I know they've got a few other colors since inception but red;s always been the hottest to my knowledge. Blue is PAF voiced, and silver has more of a warm jazz feel. The combo you're citing was in the old Strat Plus Ultra if my memory serves.

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"Another day in paradise!"

Yup, the red/silver/blue set up was used in the strat plus's(?) though I believe some came with the golds too. In the end I found a good deal for the R/S/B set up and pulled the trigger yesterday. I found them for 134 dollars and I had a 40 dollar gift card so with the DPDT switch it comes out to be about 100 dollars.

Can't wait for it to get here, I'll post pics if I can. My wiring might not look pretty but as long as I don't fry anything and it sounds good...

A word of warning. If your wiring is not going to look absolutely gorgeous perhaps you ought to have a professional install it. There's a rather interesting recent thread dealing with a botched soldering attempt which would be a pity considering your expense, and the kind of components you're dealing with.

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"Another day in paradise!"

I received my pickups today but still do not have the switch. While looking over the pickups I saw something unusual in the red pickup. I saw a thin copper wire sticking out from the pickup and one more soldered with the green wire. I was really difficult to get a picture but the ones bellow are the best I can get. Could anyone tell me if these little wires are a problem in the pickups? The red one is the only one with this. I am not sure whether to wait for the switch to get here or to wire it in now to test it...advice?

Anyways here are the pictures:


The problem in these next pics is circled in red

Eeek broken coils.

Don't try the pickup without testing it with a multimeter set to read resistance. That pickup is likely broken and needs to be sent back.

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No no and no

I don't have a multimeter, should I just send it back?

go buy a cheap meter at wal-mart and return it after you are done they are in automotive by the fuses

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Going to send it back and order again. Pity, I was really excited and planned it so I would receive it in my break but now I guess my guitar won't have laces for at least another week Hopefully the next pack will all be fine.

Sucks that I have to send all of them back when only the bridge one is broken, oh well you win some and you lose some.

I own a Blacktop stratocaster and did not like the volume drop that I experienced when the 5 way selector switch isolated one side of the humbuckers. What to do? I wrote Fender about this but they really could not help much stating that was the way they intended the guitar to function.
Well, I bought a LACE Chrome dome single coil, reverse wound-reverse polarity middle pickup along with a Mega 5-way switch from Stewart MacDonald (around $87 for the pup and $20 for the 5 way) and had a local guitar repair center install these. The shop owner listened to what I wanted to accomplish and added a mini toggle to isloate the middle pickup while still allowing me to maintain the original sound.
Following the Mega switch wiring diagram for 3 pickups, he installed the new pickup, Mega switch, and routed the body and pickguard, along with the additional mini switch.
I now have a black, Blacktop Strat with H-S-H pickups, all with chrome covers and 7 way switching. What more could you want? His time was worth $60 and money well spent. Professionally done, it looks like Fender could have done this at the factory.

there isn't a way around that. you are halving the resistance when you split the coil. so you are dropping the output of the pickup as well.

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This FretKing guitar comes as close to splitting the coils of it's humbuckers without any massive volume drop



The way it's wired is that one of each of the humbuckers coils is wired to the lowest control pot. Allowing you to dial out as much of the humbucker sound as you want. So you can go from single>any point in between> full humbucker.

There is obviously a volume change but it's no where near as drastic as with a coil split switch. Whether that is because the change is gradual rather than instant and so is less noticeable, I don't know. I suspect it could be.
I'm considering trying it out on my Hotrod's humbucker.

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No no and no

that looks interesting. I am going to try to locate a wiring diagram for that guitar.

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love the Lace pups, got a few Strat Pluses now because them. Why not try something a little different than the BSR set and maybe get closer to the Black Strat sound?Emerald Silver Purple


http://www.guitarcenter.com/Lace-Sensor ... 1421594.gc
and a sound clip, end of the page
http://www.lacemusic.com/sensors.php

think I'm going to get some Nitro Hemis' for a project

Well, my goal is not to get the sound of the black strat although that could be a project for a later date. My goal in buying the lace sensors was first to get a set that can get many different types of sound and is quiet. Now both sets, the BSR and the ESP, do that but knowing that the BSR is the most popular I concluded that it probably covers the widest ranges of music. The only other thing that makes me prefer the BSR is that the blue gives a more vintage sound while lace describes the emerald as "texas-inspired" and that's not exactly what I play.

I appreciate your opinion and will keep it in mind in the future. Anyways I have already made my purchase and since the red pickup is defective I have to return them and get a replacement. If you get the Nitro Hemis tell us what you think of it.

BTW, I've taken a look at some soldering lessons and have been practicing soldering and doing fairly well, so fear not, when the time for soldering comes I am confident I can do it a good job on it.

just wondering if you have gotten anywhere with your project