Photomike666
June 23rd, 2012, 06:01 AM
I haven't done any major amount of electrical work on a guitar before, but know my way round a soldering iron.
The project has 4 distinct stages, one & two I'm working on and three and four will come in time.
Stage one is get a new guitar (Schecter Hellraiser C1-FR), saving is going well.
Stage two is to design and plan new wiring for my present strat copy
Stage three is acquire parts
Stage four is the build.
I have decided to do this as a learning exercise for working on guitars, and to explore what sound possibilities are available. Once I get the Schecter I will chose a piece of music to play on each available setting on my present guitar, and then again on each available setting on the Schecter. This will all be done on a clean channel with no effects or modeling for clarity. I will simply switch my cable from one guitar to another and keep testing. I plan for both guitars to have the same strings. Schecter has 2 EMG Active humbuckers each with a coil tap push pull pot. The present guitar has s/s/h passive pick ups through a Fender five point switch in standard wiring.
To the project guitar. It is a Harlem Strat copy that came with a lot of cheap electronics that are quite noisy. I have already put a Seymour Duncan Distortion humbucker at the bridge, but that is all.
For now all changes will be electronics only, and I have set a budget of $250 + postage. This was a cheap guitar purchased to learn on, and I see no point spending a fortune on. But I also see no point having a guitar I won't play again :-)
I am into playing heavy rock/metal, so I will be aiming at those kind of sounds.
And to the planning...
The Seymour Duncan Distortionbridge humbucker stays, but all other electronics are to be replaced
- Neck - Seymour Duncan Coolrails - fits with no mods except wiring
- Middle- Seymour Duncan Hotrails - fits with no mods except witing
The single volume and single tone pots are going, as are the 5-way and the input jack...
Once planned and reshaped, the inner cavity will be lined with insulating copper tape.
All three humbuckers will be rewired to DPDT on/on/on switches to run in series, parallel or coil tapped. Neck & middle will be wired to a stacked volume control while the bridge will run on a push/pull volume control.
A new 5-way will be used to improve quality, same for the input jack. All wires will be new (26 gauge) and heat shrinked.
The present volume & tone pots will be replaced with higher spec versions and a two more volume pots will be added.
Sound combinations will be:_
- neck, neck/middle, middle, middle/bridge, bridge, bridge/neck & all three together.
- each pick up individually can be parallel, coil cut or series
- separate volume control on neck/middle and bridge
- Switch on tone cap (0.22 & 0.47)
Total sound combinations will be = 63 (x2 for each tone setting if it makes much difference).
The guitar will end up with 2 extra pots and 4 slide switches at will be fitted almost flush to keep them out of the way.
Last part will be rerecord the same piece of music as previous in all settings and compare to original recordings. I am hoping not only for increased tonal control, but also much greater signal clarity.
Would love to hear comments and advice on what can be accomplished.
The project has 4 distinct stages, one & two I'm working on and three and four will come in time.
Stage one is get a new guitar (Schecter Hellraiser C1-FR), saving is going well.
Stage two is to design and plan new wiring for my present strat copy
Stage three is acquire parts
Stage four is the build.
I have decided to do this as a learning exercise for working on guitars, and to explore what sound possibilities are available. Once I get the Schecter I will chose a piece of music to play on each available setting on my present guitar, and then again on each available setting on the Schecter. This will all be done on a clean channel with no effects or modeling for clarity. I will simply switch my cable from one guitar to another and keep testing. I plan for both guitars to have the same strings. Schecter has 2 EMG Active humbuckers each with a coil tap push pull pot. The present guitar has s/s/h passive pick ups through a Fender five point switch in standard wiring.
To the project guitar. It is a Harlem Strat copy that came with a lot of cheap electronics that are quite noisy. I have already put a Seymour Duncan Distortion humbucker at the bridge, but that is all.
For now all changes will be electronics only, and I have set a budget of $250 + postage. This was a cheap guitar purchased to learn on, and I see no point spending a fortune on. But I also see no point having a guitar I won't play again :-)
I am into playing heavy rock/metal, so I will be aiming at those kind of sounds.
And to the planning...
The Seymour Duncan Distortionbridge humbucker stays, but all other electronics are to be replaced
- Neck - Seymour Duncan Coolrails - fits with no mods except wiring
- Middle- Seymour Duncan Hotrails - fits with no mods except witing
The single volume and single tone pots are going, as are the 5-way and the input jack...
Once planned and reshaped, the inner cavity will be lined with insulating copper tape.
All three humbuckers will be rewired to DPDT on/on/on switches to run in series, parallel or coil tapped. Neck & middle will be wired to a stacked volume control while the bridge will run on a push/pull volume control.
A new 5-way will be used to improve quality, same for the input jack. All wires will be new (26 gauge) and heat shrinked.
The present volume & tone pots will be replaced with higher spec versions and a two more volume pots will be added.
Sound combinations will be:_
- neck, neck/middle, middle, middle/bridge, bridge, bridge/neck & all three together.
- each pick up individually can be parallel, coil cut or series
- separate volume control on neck/middle and bridge
- Switch on tone cap (0.22 & 0.47)
Total sound combinations will be = 63 (x2 for each tone setting if it makes much difference).
The guitar will end up with 2 extra pots and 4 slide switches at will be fitted almost flush to keep them out of the way.
Last part will be rerecord the same piece of music as previous in all settings and compare to original recordings. I am hoping not only for increased tonal control, but also much greater signal clarity.
Would love to hear comments and advice on what can be accomplished.