Hi, anyone recommend a good site for learning how to do your own circuit diagrams for guitar wiring? I've wired dozens of guitars in the past but never really understood the theory.

For example, I'm starting another build currently where I want to wire three humbuckers to a gibson style toggle selector, with a master volume, a master tone treble cut and a master tone bass cut. But have no idea how to go about putting a circuit together and, clearly, this isn't one you can just lift off the net! I'll probably go for a simple, neck or middle or bridge switch but if I knew the theory I could do something more challenging instead!

Also the humbuckers are four wire plus ground type so if I knew what I was talking about I could consider push pull pots for extra versatility, coil taps etc.

Anybody know where you can find a really good "how to draw your own guitar circuits" tutorial, sort of thing?

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.

Not a web site, but one of the better starting points is Guitar Electronics for Musicians by Donald Brosnac. Yes it's old and parts are out of date, yes it's poorly written in places, but it will give you the basics so that you can then go explore online and make the most of the internet. For many years it was the only reference available.

Dan Erlwine's Trade Secrets articles at StewMac as well as his books are very useful. And at Seymour Duncan support pages there are a lot of schematics, some FAQ's and about 250 articles written by Seymour that are published as Seymour's FAQs. A couple more pages about how pick-ups work are here and here. And as well as FX pedals, there is some interesting stuff about guitar wiring on the GEOFEX pages.

Get your head around those and you'll be able to use search engines to find more.

Hope that helps.

Andy

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When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

OK, cheers Zen, I'll check 'em out. In the meantime, anyone got a schematic for the above wiring scheme let me know!

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.

What pick-up selections do you need on the switch Huge? The Gibson style toggle has two inputs and select them individually or together. If you want to have neck in the up position, middle in the centre position and bridge in the down position... no chance.

Our friends StewMac offer this 6-way toggle switch that almost gives you the options you want. It will fit in Les Paul style cavities, although some will need modification to use it.

A rotary selector switch would do the job, but the PRS style switch is 5 positions and the Gibson Varitone style switch is 6 way. However, they wouldn't fit in a Les Paul style cavity although you could leave a dummy toggle switch there and put the rotary selector in place of a volume pot and then use the other 3 for Master Volume, Treble cut and Bass cut controls. A quick search found this 3 position rotary switch from RS. You would need to cut down the shaft to length and use a knob with a grub screw rather than a push on knob.

Bass cut circuits are less common on guitars, but a quick search found some useful schematics and info here that should get you started.

Andy

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When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

Well, what I'm doing is converting a Yamaha pacifica strat into a Rickenbacker 325-alike (!). This is the famous child-size John Lennon one in case you're unfamiliar with the name. So that's why I've got the three Artec humbuckers which look like Rickenbacker toasters and two large knobs and one small, the thought being to add a toggle for pickup selection to keep it looking in the spirit of the 325. I was going for three knobs for master vol, master treb cut and master bass cut as I mentioned.

But as far as pickup combinations go, I'm not too fussy. The original 325 pickup toggle offered: just bridge, all three or neck and middle. But with a 3 way toggle I guess I'd prefer to go for bridge, bridge and middle, and neck. Is that doable with a regular three position? (I've no idea what 3 pup Les Pauls offer, by the way???)

That stewmac switch looks fascinating though--useful for coiltapping. The description is a little vague but I assume it moves side to side as well as up and down or something?

PS Andy If you're interested you can see my other recent guitar conversion projects on Facebook--the Wilkocaster, the Fraudcaster and the Billycaster: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Plent/100928886698056?ref=tn_tnmn

Simon

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.

Yep, the switch moves from side to side as well...

You can see how Rickenbacker wired the 325 models on their support pages where they have a section devoted to schematics.

By far the easiest way to do what you want is to use a Fender style 3 way switch which should drop straight into the Pacifica.

Andy

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When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

I know, I could leave the loom exactly as it now in the usual strat configuration, but where's the challenge in that!

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.

ANdy, this switch is described as being for 3 pickup guitars. Is this different from a normal toggle? ie would this help me?
3way toggle

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.

