Robert_the_damned

Wondering if I could bug y'all for one last question.

On my diagram, can I just bridge the ground from pot through killswtich to jack, like I did the hot wire? Or does the T-Junction need to be there for it to function properly?

so long as there's a wire going from the pot to the lug then from the same lug to the jack it'll be fine. Shouldn't make any differance what so ever.

Pete is there anything in guitar electronics you've not done, then re-done and completely altered and improved?

Kahler on a tele looks sweet, must get mine onto a guitar.....when I have a shop to build one in......

thanks guys! no i am not using a plumber grade soldering iron, i've got a decent quality electronics grade one. both these responses sound great! i'm going to try Robert's idea first since i already have my old 3 way switch laying around. but if it makes bad popping noises then i'll switch to an on/off switch. thanks again!

Ah good just worried by the mentioning of 'soldering gun' I think Anti-Idiot's way will work better tbh, not quite sure what I was thinking when I was writing my suggetion Which might pop a bit, probably no more than a pickup sellector when changing pickups (if the on/on is a make-before-break type) I'm not sure (don't use kill switches just use my vol pot or volume pedal!).

my main guitar right now is an older epiphone special 2 i gutted and rewired and replaced the pickups with just a X2N in the bridge anyways I'd like to make the controls on this guitar as simple as possible by setting it up so i only have an on/off switch on the guitar. are there any links or diagrams on how to do this? i fooled around with the soldering gun when i put in the new pickup but couldn't figure out how to make a kill switch. thanks in advance!

-Max

Right first things first, soldering gun? I hope you're not using a plummers solder gun, they're really not a good idea for guitar electronics, they use a soldier with acid in it which ends up corroding electronic components.

As for wiring up a kill switch its pretty easy. If you've got an on/on switch connect the pickup output to one outer lug, ground to the other outer lug and connect the middle lug to the output jack. This way one way will connect the amp to the pickup and the other throw will connect the amp to ground (rather than connecting it to nothing which is the same as putting a lead in your amp with no guitar on it i.e. it'll buzz like mad!).

Hope this is helpful.

The SD Seth Lover is not potted. That won't work for louder and higher gain music.

ok now I didn't expect that! my bad! You could always get one and if it sounds good get it potted, I would think they'd be a pickup repair shop that'd do that for you for a nominal charge, might be worth it if it'll give you the tone you want.

The Alnico II Pro from SD sounds like it would be the best bet, from SD. Any other brands to suggest?

You might also want to think about the new SD P-rails, I have one in the neck of a guitar and it sounds nice and has a lot of P90 quality to it even in humbucking mode (and not to much output even though its got quite a high DC resistance). One warning though is that this pickup seems really really sensitive to how close it is to the strings, took me a while to get it set right.

I personally like the Kent Armstrong line of pickups, a lot cheeper than SD pickups and IMHO just as good. Their standard PAF is pretty hot (8.9K) and alnico, unfortunately their PAF plus is ceramic which might cause it be to bright for your needs. They do make their 'rocker' (15K) with an alnico magnet and I have one of these in a Les Paul so I can vouch for it being a decent pickup, tones of dynamics and it'll handle high gain well too. After that they're pickup line goes all high output metal pickups (which I think I have one of each of now ), the super distortion is quite nice actually, don't remember that being overly trebbly but I was using it as a neck pickup so its hard to say.

Lots of people say Bareknuckle are good but I've never played anything of theres so I can't give any personal insight.

The metalic-y sheild inside the cable will be in contact with the bare and is grounded with that. That's basicly what the bare in these pickups is for.

I've done various differant star grounding styles before, everything from soldering all the grounds to a screw in the middle of the control cavity to quite complicated 'tree' styled star grounds (damn Les Pauls!). Defenatly the way to do it though!

My suggestion for a bridge pickup would probably be something with an alnico magnet wound to arround 8-10K, lower numbers of windings lead to lower inductance which will give you a lower resonance frequency (so should be less bright), though if you're saying an Alnico Pro II is still to bright you may have a problem. You say T-Tops have you tried the SD Seth Lover pickup? Might be what you're looking for.

