Ultra Strat Mod

Ultra Strat Mod
Do you have a guitar with 3 single coils, sometimes referred to as a Strat type
guitar? If you are thinking of replacing the pickups to get more sounds from your
guitar, there is another, less costly solution. Try changing the guitar switching
instead.
There are many switching modifications for 3 coil guitars. This particular switching
arrangement offers a lot in return for relatively little work. Before you do this
modification, let's look at what you will lose and what you will gain.
Disadvantages:
1) If your guitar is under warranty, doing any kind of unauthorized work will void it.
2) A few of the possible switch positions will produce no sounds at all. Some people
do not like even the slightest possibility of a guitar going "dead" - especially on stage.
Becoming familiar with the switching should completely eliminate this from occurring.
While the switch is set for "parallel" the "dead" switch settings are:
choosing any single coil and choosing Neck & Bridge.
This really isn't that bad because all 3 single coils can be chosen when the switch is
set for "Series" and Neck & Bridge in parallel isn't humbucking.
3) This will change the appearance of your guitar. In fact, the selector modification
will look like this:
Basically, the five way switch gets removed, 5 small holes are drilled, then 5 small
switches are installed.
The guitar's change in appearance isn't that drastic is it? In fact, some might even
consider this an improvement. Of course it is your guitar and the choice is up to you.
Advantages:
1) The five switches required for this modification (2 DPDT and 3 SPST), are very
easy to obtain and are inexpensive. Yes, you could even get these at Radio Shack
or other electronic retailer and the cost would probably be about $20.
2) The guitar is switched from the exact same location. Unlike some guitar
modifications which utilize switches mounted on the "pots", all 5 replacement
switches are located precisely where the old switch was. Also, the five switches line
up neatly and it is easy to see which option is being used. For example, you do not
have to remember which "pot" controls, series, parallel, out of phase, etc.
3) You'll still get all five sounds you had from the old switching.
Three Single Coil Sounds - Neck Middle Bridge.
Neck & Middle in Parallel
Middle & Bridge in Parallel.
4) You'll get the following new sounds:

Neck & Middle in Series
Middle & Bridge in Series
Neck and Bridge in Series and Out of Phase
All 3 pickups in Series
Neck and Bridge in Series
Middle Pickup In Parallel with Neck and Bridge in Series
If your guitar was made in the last 20 years or so, the chances are good that the
middle pickup is reverse wound and has reverse polarity (RWRP). If that's the case
you already had 2 "humbucking" positions - choice 2 & 4 on the old 5 way switch.
Now you will have 3 more humbucking options. (These are the first 3 of the 6 listed).
(You might be surprised by the "out of phase" choice being humbucking but 2 coils
with identical windings and polarity become humbucking when they are wired out of
phase).
Actually, you get more than the 6 new sounds listed if you include all the
combinations that the phasing switch can produce. However, the neck and bridge in
series out of phase is the best-sounding out-of-phase option but experiment all you
like!!
My schematic:
A schematic is okay for seeing how a circuit works but a wiring diagram is much more
helpful when you go to do the actual work:
To make it easier to read (and to follow):
Wires from the pickups are drawn with thin lines.
Wires from the switches and between the switches are drawn with thicker and
darker lines.
The connections have been numbered.
If you choose not to have a phase switch, connect wire #5 and wire #6 directly to
the SPST switch at positions 5 & 6. (This is the reason there is a dashed line around
the phase switch).
How It Works
You do not have to know this, but in case you are curious, by redrawing the
schematic and not showing the phase switch, the switching becomes a little easier to
understand.
When the DPDT switch is in the series position, (middle terminals connected to the
top terminals which are connected by a wire), the switching is easy to see. The only
outputs for the pickups are the middle pickup "+" terminal and the bridge pickup ""
terminal. The switches are wired so that they shunt (actually "short-circuit") that
particular pickup. So when you are turning one pickup "off" on your guitar, the switch
is actually "on" and bypasses that pickup. This creates no problems when all pickups
are in series.
Switching to parallel, the middle terminals are now connected to "" and "+". The
switches still function the same way. When you want neck and middle, the bridge
pickup is "shorted" and the neck "minus" terminal goes directly to ground and its "plus
terminal" goes directly to the "hot" (or '+') output. When you want bridge and middle,
the neck pickup is "shorted" and the neck "minus" terminal goes directly to ground.
These are the only parallel combinations you can obtain. Why? If you wanted Neck
and Bridge, you would flip the middle pickup switch "on" and do you see what
happens? The middle pickup switch causes the ground and hot outputs to be
connected together which results in the entire guitar turning "off" and no sound
comes out. By the same reasoning, you can see why trying to choose single pickups
when the switch is set for parallel will also have the same effect. (Luckily, you can get
ALL 3 single coil choices when the switch is set for series).
In order to maximize the humbucking possibilities, the pickup that is reverse wired
with reverse polarity (RWRP)should be on the "left" side of the circuit. Let's suppose
the RWRP pickup was in the bridge? Then we would want to wire the guitar in this
way:
In this way we could get neck and bridge (series and parallel), and middle and bridge
(series and parallel) and all four would be humbucking.
As you can see this circuit is quite "flexible" in accommodating the kinds of switching
that you want.

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Ultra Strat Mod

4) You'll get the following new sounds:

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