Coil Tap wiring question

[stumblinman]

Hey all, as I stated in a previous post, I'm planning on putting coil taps on my G-400 in a few days when the pots arrive, and I was curious about something. I'm using 2 bridge pickups instead of 1 bridge 1 neck and I'm wondering if I should wire the taps the same for south magnet on both due to the adjustable pole pieces being the same. If so, would it have much effect on the tone? I mean c'mon.. it's less than an inch gap tonewise. I figure I'll look at the Prophecy SG and go from there, but thought I'd ask if anyone had done this. Happy Mother's Day!

[Fantana]

I was always under the impression that it's always best to have the 'slug' coil active during coil tapping, eg the non pole coil on the humbucker which should be the 2 inner coils, but maybe i'm wrong?

[RSDx]

....... I'm planning on putting coil taps on my G-400 i.........

Coil splitting, yes. Tapping buckers ???

[stumblinman]

Split, tap, tomayto, tomahto. Yes, splitting. Faster to type taps than split. I know they are different, but to most folks they are interchangeable terms. Sorry for the confusion.

 

Looking at diagrams it seems to be the outer magnets Fantana, but then again, I don't know either. Only ones I've owned have already been installed, so it was all magic to me.

 

Also, it seems if you put the split on the volume knob, there's some splice involved in going to the pole and the post for the push/pull portion. As seen here http://www.guitarelectronics.com/product/WD2HH3T22_02/Guitar_Wiring_Diagram_2_Humbuckers3Way_Toggle_Switch2_Volumes2_TonesIndividual_Coil_Taps.html

 

Is that actually right?

[Fantana]

I'm not to sure either, it's just that when I had the coil split done on my Firebird my tech said that it's the inner coils that are usually the active ones when split, which is the general impression that I got when reading about these things

 

However I could be completely wrong.............sorry for not being much help!

 

Musiktron will be able to help

[Vic Flick]

Split' date=' tap, tomayto, tomahto. Yes, splitting. Faster to type taps than split. I know they are different, but to most folks they are interchangeable terms. Sorry for the confusion.

 

Looking at diagrams it seems to be the outer magnets Fantana, but then again, I don't know either. Only ones I've owned have already been installed, so it was all magic to me.

 

Also, it seems if you put the split on the volume knob, there's some splice involved in going to the pole and the post for the push/pull portion. As seen here http://www.guitarelectronics.com/product/WD2HH3T22_02/Guitar_Wiring_Diagram_2_Humbuckers3Way_Toggle_Switch2_Volumes2_TonesIndividual_Coil_Taps.html

 

Is that actually right?[/quote']

 

Don't make it more complicated than it has to be. Look at the wires coming from you pickups, you'll see 2 wires that are joined together and not connected to the circuit. If you connect these wires to ground, the second coil cuts off. That's it!!!

 

So you connect these wires to a switch, in one position the switch connects them to ground (single coil), the other position the switch doesn't connect them to anything (humbucker). Nothing complicated there...

 

As far as which coils are active, who cares??? It don't amount to a hill of beans as Rick said.

[dchale]

My preference is south for neck and north for bridge. I feel that the tone is a little better using the north on the bridge pickup. It's also supposed to reduce hum if you use opposite coils but I haven't actually tested this, it's just something I read.

[stumblinman]

Ok, I decided I'm not concerned about which magnet it is. Now my concern is the odd splicing of the lead wire to a post on the push pull as well as to the post used for volume in the drawing I linked to. Any ideas why bridge is that way and neck isn't? I'm guessing it's a north/south magnet thing.

[Vic Flick]

Ok' date=' I decided I'm not concerned about which magnet it is. Now my concern is the odd splicing of the lead wire to a post on the push pull as well as to the post used for volume in the drawing I linked to. Any ideas why bridge is that way and neck isn't? I'm guessing it's a north/south magnet thing.[/quote']

 

Throw that diagram away, it over complicates the matter. I told you the clean simple way of doing it, here's the Duncan diagram:

 

 

There are two wires that are joined together and normally not connected to anything, red & white on Duncans, different colors on different manufactures. All you have to do is ground those wires and the secondary coils cuts out. Look at the Duncan diagram, it uses one DPDT switch, the red & white wires go to the center lugs, one set of lugs go to ground, the other lugs don't connect to anything. That's the whole shebang!!!