496R? that's one of the ceramic magneted ones I seem to remember, if you're going for something less meaty in the bridge you'll probably want to put something ballanced with it in the neck. Again I'd say something Alnico and about 7-8k depending on what you've got in the bridge. If you like the Dimarzio PAF Pro that'd probably work well.

lug 4 should be the ground wire from the pickup (the green wire) not the sheild, the sheild should go directly to ground and not be connected up to the selector. You need to connect them up like this because of how the switch gets all the fancy differant coil combinations (in this case outer coils only I think but I'd have to trace it to be sure). The tone cap is electronicly in the same place they've just drawn the layout differantly

As for ground loop problems my advice would be to make sure that all your grounds connect to the output jack by one route and one route only. I also always use sheilded wire, makes it more difficult working out how to ground things to prevent loops but its less work than sheilding the whole cavity.

Hi EDLK,

I'm guessing this is for a guitar with two humbuckers yes? If so what brand? What switch are you looking to use? I've not seen many 6-ways, though I think one of the PRS rotary style ones is a 6-way, give me a link to the part and I'll do you a wiring diagram.

I think you could do this with a tele-type 3 way, wire the pickups to the selector then wire that to the blend pot, easy peasy. Not going to happen with a standard LP switch though!

If you'd like a diagram I'd be happy to do one.

There are blend pots with centre dents available, where to order them from will depend on where you are!

Are these truely the first neomag pickups.

well the first production ones I'd say..... bit more high tech than the pickups neodymium I made about two and a bit years ago!

I wonder if in low powered, low impedance active boosted designs whether the effects of covers would be more apparent?

I guess this was my question exactly - just couldn't get it out quite that clear.

I'd suggest maybe not, as the active part will compensate for any reduced output due to additional distance. Hell a low powered low impedance active boosted system is basically what an EMG is. Any pickup will have reduced output due to distance but if you've got a greater than unity amplifier afterwards it'll help reduce any lack of output due to pickups being far from the strings.

Any particular suggestions if I decide to go down that route Wez? I've got a number of pickups lieing arround so if I can get away with using something that I already have that'd be handy. This is only going to be used for playing metal so its going to be down in the mix anyway.

yeah I was thinking guitar humbuckers are going to sound well...yeah wont even go there.

I don't have a router unfortunately, and as this body is already routed I'd probbaly have to rebuild it and then re-route and its just a lot of hastle and I really need this to be a rather quick project.

Hi everyone,

I've recently bought an old Kay SG bass as I need a bass but have no money, as far as I know this body is routed for humbucker sized pickups (as in guitar humbuckers). I was wondering what options I had in the way of pickups that would be direct drop-ins but designed for bass. I know EMG does a bass HB but I've not found anything else whatsoever.

I'd rather not buy EMG as that would mean trippling the cost of the project! I'd be tempted to just use standard gutiar humbuckers but have no idea how that'll sound.

Any information would be appreciated.

Robert.

erm ouch!

If you're not wanting to fill it properly yet I'd be tempted to suggest just tapeing over it so it doesn't snag. Maybe putting something over the bare wood so the tape doesn't rip it out when you take it off. hardly a pretty or proper solution but at least its the back and it'll at least stop the wood from getting even more damaged.

Thanks for the replies guys.

I was thinking the intonation would be a bigger differance than on an electric (as the differance in string gauges would be greater) but it doesn't seem to bad.

Additional slots on a five string bridge it is then.

BTW, don't set it up with the octaves on the bottom, like I did- it's a pain to play this way, and I'm gonna have to change it around someday.

I was going to do it that way arround but if its a pain then I'll do it the other way.

Thanks again guys.

you might even see something being built in a few years at this rate!

Hi Guys,

the crazy thought of making a double stringed 5 string electric bass entered my mind the other month and I've been trying to find a suitable bridge (not trying particularly hard but keeping my eyes open on evilbay and such).

