Wiring Two Lace Sensors (singles) As A Humbucker...

[~Maxx]

Hi folks. I was wondering if i could draw on someone's experience and knowledge in dealing with these Lace Sensor pickups I have lying around. I have three golds which I pulled out of a late 80's Strat, and a red that I inherited with a box of random parts. I didn't like the golds in my Strat - which I've set up as a blues/rock instrument - so I thought I'd try them in my Harmony Strat copy, which I've always used for slightly "heavier" sounds (I'm not much into metal - but we'll say "heavier rock"). I've always had a humbucker in the bridge on this one though, and was wondering if I could make use of all four of these Lace Sensors somehow. From the reading I've done it sounds like the reds have more output than the golds, so I wasn't sure where to put it. If I wire two in series for the bridge I'm assuming I'd be best off using two of the golds. But then what? Red in the mid and gold on the neck? Or is this all just a silly idea?

I think what's got me stuck is that I don't really understand how the Lace Sensors work. If you have a set of three (ie. three golds), is one of them hotter and darker for the lead position? Or are they all exactly the same? I'm assuming that RWRP is a moot point with these since they're not actually coiled, correct?

I guess I just need a bit more info if anyone has it. Very much appreciated!

[verhoevenc]

As far as I know, and the short read of their wiki page, I don't think RWRP is a moot point. As far as I can tell they are pretty close to standard pickups with a tweek or two here or there. So if you wanted to make a "humbucker" you should find out which was originally the "middle" pickup of the 3 golds and simple wire them up together in series and place them right next to one another. However, unless you happen to have a "red" that was also a "middle" pickup, I think you're gunna be up the creek with the idea of making two humbuckers out of them.

That said, why not just buy some humbuckers? I mean, if it's a Lace thing, their used humbuckers go for pretty cheap on the 'Bay sometimes. Also, my first "serious" (read: not cheaply made copy junk) guitar was a late 90s Fender Tele Plus (V2) that has 3 lace golds in it and I love the sound. I still have the guitar and play it quite often (we had a falling out for awhile, but we get along fine again). I think the gold's are great pickups and I would LOVE to put a set of 3 of them in a guitar just as they are.

If you want humbuckers, buy some humbuckers. If you want 3 lace gold singles, use those.

Chris

[~Maxx]

Thanks for the reply Chris. I'm actually only looking to make one humbucker (for the bridge) - the mid and neck will be single coils. I dug out my meter and checked all four pups just to see what the output difference was between the red and gold, and to find out if the lead gold read any higher than the other two. The golds all read about 5.75K, but the red weighs in at a whopping 15K! As far as the RWRP situation I could swear I read years ago that since these were noiseless pickups there was no need for it. I've been shopping around for pickups quite a bit the last few months, and I've never seen a Lace Sensor advertised as RWRP. But I'm not willing to cast out your assumptions based on my own Chris. If anyone can clear this up for us I'm sure we'd both be appreciative

Setting aside the RWRP issue, I'm a bit worried now about the balance of output. I'm pretty excited to hear what this red can do, but how are these poor golds going to keep up? If I can get away with dual golds in series on the bridge, I suppose they'll do well enough with the red in the mid position. But what about neck pup? It seems like it would be terribly underpowered compared to the other two.

I'm not at all opposed to buying new pickups for this guitar, but I'm still in the process of dumping money into my Strat. The Harmony's always been a bit of a Frankenstein anyway. At one point, while I was refinishing the Fender, I did throw the Lace Sensors in the Harmony's mid and neck. I liked them for what I was playing at the time, but when I put them back in the Fender I decided that they weren't what I was looking for in a blues setup. So I pulled them out. I'm still experimenting, but right now I think I'm sold on the Texas Special in the mid, and I'm going to order a Lil 59 for the bridge. The neck has an SD Quarter Pounder right now, but I don't think I'm quite happy with it. Not sure where I'll go with that. Maybe another Texas Special?

Anyway - I have a few spare minutes, so I think I'll hit Google about these Lace Sensors. I'll post my findings (if any). Chris or anyone else - feel free to chime in with any wisdom you might have. Much appreciated!