Quote Huge Longjohns:

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ANdy, this switch is described as being for 3 pickup guitars. Is this different from a normal toggle? ie would this help me?
3way toggle

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Nope, does nothing like you need I'm afraid. Toggle switches are essentially A, B, or A+B, and that's it. Even the 6 way toggle I highlighted earlier is basically 2 normal toggle switches linked together mechanically in the same housing to get some extra options. Once you need to switch between 3 or more inputs you need a blade or rotary switch. Blade and rotary switches are variations of the same thing, the shaft or lever turns a wiper, or wipers, (similar to a rotary pot) to connect to different sets of connections. A toggle switch breaks pairs of connections that are normally closed by spring actions. Grab a Les Paul toggle and a Tele 3 way switch and examine how the work mechanically, that will give you a good idea what's happening.

Andy

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When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

Quote Huge Longjohns:

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I know, I could leave the loom exactly as it now in the usual strat configuration, but where's the challenge in that!

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But that's not what I said

I said use a switch that fits the body and make a loom that delivers the functionality you need. And quite clearly, that is a challenge. You may have to compromise the aesthetics to accommodate a switch that allows you to select one of three sources but to get your Master Volume, Master Treble Cut, and Master Bass cut you need a new loom.

Andy

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When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

i destroyed my strat with this site: guitar nuts
was good fun though

Quote leemo:

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i destroyed my strat with this site: guitar nuts
was good fun though

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Yep, that's another good resource and one I've had bookmarked for a long time now.

Andy

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When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

OK, made my decision. Toggle switch for bridge, bridge and middle, neck. THen vol, bass, treb using this circuit here:
Bass and treb cuts Thanks for all your help, Andy, much appreciated!

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.

+1 for the bass cut
been wanting to do this on my guitar for ages, just not had the time

Quote Huge Longjohns:

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OK, made my decision. Toggle switch for bridge, bridge and middle, neck. THen vol, bass, treb using this circuit here:
Bass and treb cuts Thanks for all your help, Andy, much appreciated!

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You're very welcome Huge.

There's a lot of wishy washy anecdotal stuff on that page, but the technical stuff is good and the circuit is just fine. As you are still new to this game it might be worth pointing out a few things from the schematic that you might not have picked up on.

The circuit is for a strat, but he has made some interesting choices and this might help you understand his explanation. The main issue is that he is using 500k pots rather than the 250k pots usually used for a strat. The value of the pots does make a difference, they affect the high frequencies by changing the load on the pick-up. The higher the value of the pot, the more high frequencies get through. Gibson originally used 300k pots and later switched to 500k pots for humbuckers because they are not as bright tonally as single coils.

One of the common tricks for fine tuning the sound of an instrument is to swap the some or all of the pots to ones of different values, especially the volume pot. A lot of metal guitarists use a 1Meg pot for the volume control on humbucker equipped guitars to get extra brightness. What we don't know here is whether he has chosen 500k pots just because he has a preference for a brighter tone, or whether he is also compensating for some treble loss due to the other changes to the circuit.

I would stick with the 500k pots as they are the norm for humbuckers, but if it sounded a little dull in use I would swap out the volume pot for a 1Meg pot.

Next, the Master Bass control will affect all 3 pick-ups. It is always in the circuit and is connected between the output of the pick-up selector and the Master Volume control (and this is why I wonder whether it might have affected the choice of pot values). However, the treble control will only work on the Neck and Middle pick-ups. If you want to use it as a Master Treble for all 3 pick-ups you will need to make a modification to the circuit.

If you want to do that, there are 3 ways you could do it easily. Which is best depends on the physical layout. Basically, you will only need one side of the switch so if you look at the schematic you can disconnect from the switch the wire that leads to the centre tag on the treble control and you can omit the two diagonal wires linking from one side (or pole) of the switch to the other. The wire from the centre tag of the tone control is then connected to either the pick-up output of the selector switch, the centre tag of the Bass control, or the input to the volume control. I would suggest the centre tag of the bass control would be the neatest way to do it.