Is there anything even vaugely suitable available? If not any suggestions on making something would be welcomed. I know I've seen similar projects on this site before but the search function hates me at the moment. :

Rob.

The way I'd do it is to put a screw in from your neck pickup route to your bridge insert, you only need to screw it in until its in contact with the insert then you can solder a wire to the screw (make sure the screw isn't plated in something unsolderable before you screw it in!). I've done this on a couple of guitars and it works perfectly well, it also gives you a good point to attach your grounds to if you're star-grounding everything.

You won't be able to solder to the base of the bigsby as they aluminium which is pretty much unsolderable.

I'd agree with Greg in saying that you're not going to get a lot of sound with your pickups that far from the strings.

Personally I'd paint the body and just use a mirror pickguard and chromed pickups (if you're wanting that sort of look).

I'd follow the body shape sort of like this:

That's brutal! I love it

Its probably not *that* much smaller than a LP anyway (seeing as a strat is actually a lot larger in profile).

A question though: why the heck is your sustain block still in the body?

that's going to look cool with a nicely shaped pickguard. Something that follows the curves!

-Re-backing. It's kinda like retopping, but with the back... I want to buy some mahogany and stick the carved maple top on, to give the PoS some actual tone.

An interesting idea but if you're doing that much work you might as well be making a whole new body for it.

-Pickups. I'm thinking Seymours, getting a JB/59 or JB/Jazz, some versatile combo. Even if the project goes nowhere, I'll have good pickups

always handy to have a decent set of pickups.

-Electronics. new switches, pots, knobs, jack.

unless any of isn't working just use the stuff it comes with, expensive pots sound the same as cheep ones though you might want to use better wire (sheilded stuff if you're not shielding your cavitys) and maybe a new switch as really cheep switches do suck.

-Hardware. Basically just better tuners, maybe bridge and tailpiece.

I'd replace the tuners for sure. The bridge *might* need replacing but I don't see it neccisarily needing to be replaced. As long as the tail piece fits there's not a lot of point replacing it.

-Painting. I want to do black/sand/black for this awesome AAAA maple top, spray the back with opaque black, and do a faux binding if the maple top is thick enough to do so.

That sounds like it'd look nice. I think the top is actually a veneer and so proabbly less than a milimeter thick, you could route a binding channel and put in some maple binding if you're that into the faux binding thing.

-Making a new neck/fretboard??? I figure that I'd use the bolt-on until I have time to make my own set neck and glue that and carve it.

Again not a lot of point if you want to actually use the kit as if you did all this replacing you're basicly making a new guitar appart from carving the top.

Now, the real question is... Is it worth it to put that much effort into a Saga kit? I dunno if I'm being overly optimistic, but I see a bit o' promise in the guitar, as well as the fact that the only money I put into it is the upgrades, becasue the kit is free

I'd keep the body pretty much as it is and just stick some half decent pickups and tuners on it and it'll sound pretty good, not like a top of the line PRS but it'll sound better than a cheep off the shelf guitar.

Rob

Stuff is made cheaper and cheaper every day. The only thing I'd never worry about buying a warranty on is a Mesa.

dont they have a standard warranty period anyway ?

most amps ive bought come with 5 year limited warrantys , whatever all that means i dont know but 5 years seems good to me.

most televisions ive bought only have a year warranty and the failure rate seems a lot higher with tv's wonder why this is...

over use

I've had a Hitachi TV for at least 8 years and its still going strong dispite me using it a lot.

ANYWAY I hope you get your cab fixed wwwdotcomdotnet, if not a short trip to the local hardware store to buy some all steel casters that will just screw to the bottom of your cab replacing the marshall ones will be in order I believe!

'fraid its got to be doomlord's Judas Preist Tribute guitar....... I want one now no fair! **adds it to the list of things to build before I get to old to show off with them on stage**

looks cool.

now how the heck do you go about playing a walmart rack display?

Your build is looking really nice Hooglebug. I like the 'custom' markings on the headstock, they look very neatly done.