[lvs]

A red Lace Sensor is normally installed at the bridge, but of course there's no law against your own preferences.

I think I'd be much interested to try red+gold as the "bridge dually" with the red one at the outside, and a SP on-off-on switch to select them separately or both in series. A SPDT could be used instead if both in series doesn't really sound like an asset. The extra pickguard hole for the switch could be avoided by replacing one of the tone controls with it. The remaining pickups and wiring would be like standard. So you end up with all stock tones possible from a SSS guitar, with the switch giving you an extra hot "superstrat" option. Just some ideas.

As Chris said, Lace Sensors are electrically pretty close to standard pickups - they have coils too - but their magnetic structure is different. They pick up less noise and display less string pull. That said, one may suppose RWRP ones don't exist because they aren't necessary, however I must admit I'm not 100% sure. My own experience with Lace Sensors by the way was a gold-silver-blue set in a Strat in the past and they were quieter than traditional single coils for sure.

Edited August 27, 2010 by lvs

[verhoevenc]

It was my understanding that the only magnet difference was that they're weaker. Companies use, correct me if I'm wrong, RWRP pickups not for their humcancelling characteristics when paired with a normal pickup, but for the fact two pickups in series when one's NOT RWRP sound pretty danged funky. So this isn't a magnet style, noiselessness issue from where I see it, it's a "will this sound right" issue. Furthermore, by definition humbuckers should have one RWRP coil since that's what provides the hum canceling properties. To my knowledge two normal pickups played in series and close together (physically) would not cancel hum since the electrical interference isn't canceled out by the reverse coil/magnet arrangement.

Although, I could be wrong, I'm not a huge electronics guy.

Chris

[lvs]

Hi Chris, I suppose you refer to the honky out-of-phase sound people sometimes get after installing a pickup whose polarity is unfriendly to the others. To my knowledge it goes like this : two single coils connected in series or in parallel, and having the same coil and magnet polarity with regard to each other, will sound in phase. The same goes when they have opposite coil polarity AND opposite magnetic polarity ("reverse wound, reverse polarity"). The other two combinations of coil and magnetic polarities result in a out-of-phase sound : that is, when there is only a difference in coil polarity, or only in magnetic polarity.

So if you have two identical single coil pickups, and modify one of them swapping the coil connections and flipping the magnet(s), combining them will sound the same as before. That's often done with a Strat's middle pickup. But why combining a pickup with a RWRP one, since it won't matter for the resulting sound : to cancel out hum that's radiated from external sources (like for example an CRT monitor) into the coils, when both pickups are on.

A simple explanation for the hum being cancelled while the string signals remain in phase, is that in the RWRP pickup, the string signal is "flipped twice" : once by the reversed coil, and once by the reversed magnet polarity, and like flipping a coin twice, the result is a null operation. The hum signal on the other hand is only affected by the reversed coil and not by the reversed magnet polarity, so it's "flipped once" and becomes opposite to the other pickup's hum signal, resulting in each other's cancellation.

A single Lace Sensor is constructed in a way that the coil is "protected" against hum radiation by what Lace calls a "radiant field barrier". Is that it's only protection against interference or might there be more? Dunno. When combining two of them, I think it's enough to know that each one performs good against hum individually, so extra measures like making one RWRP would seem a bit overdone.

[~Maxx]

A red Lace Sensor is normally installed at the bridge, but of course there's no law against your own preferences.

I think I'd be much interested to try red+gold as the "bridge dually" with the red one at the outside, and a SP on-off-on switch to select them separately or both in series. A SPDT could be used instead if both in series doesn't really sound like an asset. The extra pickguard hole for the switch could be avoided by replacing one of the tone controls with it. The remaining pickups and wiring would be like standard. So you end up with all stock tones possible from a SSS guitar, with the switch giving you an extra hot "superstrat" option. Just some ideas.

Hey lvs. Welcome to the discussion. Do you really think a red and gold dually would make a decent combo? I would have thought, given the output difference, that adding a gold in series with the red would be like tossing a pebble into the Grand Canyon. You'd hardly know it's there. I can see why the reds are generally installed in the bridge position. They sure are hot sob's. A dual gold setup on the bridge though would get me somewhere between 11 & 12, which I hoped would keep up with the red at 15. I tend to favor the middle pup anyway, and rarely use the lead by itself. My Harmony already has coil tapping and phase reversal across the board anyway, so in the long run experimentation would be a snap once everything's installed.

