Captainstrat

I would be interested to know how you wired the 4pdt switch for a strat...I posted a diagram somewhere...but recently I redid the whole scheme for another guitar that worked a bit better. This wasn't a strat so that could be a problem if you are using all three pickups and the driver.

Currently I've sacrificed the neck pickup position until I can figure out a way to convert a pickup into a driver while still preserving the pickup the way you did...I've found an inexpensive rails pickup made by TOG which might be a good candidate. It suddenly dawns on me that the driver coil must actually touch the polepieces and that winding the driver coil around the top 3 mm's of the existing coil won't work; is that right?

I've wired the hot and ground leads to the middle and bridge pickups to the 4PDT switch so that in non sustainer mode the hot leads go to the pickup selector switch and the ground wires go to the common ground, and in sustainer mode the middle pickup is disconnected and the hot and ground leads from the bridge pickup go to the circuit (the ground connectes the the battery's - )

Ahhhh...the dreaded fizz...you have failed to properly bypass everything...perhaps the ground. This distortion should be different with the two modes as well.

D'oh! Dear sir I do believe you've hit the nail right on the head: I wired the circuit's (the Ruby Amp) ground to the output jack, bypassing the star ground...keep in mind that I only get the fizz in non sustainer mode while using the Variax's power supply. In sustainer mode, no fizz, the sound is clean. Without power (using a plain mono cord) the "straight strat" tone sounds as if the tone's rolled all the way off.

A lot of people have doubted me, or taken unsuccessful short cuts...but most simply use a single bridge pickup and so never have to tackle this. You need to not only cut the hot wire of that middle pickup...but also the ground and connect them together and to nothing else.

That I have done via the 4PDT switch!

In sustainer mode - the buffered output works like a charm: the bridge single coil sounds bright and loud.

This bit I don't understand...I thought it was muffled no matter what. Normally I would suggest that your circuit is loading down the pickups but you are right to suspect the tone grounding I think.

Nope, I do have a bad habit of skipping from one point to another in my posts, my bad ... but to summerize:

• regular cord (no power) - dull sound as if the tone was rolled all the way off - using the tone control has no effect
  
• stereo cord (power on from the Variax power supply) clean sound in sustainer mode (I send the signal from the FET transistor to the output jack - oops - that ain't bypassed either when switching to "normal" mode) though there is little sustain so far
  
• stereo cord (power on) dull sound like in non powered mode, and fizzy, overdriven sound.
  

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I have been busy doing a very complicated circuit for a guitar being built in the USA and featuring my new commercial prototype version that evolved from this thread. I replicated the pickups outlay on a cheap guitar (single neck+ driver and bridge HB) mounted on a piece of cardboard. First...I tested the circuit and driver were working with just the HB and a volume control. The I added in the 4pdt switch and selector...then I added the tone. The rest was pretty weird with dual kill switches and stuff so it did get a little bit busy. Once it was working ok...I checked all the connections, shortening the leads as required...then taped everything up including the posts so there would be no possible way of shorting and all the wires were bundled together and taped as one.

Once finished the whole thing looks neat and you know it works and will fit. You take it off the cardboard and just pop it into the control cavity (maybe a little pushing a squeezing)! mine was tricky too because I used a cheap strat but the guitar is being custom built...the layout then was done like this to ensure everything was where it would be in the real guitar.

You are much more patient than I am!

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A lot of the problems you are having destroy the efficiency of the circuit. For instance...if your tone is grounding, not only are you hearing a bad signal...so is the circuit trying to drive the string.

Hmmm...now I can't wait to add that PVC tape and try it again! Many thanks for the input!

What I think the problem is: before proceeding with the DIY sustainer project, I sheilded the Strat and star-grounded it; redid all of the wiring with 22 gauge wire. Could it be that one lead from the tone cap is shorting against the copper tape? My shrink-wrapping skills leave a lot to be desired ...at any rate, if the tone cap is shorting against the sheilding, could this result in that "rolled all the way off" sound I'm getting?