And finally, even though it is a strat circuit it will work equally well with a 3 way tele style switch.

Hope that helps.

Andy

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When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

Brilliant, Andy, thanks! Take me a while to get my head round this but I'll enjoy the learning curve! I'd love to be able to 'read' a circuit like you've just done and know what's going on! I've been doing mods to guitars for so many years but without the slightest idea what the wires did, really!

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.

Cheers Huge,

And if it helps, I started with 'painting-by-numbers' just like you did. The good news is that it really does start to make sense after a while, the bad news is that, like so many things, the more you learn, the more you realise you need to learn. Ho Hum !!

Switches seem simple, but once you get to multiple pole switches it's easy to get confused. When you are looking at schematics with switches it's definitely worth getting out the pencil and paper and working out a separate circuit diagram for each switch position to help you understand what's going on. That helped me learn a lot, and it's something I still do now.

Did you see the schematic for the Peavey Omniac I posted in another thread recently? I'd read several descriptions of what the 5 different switch positions did, they all made sense but I still couldn't get my head around how it all worked. So I printed it out and took it to the pub along with a pencil and paper, and then I sat at the bar with a pint or 3 of cider and patiently worked through it, drawing out the circuit for each switch position. Turned out to be a quiet night in the pub so I got all 5 positions drawn out, the explanations I'd read suddenly made a lot more sense, and the barmaid was pretty impressed too It's a very flexible and powerful wiring loom and with the aid of my notes I can now reverse engineer that circuit and apply the ideas elsewhere.

And my tame amp tech has about 40 years experience, he still prefers to work through a circuit and draw out his own schematics because that helps him to better understand what is going on.

So don't worry, it will all come together with practice

Andy

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When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

Yes, you're right. And part of the problem is that, for me currently (!), actual schematics seem to bear so little relation to pictorial wiring diagrams. I can follow the latter, obviously, but schematics seem so unnecessarily complicated to the untrained eye! You see a pictorial diagram and it's clear that three wires all join onto the same lug on a pot but on the schematic they might all appear to be joined at various places along their length etc!

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.

Found this schematic for a three pickup sg or firebird. Is this a regular toggle switch or a special one? Firebird

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.

Looks like a regular 3-way switch — the middle positions is pickups 2+3 together, but the third pickup has a pot so you can roll that all the way down and effectively use it for just pickup 2 (the first position is just pickup 1, the third is just pickup 3).

I think...

Cheers!

Chris

No, it is DEFINITELY a different switch. Allparts carry them in right angle and straight configurations, I've linked to the straight version here because they don't have a photo of the right angle version that was used in the Firebird VII and SG. For comparison, here's a standard right angle switch used with 2 pick-ups.

The forum post the image is linked to does confirm it is a different switch with an extra blade. But that is a difficult schematic to read without having an example of the switch to hand. It's not clear how the connections are made and broken in the 3 different toggle positions just from looking at the schematic.

Andy

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When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

Now I'm REALLY confused, Andy. Isn't that switch you've linked to the same as the one I linked to earlier in the thread which you said COULDN"T do the three pick up thing?

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.

Yes, it is Huge

The difference is the context. When you first linked to it, I replied saying that it wouldn't do A, B, or C switching s you required. Don't forget that you specified that you needed to select A, or B, or C, individually, not in combination, that switch gives you A, B+C, and C. But when you later linked to the post with the schematic you asked a different question, was it a normal switch or a special one. And I replied that it was a special one and provided the links for clarification. Remember, a lot of people visit the SOS forums and read posts here, so I always bear that in mind when I answer. And it was important to make that distinction after Korf had suggested it was a standard switch.

The bottom line is that it was the wrong switch when you first linked to it, and it remains the wrong switch now.

Andy

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When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

Quote:

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Toggle switches are essentially A, B, or A+B, and that's it.

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Sorry, I took what you said here to mean that there weren't any toggle switches that were designed for anything other than two pickups. Told you I was in need of a lot of education.

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"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge" Charles Darwin.