It was my understanding that the only magnet difference was that they're weaker. Companies use, correct me if I'm wrong, RWRP pickups not for their humcancelling characteristics when paired with a normal pickup, but for the fact two pickups in series when one's NOT RWRP sound pretty danged funky. So this isn't a magnet style, noiselessness issue from where I see it, it's a "will this sound right" issue. Furthermore, by definition humbuckers should have one RWRP coil since that's what provides the hum canceling properties. To my knowledge two normal pickups played in series and close together (physically) would not cancel hum since the electrical interference isn't canceled out by the reverse coil/magnet arrangement.

Although, I could be wrong, I'm not a huge electronics guy.

Chris

Good point about the sound vs hum canceling Chris. For some reason it never crossed my mind. I did some reading, and couldn't find anything "official" about rwrp on the Lace Sensors. There were several posts in the Fender forum, though, that indicated rwrp was not necessary for hum canceling with these as they are low output and sheilded. But I also found several references to a a Lace Sensor silver that was available rwrp, but no indication as to what it's purpose is. I couldn't find anything about the factory duallies consisting of an rwrp coil either. I did find a wiring schematic, but I don't think it really tells us anything we don't already know (though they do have a funky way of wiring these things up in my opinion). I also found a short, but informative review of the Lace Sensor line. A good quick read if your interested in understanding them a bit more. Again though, nothing about rwrp.

I guess I'm just going to have to try it out and see what happens! Not sure when I'll get around to it, but I'll post my findings when I get it all tested out. My thanks to all! And if anyone has anything else to add go ahead and jump on in. I'll be monitoring this thread.

[~Maxx]

Hi Chris, I suppose you refer to the honky out-of-phase sound people sometimes get after installing a pickup whose polarity is unfriendly to the others. To my knowledge it goes like this : two single coils connected in series or in parallel, and having the same coil and magnet polarity with regard to each other, will sound in phase. The same goes when they have opposite coil polarity AND opposite magnetic polarity ("reverse wound, reverse polarity"). The other two combinations of coil and magnetic polarities result in a out-of-phase sound : that is, when there is only a difference in coil polarity, or only in magnetic polarity.

So if you have two identical single coil pickups, and modify one of them swapping the coil connections and flipping the magnet(s), combining them will sound the same as before. That's often done with a Strat's middle pickup. But why combining a pickup with a RWRP one, since it won't matter for the resulting sound : to cancel out hum that's radiated from external sources (like for example an CRT monitor) into the coils, when both pickups are on.

A simple explanation for the hum being cancelled while the string signals remain in phase, is that in the RWRP pickup, the string signal is "flipped twice" : once by the reversed coil, and once by the reversed magnet polarity, and like flipping a coin twice, the result is a null operation. The hum signal on the other hand is only affected by the reversed coil and not by the reversed magnet polarity, so it's "flipped once" and becomes opposite to the other pickup's hum signal, resulting in each other's cancellation.

A single Lace Sensor is constructed in a way that the coil is "protected" against hum radiation by what Lace calls a "radiant field barrier". Is that it's only protection against interference or might there be more? Dunno. When combining two of them, I think it's enough to know that each one performs good against hum individually, so extra measures like making one RWRP would seem a bit overdone.

Ahh... Just saw this lvs... Very good stuff! So basically I should be able to put two of these in series without any worry of phase or hum issues? It's just going to be a matter of weather or not I like the sound they produce. Like I said - I'll post my results. Thanks again!

[lvs]

I tend to favor the middle pup anyway

Then I'd say by all means, go ahead and try the red one at that position and put two golds in series at the bridge. I share you concern about the red's output, but there's also more room available than with traditional pickups for adjusting the distances of the sensors to the strings so their volumes even out. The gold-gold can get pretty close before getting worried about string pull. Also, a dual gold at the bridge is a proven combination tonewise - I remember seeing one in a JB model by the way.