Possibly. Use a multimeter set on ohms and check for resistance between the lead in question and ground. You should get a few hundred K (because of the pots). If you get zero, then it's shorted.

Bingo ... looks like I got to "look under the hood" again! A bit of electrical tape should fix this I hope!

Does it work very well?

I mounted the circuit last night; ever tried to mount a ship in a bottle? I ended up having to trim off unused pieces of the perfboard to allow it to fit in the pocket I routed last week (invisible under the pickguard.)

In sustainer mode - the buffered output works like a charm: the bridge single coil sounds bright and loud. I am getting controlled feedback... mostly from the D string, past the 12th fret. But at least the whole effort wasn't a complete bust!

But now it's clear why Fernandes uses a rail polepiece: the magnetic field is more uniform and will allow string bends. Also, I need to get to that trimpot and incease that volume.

The big "what happened"? question: using a regular guitar cord (no power to the circuit) the guitar should perform like a regular Strat. As it stands the guitar sounds like the treble's been rolled off all the way.

Using the stereo cable (power on) with the sustainer circuit on bypass, not only does it sound like the tone control is rolled all the way off; but I'm getting some weird-ass distortion ...

What I think the problem is: before proceeding with the DIY sustainer project, I sheilded the Strat and star-grounded it; redid all of the wiring with 22 gauge wire. Could it be that one lead from the tone cap is shorting against the copper tape? My shrink-wrapping skills leave a lot to be desired ...at any rate, if the tone cap is shorting against the sheilding, could this result in that "rolled all the way off" sound I'm getting?

Okay...since Fernandes guitars aren't distributed in Canada I'd gotten it through my thick skull to take a stab at it myself... I found this wonderful site (oh no! ) and got cracking.

First thing I've learned is that winding the driver at the top of a DiMarzio Virtual Vintage is an exercise in frustration: the wax they use for potting make the top 3 mm's very slippery indeed!

So I found me an open coil Fender pickup (99 cents on ebay) and butchered it to my heart's content ... 70 winds of gauge 34 wire and I have a solid 8.2 Ohms, using masking tape as a spacer and hot glue to make the coil stay in place. In Theory, I should have a functional driver, even if I am at this stage sacrificing the neck position.

Note to self - thouroughly test the circuit before mounting it ... the old Radio Shack handbook has the 386 wired a certain way while The Ruby circuit is wired differently; although the circuits are similar. Using a stereo jack and my Variax's power supply I've firgured out a way to forgo batteries altogether.

I got me a small 8 Ohm speaker and I'm going to test the circuit externally before attempting the internal mount to the "driver". Try both variations of the circuit and get a feel for which one sounds better.

Oh yeah...in "sustainer" mode, all of the gain in the world won't do jack squat if you forget to send the bridge pickup's signal back to the output jack...d'Oh! And clearly label the wires with tape; that'll avoid an embarrassing situation such as having the battery + hooked up to the out! Learning every day ...

Oh, and I've hooked up my remaining pickups to a 4PDT mini switch - this way I bypass the middle pickup entirely and move the bridge pickup's hot & ground wires to the sustainer circuit at the flip of a switch!

Bad idea then...thanks for the replies!

It's a long, long thread and my question's been missed ... I was wondering; rather than rewinding a pickup as a driver (thus losing the neck position) what if a resistor of appropriate value was patched between the hot and ground leads of the neck pickup, thus dividing the value down to 8 Ohms?

Wired to a dpdt switch, the player can switch from "regular" to sustainer at the flip of a switch... could that work?

Hi dudes & dudettes, newbie in the house! What I'm about to ask may be a stupid question (I'm not an electronics expert) but I've been wondering: could a resistor be wired to the output of the mini amp circuit to divide the neck pickup's impedance to 8 Ohms?

This way with a DPDT switch one could select between regular guitar operation (and not sacrifice the neck pickup position) and sustainer operation where the existing neck pickup becomes the ad-hoc driver?

Just a thought...and my apologies if this question has already been asked, this is quite a lenghty thread!