Position 2 humbucking? (H/S/S)

[grumptruck]

http://www.seymourduncan.com/support...l_1tone_5w.htm

I am using the above link and I am not getting any humbucking in position 2 of a 5 way switch.

My Neck pickup is RW/RP APS-1, my mid is a APS-1, and my Bridge is a Tony Iommi Signature (Gibson).

My wiring is exactly like the diagram but....Gibson's color scheme's are different....Red is hot, My white and green are soldered together, and black and bare wire go to ground.

Any ideas or help would be awesome.

[grumptruck]

bumpage.

[Fresh_Start]

Here is some useful info on winding, wiring & polarity of diff pups: http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Electron...2.html#details this is "Page 2" - in the middle of "Page 1" there's a great chart showing a matrix of all the possible magnetic and winding combinations.

I've never touched a Gibson humbucker, but looking at this chart (which could be wrong) the problem may be that you have reversed polarity but not winding when you split to the slug coil and combine it with the "regular" S-D single coil in the middle.

S-D single coil is "south" wound clockwise

Gibson humbucker slug coil is "north" wound counter-clockwise except that red is the start of the slug coil and white is the finish. I think the way you wired it effectively reverses the winding to clockwise.

[DELETED MIS-INFORMATION]

Now that I typed all of this, I'm not sure this is on track with what you need/want.

By "position" 2 do you mean the bridge/middle combo? (S-D confuses this 'coz they reverse the typical position numbering for some unknown reason.)

If you want the humbucker split in position 2 (bridge/middle) with humcancelling, use this diagram

[DELTED MORE CRAP - DEFINITELY MORE CONFUSING]
Chip

[grumptruck]

So a basically just move remove my heat shrink and clean up the ends...and solder them to the other side of the switch?

I believe you thought I wired my gibson pickup like a seymour but I wired it like this.
http://www.gibson.com/Service/PUPwiring.pdf instead of
http://www.seymourduncan.com/support...l_1tone_5w.htm .... on the bridge. Let me know if this is the case

Thanks for your help bro.

[grumptruck]

Bumpage..

[Dirt123]

What are the specs (resistance value) of the Iommi? The APS is measured at 6.4 k ohms, if each of the coils of the Iommi are not close to that, you won't be able to cancel all the noise.

My split JB (8.2 k per coil) and my SSL-1 (6.5 k) are very quiet, but when I tried my Gibson T-top (3.54k split) with the SSL-1 it was too noisy.

[Fresh_Start]

[DELETE EVERYTHING EXCEPT REQUEST FOR HELP/CONFIRMATION]

Maybe Robert S. or Jeremy can weigh in on this and make sure this is right.

Chip

[grumptruck]

Yeah bro that is exactly the correct diagram.

I am just confused..Do I use the gibson diagram or the stew mac diagram.

[Fresh_Start]

Yeah bro that is exactly the correct diagram.

I am just confused..Do I use the gibson diagram or the stew mac diagram.

EDIT: no wonder you're confused. I've screwed the pooch on this, and tried to correct it below...

Chip

[grumptruck]

If red is hot with gibsons why would i not put it on the right side with with the ground wire (non single coil wire side)?? Just curious.

And thanks again for your help.

[Fresh_Start]

For a given coil, neither wire is intrinsically "hot" or "ground". For Gibson humbuckers (according to your link) red is typically used as the hot lead off of the slug coil. However, according to that StewMac chart, red is actually the "start" of the slug coil and white is the "finish". Therefore, if you use red as the ground and white as the hot lead, the electrical polarity should be counter-clockwise (hopefully curing your problem).

My earlier posts were crap 'coz reversing the electrical phase of one coil only of the humbucker would screw up that pup by itself...

