single coil sounds from a humbucker

What's the best way to get single coil (strat, tele sounds) out of a humbucker? should i (option 1) have a coil tap and then add resistors/ capacitors to strengthen the weak single coil sound or (option 2) should i install a varitone switch? I read some reviews and some folks say you can get a strat and tele sound around the middle position of the varitone switch. I use a classic 57 and a classic 57 plus on my les paul.

http://www.dimarzio.com/hum_hell.html

Originally posted by Guitar-Sam
Go with a series/parallel switch or an out of phase witch and use the pickup in a an inbetween position on the switch.A humbucker in parallel sounds pretty single coily.
A tap(coil split)will only slightly drop the humbuckers fullness and output and will hum like a single coil.
As far as the Varitone I dunno??

Hey foo',

I've deleted you double-posted thread in Tone & Effects and moved the one reply into the thread you started in Tech Talk.

I've heard of the dimarzio humbucker from hell- my friend has them on his HSH configuration strat and they sound very good- but I'm really happy with the pickups that I have right now. Sorry about the misunderstaning. When I said I wanted a single coil sound, I didn't mean that I wanted to change my tones permanently by changing the pickups. I'm a biggie of the PAF sound. What I meant was more in the lines of getting that single coil sound (tele/ strat) through a means of a switch somewhere whether it be through a coil tap or a varitone switch ala B.B. King or the blueshawk. thnx.


[Edited by Lordathestrings on 12-30-2003 at 06:16 PM]

sorry for the double post eggman, I didn't know under which heading should my post be so I did it in both.

My luthier did advised me about adding a series/parallel switch or an out of phase switch but I'm worried about having to mess with the pickup. You see, the classic 57 and 57 plus only has 2 braided wires instead of four so (I might be wrong about this one but)I'm guessing you have to mess up with the pickups. I know its not a big of a deal but I have become paranoid about my pickups lately because I am very happy with the sounds I am getting from them. A slight change in the tone that is caused by tweaking the pickups would drive me nuts- so as tempting as it may seem I had to throw that one away. Besides, I don't think the paf pickups were designed for coil taps and for making them out of phase. If they were, I think Gibson would give them 4 braided wires instead of 2. But again, this is just my uninformed opinion. Maybe you guys know better.

As for the coil tap, I am aware that it often leads to a weak thin tone- especially with not so hot pickups like the ones I have, so I did some research on the local library about guitar wirings. From there, I found out that you can do a capacitor tap to strengthen the thin tone- but I've also found out that the boost provided by the capacitor tapped coil can be too much for a good single coil.

My best option so far (I think) is to add a varitone switch. I've never tried one. Some people say that its useless and many of them disabled it. But I've heard blueshawk players report that you can get a good strat and tele sound somewhere in the 4,5 position. BB King also uses it in his Lucille and never removes it in the middle position. I wanted to try the Lucille to see it for myself (I don't know where in my area can I find a blueshawk) but someone already bought it when I went to the music store today.

Does anyone here own a blueshawk or an ES 335- or any guitar with a varitone tell me if you can get a strat and a tele sound from a varitone switch?

A PAF or a PAF Pro (or a FRED for that matter) sound very good with a coil tap. I use a PAF Pro on one of my HSS guitars, and I have a coil tap on it, but its such a bright sounding pickup that for rhythm parts it sounds close enough to a single coil that I dont use it.

What PAF is it sambob, is it a classic 57?

No, just a PAF, I don't think they made the 57 model when this was bought :P

If your humbucker has 4 wires (4 conductor humcucker), then go for the Series/ Parallel Switch. You don't get the 60 cycle hum, and it sounds like single and humbucker. I have it, and its awesome.

Originally posted by the fool
... My luthier did advised me about adding a series/parallel switch or an out of phase switch but I'm worried about having to mess with the pickup. You see, the classic 57 and 57 plus only has 2 braided wires instead of four so (I might be wrong about this one but)I'm guessing you have to mess up with the pickups...

If your pups only have two wires, you can't coil-tap them either!

A coil tap switch simply shorts out one of the two coils in a humbucker. That's why they become noisy - you lose the hum-cancelling effect of the two coil design. To coil tap a humbucker, you need to bring a wire to the switch from the connetion between the pup coils. On a 2-wire pup, that means opening it up to add another wire. A 4-wire 'bucker simply gives you access to both ends of each coil so that you can hook 'em up any way you want to.

Yes on a 2 conductor pup you can't coil tap either.You can however add a out of phase switch still,in the middle position on the selector switch you'll get a straty tone.
As far as having a 4conductor cable added it won't effect the pups sound at all.BC Rich used to use guild pups in the seventys,they were all 2 wire and they opened each up and added the 4wire cable on.Just peel the tape of very gentaly and don't chip off any more potting wax than needed to add the two extra wire,retape it and glue the end were the tape over lapes you should be fine.

Lord of the strings

I know that you can't coil tap a pickup that only has two wires that's why my luthier advised on adding a four conductor cable. At that time though I didn't go with it because as I said before I was paranoid about my pickups and the whole tweaking thing. I was afraid that tweaking the the pickups can alter the tone quite a bit because my pickup is not very high output. It's actually low.

Sambob

If a four conductor cable won't alter the sound of my pickups in any way, which one should I do- add an out of phase switch or add a four conductor cable? which one would produce the best single coil sound?

And To Everyone

You guys have been extremely helpful and patient with me. Thank you!!!

