

IME the closer to the bridge you get, the further apart the two coils will need to be for them to sound different in single-coil mode.

The usual options for the type of humbucking pickup you have is to either go with series/parallel or series/single coil, neither of which can be achieved with the standard 3-way toggle pickup selector switch the you have.

Having said that I did have a guitar with a single humbucking pickup which I wired using the same type of selector switch as you have to give me single coil A/parallel/single coil B, but I also angled the pole pieces of each coil so that one was biased towards the bass the strings and other to the treble and used it mainly for playing chords. The result was threes very different and useful (to me) tones from a single humbucker. That's probably not going to be as useful on a bass where you'll mostly be playing single notes.

You could replace the pickup selector switch with a similar-sized Two Pole, Two-Way switch that will give you the either of the usual two options described above. However this is normally done with a mini-switch and IME the larger ones tend to be fairly clunky and stiffer to operate.

Alternatively you can go the whole hog and fit a 4-pole, 4-way rotary switch which can be wired to give all four coil options: single A, single B, series and parallel.

It might be worth connecting the pickup directly to the output and trying all of the various options hard-wired first to see if you get enough tonal variation between the two single coil options and parallel mode first before doing anything else.

Edited April 15, 2016 by BigRedX

[operative451]

Thanks! I'm keeping the neck pickup. When i start pulling it to bits i'll be able to see what's easiest - i have minimal tools so i want to keep it as simple as possible!

Having said all this stuff, i'm leaning in a direction of new MM style pickup at the bridge with a P-bass style cover on, and a les paul/jazz box style pickguard! I think whatever happens this thing is going to be a mutant...!

EDIT: Inept mockup attached...

[attachment=217062:bass_mockup.png]

Edited April 15, 2016 by operative451

[Chienmortbb]

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1460655547' post='3027677']
Yes you'll get get a humbucking combination with both coils on (provided that you wire them up the right way around) but only with the coils in parallel and not the more useful, and tonally different series configuration.

You can get quite different sounds out of two pickups close together but only if they are wound differently which the two coils of a single humbucking pickup will not be.

I'd consider replacing the pickup selector toggle switch with one that is capable of giving you the more useful single/series/parallel combination.
[/quote]The way I understand Humbuckers, series or parallel operation can both be humbucking as long as the RWRP configuration is maintained. Is that wrong?

[dannybuoy]

I've used this diagram (with a hard to find DPDT on-on-on switch) to get series/single/parallel from a MM humbucker before:



It's a bit mind-bending, but stare at it for a few weeks and it'll start to make sense!

Edited May 5, 2016 by dannybuoy