Here's the correct (I hope) mapping of S-D to Gibson color coding (assuming the StewMac chart is right):

S-D _____ Gibson
green _____ green
red _______ black
white _____ red
black _____ white

For S-D and Gibson humbuckers, the screw coil magnets are both "south", and slug coil magnets "north". The confusing part is that S-D pups are wound clockwise, while Gibson's appear to be wound counter-clockwise. Since both coils are wound in the same direction, you normally use the "start" of the slug coil as the hot lead and the "finish" of the slug coil as the ground (connected to the hot lead from the screw coil for a humbucker in series). Unfortunately, it looks like we have to do the opposite on both coils of the Gibson humbucker to get the correct electrical phase and magentic polarity (i.e. for screw coil, ground the finish - green, start as hot lead to series connection with slug coil - black, then the slug coil start - red - is the ground to the series connection and the finish - white - goes to the switch as the hot lead.

Attempting to fix my earlier mis-information, I think this is how you need to wire the humbucker to get humcancelling when it's split and paired with a "normal" S-D single coil (south polarity, wound clockwise).

Use the Seymour-Duncan diagram, except substitute the wires as I laid out above:

green & bare go to ground

splice black & red together and attach to right/splitting side of switch (i.e. common lug going to ground)

white goes to the other side of the switch where the white leads from the two single coils are already attached (i.e. common lug going to volume pot)

POSSIBLY EASIER ALTERNATIVE: wire the Gibson humbucker just like the Gibson diagram, use the green/white series connection for the splitting side of the 5-way switch, but reverse the electrical phase of both of the single coils by grounding the white leads and connecting the black leads to the switch.

I feel really bad about typing last night without thinking this through enough - I'm really sorry 'coz it must be confusing as hell.

Lord I hope this is correct now. I'll PM one or two buddies here to double check my endless crap here.

Here's a color coding and wiring chart for various humbuckers from Guitar Electronics: http://guitarelectronics.zoovy.com/c...kupcolorcodes/ The problem with this chart is that it doesn't show which direction the coils are wound in - that's in the StewMac chart and is the likely source of your original problem. It's also why the color mapping above does not match the GuitarElectronics chart.

Chip

[grumptruck]

Black is ground...I do know that. The newer one you made is more confusing. :*(

Go to page three of http://www.gibson.com/Service/PUPwiring.pdf this.

That might help some...I dont know...I am so confused.

[Fresh_Start]

Hi Grumpy -

Sorry for the confusion. Seymour-Duncan humbuckers are wound clockwise. Gibson humbuckers are wound counter-clockwise according to StewMac. So it's really their fault (j/k)

To get humbucking between two coils, you need opposite polarity and opposite winding (or "wrap").

You want to combine your two S-D single coils with the Gibson humbucker, have Reverse Wrap/Reverse Polarity between the neck pup and the middle pup (humcancelling in position 4), have RW/RP between the middle single coil and the split slug coil of the bridge humbucker, and have the humbucker itself hum-cancelling.

To do this, you can either (1) wire the Gibson just like page 3 of the link we already looked at but reverse the winding of both of the two single coils by grounding each single coil's white wire and connecting their black wires to the switch as the hot leads, or (2) wire the humbucker like I explained above and wire the single coils normally as shown in the S-D diagram (i.e. black to ground & white to switch).

In either case, you need the "normal" S-D single coil in the middle and the RW/RP single coil in the neck.

Please look at page 1 of this StewMac info sheet, scrolling down to "Humbucking pickups, phasing & magnetic polarities". There's a good drawing showing how the winding gets reversed in a humbucker, and a table showing all the possible combinations of polarity and winding between two coils. Please note that it doesn't matter whether the two coils are part of a single humbucker, two single coil pups, or a single coil pup and a split coil from a humbucker.

I really hope this helps.

Chip

[grumptruck]

I put the gibson green and white together on the right side. Black and bare to ground and red to left side. Works really well. Issue resolved.

[Fresh_Start]

I put the gibson green and white together on the right side. Black and bare to ground and red to left side. Works really well. Issue resolved.

Now I'm confused - that's how you said you wired it at the start of the thread.