And a million thanks to you sambob and lordadastrings for everything. Of all the sites that I'v joined this is the most useful because of guys like you. I really appreciate it. Thank you!!!

Originally posted by the fool
... If a four conductor cable won't alter the sound of my pickups in any way, which one should I do- add an out of phase switch or add a four conductor cable? which one would produce the best single coil sound? ...

Do the conversion to a 4-wire setup. Change two of your pots to push-pull types so you can select series/parallel coil connection. Series connection is the normal humbucker - parallel connection gives you a good single-coil sound while retaining the hum-cancelling feature of the pickup. You can also add a phase switch to give some additional options.

Out-of-phase humbuckers give a low output with a 'hollow' sound that's almost like flanging. If you have separate volume controls you can adjust the pickup balance to get the optimum mix of output/phasing.

I play Yamaha SBG1000 guitars with DiMarzio 4-wire pickups in them. The stock setup had coil tap switches in the Tone pots that I rewired for series/parallel selection. I changed out one of the Volume pots to include a Phase switch. That provides a dozen possible combinations. I don't routinely use all of 'em, but I don't have to settle for same-old-same-old either.

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Originally posted by lordathestrings

... Change two of your pots to push-pull types so you can select series/parallel coil connection.
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OK, all of this sounds really good. I'd love to have a series/parallel option and a phase switch. It's sort of like ala Jimmy Page!!! However, this is my problem. I can't replace any pots in my guitar any further because I've already used all of the space for the ghost sytem/ hexpander system that I've installed! You see, I have replaced the two volume controls with 2 dual concentric pots wired volume/ tone, volume/ tone because I don't want to lose the ability to have two volume and two tone controls. The remaining two tone pots I have replaced with a push pull pot which serves as a mid/dark boost and volume pot for the graphtech ghost system (piezo), while the other tone, I removed to make space for the hexpander volume pot (midi/synthesizer capabilities). All in all, its like having 7 pots occupying those 4 holes in my les paul- its pretty crowded already, so I have no idea where to place those two push pull pots for series/ parallel coil connection- that is... unless I have to drill extra holes and add extra pots. Now, I don't mind drilling holes but I have this thing with adding extra pots because you see, I already have a varitone switch and a couple of pots comming for the built- in chorus effect which means I have to drill 4 more holes!!! For aesthetic reasons, I want to make my lespaul look as normal as possible. I don't want to have a weird- looking les paul hollowbody with 8 pots. So now, my question is, is there a way in which we can achieve a series/parallel option and a phase switch without adding two more pots- ie. for instance, adding some switch or something somewhere? Anyways, thanks a lot for the suggestion.

I think Lorda was suggesting a push-pull pot to keep the stock look. You can set up separate switches for coil-tapping and series-parallel switching. These could be any kind of switch, like a mini-toggle that would not be too noticeable, anywhere there's room.

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Originally posted by I amthe_eggman
I think Lorda was suggesting a push-pull pot to keep the stock look.
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I know that. But all four spaces are already occupied by either a double concentric pot, a push pull pot, or by a hexpander pot so I am not to sure how we can preserve the stock look by adding 2 push pull pots- unless we drill additional holes.

As for mini toggle switches- how many of these would I need for a (1)series/parallel option and (2) a phase switch and how do I go about wiring it? thnx. Also, (3) what's a good strategic place to put the mini toggle switches so that they are barely noticeable. I heard jimmy hides them under a pick guard but my les paul doesn't have any. You've seen a pic of my les paul right? I posted it before. What's your say about this?

Originally posted by the fool
... But all four spaces are already occupied by either a double concentric pot, a push pull pot, or by a hexpander pot so I am not to sure how we can preserve the stock look by adding 2 push pull pots- unless we drill additional holes...

hmm... well, I gues it's time to get out the drill...

You and Incidents Happen should get together. He keeps dreaming up incredibly complex systems that will do everything but make the morning coffee! LOL.

Three Double-Pole-Double-Throw (DPDT) switches will handle the task. One for each pickup to select series/Parallel. One to reverse the Phase of one pickup releative to the other.

The DiMarzio website has wiring diagrams to show how it's done. Click on 'Pickups' and then select "Installation and wiring".

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Originally posted by Lordathestrings
You and Incidents Happen should get together. He keeps dreaming up incredibly complex systems that will do everything but make the morning coffee! LOL.
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lol lol Maybe we should. There's a saying that two heads are better than one. Right now, I can imagine the headache that we cause to you and to eggman and to the other techies in this site lol. You know, I'm just new to the site- I've never met Incidents Happen but if I do, maybe we can make up something totally amazing that will make both of us rich! like... a modified varitone switch where you can get tele, strat, gibson, ibanez, prs sounds so you don't have to put them extra pots or dpdt switches- just one big switch that'll give you everything, or inventing a quadruple concentric pot for volume/tone/equalizer/boost whatever lol... i don't know, there's so many things in my head right now- but watch out Lordathestrings. You gave me an idea and ideas are a very dangerous thing! Someday I might come up with something that I might rule the world with. Man, now thanks to you, I found my new year's resolution. Note to self: this comming New Year I should only go out with engineers and have an engineer girl friend.
lol

Anyways, thank you very much Lordathestrings. I appreciate all the help greatly! I would also like to extend my thanks to the other members who also contributed to this post. To the folks who have read this thread, I hope you guys learned something from this. Lastly, to all the dreamers and tone seekers out there always thinking of an idea of making their guitar, I hope this little thread have given you guys an idea. Thanks a lot :)