Dual coil pickups

[four/five]

I’ve just acquired a pair of dual coil pu’s which I was going to fit on a jazz or p bass look a like.

The pu’s have come from bass that had a preamp and I was wondering if they could be used just in passive mode.

The coils measured in series are 6.8k ohms and in parallel 1.7k ohms. Each coil 3.4k ohms.

The output wires are marked in pairs with each pair having a  + and - mark. They are not active ie battery fed.

If wired in parallel would the + be joined together or + and - joined to make the circuit ie reversing one coil.

I was wondering due the low coil resistance whether it was necessary to have a preamp.

The pu’s came originally from a GB bass and looking at the cct in my own GB Spitfire it’s virtually impossible to see how the pu’s interact

in the cct.

Suggestions please.

[itu]

Yes, the resistance of the coils has a bit to do with the output level. But you can compensate the level with your amp settings.

Preamp is usually wanted because of the eq, not the output. You get the possibility to sculpt the sound with T/M/B/LP/BP, semi parametric or whatever. Most of the preamps do not handle panning, but that is done with simple high impedance pots (250k/500k MN by Bourns is good for blend). It is the same with volume, cheap parts. John East, EMG, and Audere have real mixers, but these are rare. Maybe Alembic has mixing, too.

Go and test the pickups. It is possible to wire them in series/parallel/single with a (rotary) switch, but I would say, that in practice you need only two of those three options: series/single or series/parallel. Parallel and single are so close together, I would leave the other out. If the pickups have 4-wire outputs, you can play with many options, a rotary switch (one hole) may be helpful, or just take two ON/ON DPDT ordinary switches (two holes needed) for sound variation possibilities.

The choice of parallel (more output) or single (clearly thinner sound) depends on if you need the level difference against the humbucker. Nowadays I would say: take series/parallel, and use series most of the time.

[four/five]

Thanks for the reply. I’ll get a rotary sw and have a play with the different combinations and tones out.