When you said position 2 wasn't humcancelling, did it sound really weak and thin or did it just not cut out 60 cycle hum? If position 2 was weak & thin sounding, then the split humbucker coil was out of phase electrically with the single coil in the middle but they had the same polarity.

Maybe the StewMac chart could be wrong about the winding direction of the Gibson humbucker and all is right with the world now. Otherwise, in position 2 the slug coil and middle pup have the same polarity and winding direction. That would mean they are "in phase" but not humcancelling. Not the end of the world BTW.

Chip

[grumptruck]

I wired it originally with this chart.

http://www.seymourduncan.com/support...l_1tone_5w.htm

But with the gibson pickup colors.

this one is the new one I used.

http://www.seymourduncan.com/support...e-w-split.html

with gibson colors.

I am very grateful for the time and help that you gave me .

[octavedoctor]

Forget about schematics and do your own polarity mapping.

You have to determine which coil in the humbucking pair is the opposite magnetic polarity to the middle pickup.

Use a magnet (another pickup is a good choice!) and hold it face to face with the middle pickup. If it repels then find which of the two humbucker coils it is attracted to. Thats the one you want as the active coil when it's tapped. Obviously, if it's attracted then you want the coil that repels it.

Next you want a meter to determine which wires belong to which coil. You can establish this just by reading the DC resistance of each coil. If you get a reading then the wires you are reading across belong to one or other coil.

Make a note of your findings.

Having established which wires go where and which coil you want to select, you now have to work on the electrical polarity of the coils.

The electrical polarity of all the coils should be the same for any magnetically induced signals. If you can get one, a centre-zero meter, of the type used in certain types of VU meter is quite useful. If not, an needle meter can be used. I've even used a digital meter, but it's hard....

Connect the meter's terminals to the output wires of the single coil middle pickup, the black probe should go to earth, the red to the output. Set the meter to read DC Mv. Tap the pole pieces with a large (5mm or 3/16) allen wrench and see which way the needle kicks (see note below!)

Make a note of it.

Now repeat the process with your selected coil in the humbucker. The needle has to kick in the same direction as it did with the middle pickup. If it doesn't, reverse the terminals and make an note of the colour coding. Assign the wire that went to the black meter probe to earth. Ignore the manufacturers colour coding. The other wire will be the output/coil "bridging" connection.

Now repeat the process with the other coil in the humbucking pair. When you have established identical polarity with its partner coil, make a note of which wire goes the the red probe and asign this to the global output of the humbucker. The other terminal will be the coils return/coil "bridging" connection and will be connected to the output of the other coil to form the humbucking pair with the combined wires forming the col split connection.

There are two way of splitting the coils: split wire to earth or split wire to signal. Which one you choose will depend on the polarity values you have determined in the preceding stages.

This is the only certain way of getting it right first time...

Special note for the irredeemably paranoid:

Kinman Pickups come with dire warnings (and idiot proof connecting wire which is usually too short!) about allowing screwdrivers anywhere near the pole pieces of their dahling little bijou Hank Marvin endorsed pickups for fear of destabilising the balance of their sensitive Alnico cores. I can imagine that there are many delicate souls out there going "WHAT! TAP MY PICKUP WITH AN ALLEN WRENCH!!!! HOW DARE HE SUGGEST..."

In thirty years of working as a pro guitar tech I've never seen a pickup damaged by being tapped with an Allen Key (sorry, wrench: I can't help being british it sneaks out sometimes). I saw a pickup destabilised once after the drive shaft of a British army 3-tonner fell on it.. Destabilised the hell out of the whole firkin guitar in fact, but other than that I've found them to be pretty robust.

If you are the sort of delicate flower that worries about this sort of thing you could just wave the Allen key in front of it. Or you could go off and learn the harpsichord as the ruff'n'tuff, risk taking, fast lane world of rock'n'roll is not for you.

My advice? Party dude, get blootered, have fun, stop worrying...