Grimmer Posted October 25, 2003 Share Posted October 25, 2003 I don't know about you guys, but I have found a really nifty way to mod your strat without changing the look of it or adding any kinds of switches. Switch out your five way switch with a three way switch (stay with me). Run your neck and bridge pickup in a (1)Neck (2)Neck-Bridge (3)Bridge setup. Then, simply take your first tone pot and convert it into a passive volume control for your middle pickup. Route the hot-wire from that control straight to your tone. Now you can make any combination of pickup you want, and I have found that nailing the right tone is actually far easier with the single tone pot. Plus, your guitar will appear completely stock. This is the wiring I recommend for most of the Strats that I rebuild. It is surprisingly easy to use quickly on stage too. I gaurantee you will dig the Three together position, it totally kills for a real thick Santana-esque tone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alguit Posted October 26, 2003 Share Posted October 26, 2003 Hi Grimmer, and welcome to the board. I found your suggestion very interesting. One of my Strats has always served as a testbed for ideas, and I think I'll give this one a try. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caevan O’Shite Posted October 26, 2003 Share Posted October 26, 2003 Hi, Grimmer, and thanks for the cool tip! All combinations are in parallel that way, correct? I love the sound of three Strat-style single-coils, combined in parallel! Super deep-dish cluck! I would imagine that series and/or series/parallel combinations would further increase the "Santana-esque"-ness. I would like to try out three P-90 "soapbars" in a similar set-up. I'm expecting that it will sound absolutely like Dawgs in Heaven... Ask yourself- What Would Ren and Stimpy Do? ~ Caevan James-Michael Miller-O'Shite ~ _ ___ _ Leprechaun, Esquire _ ___ _ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blue Strat Posted October 27, 2003 Share Posted October 27, 2003 I had a similar setup on a Tele copy at one time. It had two humbuckers in it, and I routed the top for a third humbucker. The control layout was like a LP's, with two volumes and two tones. I took out one of the pots and installed a switch in it's place. I wired the outer two pickups to the three way switch and wired the switch to the volume and tone pots. I used the extra switch for a coil tap. The middle pickup had it's own volume, but no tone control. The coil tap worked on the middle and bridge pickups. BlueStrat a.k.a. "El Guapo" ...Better fuzz through science... http://geocities.com/teleman28056/index.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grimmer Posted October 27, 2003 Author Share Posted October 27, 2003 Bluestrat- wow, you just gave me a really good idea for one of my old Kramers, cool! And DANCES WITH WEREWOLVES- yes, to answer your question, that system is parallel, but I think there is a way to series the pickups, I just haven't sat down and figured it out yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grimmer Posted October 27, 2003 Author Share Posted October 27, 2003 Bluestrat- wow, you just gave me a really good idea for one of my old Kramers, cool! And DANCES WITH WEREWOLVES- yes, to answer your question, that system is parallel, but I think there is a way to series the pickups, I just haven't sat down and figured it out yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
doc taz Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 If you aren't up to doing the work yourself, I think Carvin does a mod (as an option) similar to the first post for most of their three pickup models. Any solidbody guitar from the Bolt, to the 7 string. sevenstring.org profile my flickr page Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blue Strat Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 Three humbucker guitars are awesome! I think that's the general direction my strat is headed in, although I'm using single-coil sized humbuckers. I just need two SD Little 59's for the neck and middle positions and I'm set. BlueStrat a.k.a. "El Guapo" ...Better fuzz through science... http://geocities.com/teleman28056/index.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
baronedo Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 Here's another neat way to rewire your Strat to similarly get more tones, including 3 at a time Pickups or any combo, but also with no external surgery to your Strat: To greatly improve the versatility of your Strat's sound (including getting a neat Tele sound without buying a Tele) I highly recommend a minor wiring change of the pups as indicated at the kinman pickup website (kinman.com). It's shown on their Stratocaster wirograms and is called 1. Modified wiring for neck pickup mix control & master tone control: This mod is really neat and is easy to make with no surgery to the exterior of your Strat. You basically replace the rear tone pot with a higher valued pot ( I used a 1 Meg), make the wiring changes shown and the versatility of your Strat improves dramatically. What happens is the middle tone pot becomes a master tone pot for all 3 pups (you only need one tone pot anyway) and the rear tone pot becomes a graduated blender pot for blending in the neck pup with any of the other pups selected via the 5 way switch. You really lose nothing and gain everything since if you turn the new rear pot totally off (i.e. clockwise) then the 5 way switch works as on a traditional Strat. However, if you start dialing in the rear pot counter- clockwise, you can get a progressive mix of the neck with any other pup. For exampe, if you set the 5 way switch to the bridge pup and dial in the neck pup, you get a neck and bridge pup blend for a neat Tele sound . Similarly if you set the 5 way switch to middle & bridge position and dial in the neck pup, you get all 3 pups for an entirely different sound. Everyone I've talked to who has made this mod is very happy with it. Some were thinking about buying Teles and have indicated they can now get a good Tele sound on their Strat. Additionally, I recommend the other kinman mod called 2. Treble Bypass filter: You buy a 130K 1/4 watt resistor and .0012uF 63 volt polyester capacitor needed for this minor mod (for less than fifty cents). You basically wire the resistor and capacitor in series across the two terminals of the volume pot as shown on the wirogram. The end result is that you no longer get a loss of highs as you turn your guitar's volume pot down ( a common problem of Strats associated with guitar cable inductance). In my opinion, these minor mods should be standard issue on any Strat (then again it would probably cut into Fender's Tele sales). All of the above can be accomplished for about $5.50 ($5 for a 1Meg pot and $.50 for the resistor and capacitor. Go for it on all your Strats - you will truly be amazed by the improvement. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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