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Post subject: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2018 12:39 pm
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I am not very knowledgable about electronics,and I was wondering:could one three-way toggle switch give you a choice of series,parallel and coil-tap on a humbucker,or would that require two switches?

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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2018 1:29 pm
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Did you mean a 3 way switch for a single Humbucker ?


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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2018 2:21 pm
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stratele52 wrote:
Did you mean a 3 way switch for a single Humbucker ?

Yes. Where one position is both coils in series,another is both coils in parallel and the third is both (I guess in series) tapped.

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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2018 2:25 pm
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Look here;

http://guitarelectronics.com/guitar-wir ... -diagrams/


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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2018 4:16 pm
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Tapped humbucker?

Or do you mean splitable humbucker?

If you're going to the trouble and expense of special ordering a custom-made tapped humbucker, you should take full advantage of it by using individual tap switches for each coil.

Both coils full wind
Both coils low wind
Screw coil full, slug coil low
Screw coil low, slug coil full

Using multiple switches would also let you choose series or parallel for all four combinations. Plus let you split the pickup and then choose full/low wind for whichever coil is active.

(I suspect you really mean "split" rather than "tap", but you mention tapping it with both coils on, so...)


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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2018 4:22 pm
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I understant split.


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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2018 5:39 pm
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stratele52 wrote:
I understant split.


Yes, probably what he meant. But he said this:
"Where one position is both coils in series,another is both coils in parallel and the third is both (I guess in series) tapped. ."

Since he says both coils on in all three switch positions, I figure it's best to ask if that's what he really means.


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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2018 9:14 pm
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It may very well be that I am using the terms incorrectly. What I meant by “tapped” was both coils in use,but not the full amount of windings. There’s a video of a Tele with Wide Range pups with this feature where the resulting sound is reminiscent of a p90 without the buzz. The player in the video uses both terms;”split” and “tapped” which had me confused. There’s also a video with seemingly the same guitar with series/parallel wiring,and that produces very attractive sounds too.

https://youtu.be/fUppkkGvf4s. Tap or split.

https://youtu.be/U8eh66vptcE Series/parallel.

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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2018 12:25 am
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As far as I know, Creamery's "Reissue upgrade" gives the coil split (one coil on only) option, not the coil tap (only a part of the windings active). And in the first vid, that seems to me the stock "upgrade option 3", regardless of what the guy says.
But to be sure, try emailing Creamery: https://www.creamery-pickups.co.uk/cont ... amery.html

To the original switch question: yes, you can get series/split/parallel with just one one on-on-on, DP3T type (mini)switch.
Here's a direct link from the same site st52 mentioned: http://guitarelectronics.com/2-humbucke ... -parallel/


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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2018 6:14 am
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In that vid, the guy used "tapped" and "split" interchangeably (incorrectly).

However, at one point he said the push/pull changed it from humbucking to single coil. So that's split, not tapped.

In split mode it's not humbucking and will be just as noisy as any single coil. He just didn't have any strong noise sources nearby so the noise level didn't change in split mode.


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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2018 7:10 am
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"Tone videos" where they just use one heavily distorted, compressed amp setting really annoy me.

You get no feel for how big an output drop there is, going from series (highest output) to parallel to split (lowest output).

And it masks all the subtleties and nuances. The Creamery Option 3 should sound much better split than standard humbuckers do -- it should sound very much like a Strat pickup. But with all that gain it's hard to hear that.


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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2018 7:16 am
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Just in case you don't know -- you can't do any of these switching options with stock Wide Range Humbuckers. They only have 2 conductors per pickup and are risky to convert to 4 conductors.


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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2018 8:22 am
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In terms of sound,how would you describe the difference between split hb and tapped hb? I’ve heard people say that tapped sounds a bit beefier than split,more like a p90. Thoughts?

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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2018 9:32 am
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I've never heard a tapped humbucker. Never even heard of one being made, although they're certainly possible.

Even tapped single coils are extremely rare.

A tapped humbucker in the tapped mode would sound exactly like a lower output humbucker, because that's exactly what it does. It lets you choose the full wind or part of the wind.

Neither tapped, parallel, or split will make a humbucker sound very close to a P90. Kinda sorta vaguely in the same neighborhood as a P90 maybe. In the same way that some people describe the Duncan Quarter Pound for Strat as having a touch of P90 character, or how some people hear some P90 character in the overwound ceramic mag Mexican Standard Strat pickups.

Even the humbucker-sized single-coil P90's don't exactly capture true P90 tones. Those come about as close as you can get but without the wide broad shallow coil of a true P90 you can't get that sound.


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Post subject: Re: Question about pickup switches.
Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2018 9:52 am
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A normal humbucker is in series.

Parallel drops the output a bit and raises the resonant frequency a bit, giving a brighter clearer tone. It sounds kind of "single coil-ish" while still cancelling noise.

Split turns off one coil. True single coil. Lower output, bright and clear. But the individual coils of most humbuckers are underwound compared to most Fender single coils (or P90's) so most split humbuckers sound pretty bad -- very weak, very thin.

Fender's current WRHB's are just normal humbuckers under oversized covers - small coils with ferrous polepieces and bar magnets under the coils.

The original WRHB's had larger coils and direct magnets (the "polepieces" are actually the magnets). The accurate boutique WRHB's will sound somewhat better when split, but they'll still be under 5K in that mode -- like an extremely underwound Strat pickup.

You need a very hot humbucker to get good split tones.

Those high-gain demo vids are misleading, unless you normally play with that much distortion and compression. Split is usable with that much distortion, but not so much if you play clean or lightly crunchy.


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