[stumblinman]

Jerry, thanks for that diagram. I went there, but all I saw was one with tone pot push pull. Much better, thanks!

[carverman]

Ok' date=' I decided [b']I'm not concerned about which magnet it is.[/b] I'm guessing it's a north/south magnet thing.

 

Why do people think there is more than one flat bar magnet in a humbucker..sorry to disallusion everyone, but

there is only one. The S and N polarity of the 2 coils depend on which way the magnet poles (North or South)

is influencing the flux in each coil. The coils are generally wound RWRP (Reverse Wound/Reverse Polarity) to

provide the humbucking effect. Each coil will have a start of winding and an end of winding which will be either

connected internally to each other or brought out to external connections in case of a 4 wire pickup.

http://www.1728.com/guitar1a.htm

[carverman]

Throw that diagram away' date=' it over complicates the matter. I told you the clean simple way of doing it, here's the Duncan diagram:

 

[/quote']

 

That's the drawing I use as well.

 

As far as manufacturer's colour codes..here's a site that seems to have some of them.

http://www.guitar-repairs.co.uk/guitar_pickup_colour_codes.htm

[Ricochet]

I was always under the impression that it's always best to have the 'slug' coil active during coil tapping' date=' eg the non pole coil on the humbucker which should be the 2 inner coils, but maybe i'm wrong?[/quote']

 

According to some experts over at the Seymour Duncan forum, the slugpoles holds more of the character of the HB over the screwpole coil.

I think there could be something to it, but I sorta feel silly bothering with these kind of tonal increments.

[carverman]

For those who are interested in how Seymour Duncan pickups are manufactured,

PG (Premier Guitar) magazine held an SD factory site interview, (which was put on

Youtube), with a SD representative explaining some of their processes in making them.

 

There are 3 parts to this interview and each one is about 10 minutes long.

These have to be the most informative clips of pickups being made that I have

seen so far.

Pt: 1 SC process. and around 5:10..how alnico pickup magnets are created

 

Pt II: type of wire, properties of wire/sounds, dc resistance, and specifics

on their Seth Lover reproduction pickup

 

Pt III: 4 conductor pickups, potting/waxing at 5:40 the stud side coil vs screw side

coil is mentioned and at 7:50 slug side vs screw side

[stumblinman]

That SD diagram is a single coil tap for both pups. I think between that and another one there I've got what I need. Now I just need the parts to show up so I can get it done. I'll let you all know how it went. Thanks for all the help!

[Guest icantbuyafender]

http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/wiring-diagrams/schematics.php?schematic=2h_2v_2t_3w_2pp

 

here's for two push-pulls.

 

I've used this and it works just fine. Jerrymac is right, dont complicate things.

[stumblinman]

Job is complete. Worked like a charm. Put in some orange drops while I had it opened up. The issue wasn't with the drawings, the issue was I wanted one with 2 volume 2 tone with the push pull on the volume. All the drawings I found were either just 2 volume, or 2 volume 1 tone or confusing as hell. The pickup wire color code page helped a lot, so thanks for that carverman, as well as everyone else for the various pup schematics. Got it done late last night, so I wasn't able to crank it up and really compare sounds. Wife and kids would have grumbled and groused about it. So today is the day between my day shift at work and coming back on nights for a machine startup, with a softball game in between... Oh man, maybe it will be tomorrow..

 

Anyhow, thanks so much for the help!

[stumblinman]

At work now, waiting for paper machine to start back up. Thought I'd post my opinions on the coil split. It went very well, and makes the G-400 much more versatile. Both pickups are crisp and sweet in single-coil mode, and round out nicely in humbucker mode. It sounds exceptionally good with neck humbucker and bridge single, since it gives a little less bite from the Dirty Fingers and the smooth round tone of the SH-14 neck. I'm extremely happy with it. Adds some extra dimensions to a straight up rawk guitar. Woot!