Something Different in a Strat?

[big_teee]

I do guitar and pickup work for my blues playing grandson.
He mainly plays his 4 single coil strats.
He also has a tele and a firebird.
He just wound up with a big head silver metallic squier strat. (I haven't seen it, not sure maple or RW, or trem type)
We want to make something different, not more Single coils.
Thinking about a 3 full sized humbuckers, with a swimming pool route.
Anybody out there had a strat with 3 big humbuckers?
Another idea is HSH, but the S would be a custom blade bucker.
Any ideas for something different?
T

[Mark Hammer]

Consider mini-bucker, single-coil, and P-rails, going from neck to bridge. Flip the bridge and middle pickup connections on the 5-way selector switch, so that you get neck, neck+bridge, bridge, bridge+middle, and middle in the 5 positions. Use a cap of half or 1/3 the value of the neck tone for the bridge tone, and install a 3-position toggle for the bridge pickup to get you the P-90, rail SC, or full HB for the bridge pickup.

If that doesn't get you a cornucopia of tones - some familiar, and some very un-Strat-like - I don't know what would.

[big_teee]

I like building mini's the least of all, no fun and expensive to build.
Most intense performing players, don't care for all the splitting.
Bedroom players like them some though.
I do think a Single coil rail in the middle would be cool.
I've built a lot of those for tele players.



$28 at Warmoth.

[big_teee]

Another way to do it is with 3 mini spt switches.
One per pickup.
None on-all on.
A MV, MT and a kill button.
Like this but with pickup holes hsh
I could get the warmoth PG, and drill the holes for the mini switches.

[glebert]

Was watching a review today of a Fender Parallel Universe Thinline tele that had TV Jones filtertron style pups and for the tone it has a bass cut rather than a treble cut. I thought that was an interesting idea.

I have a Warmoth strat style partscaster that has EMG pickups and the David Gilmour EXG and SPC controls. It definitely is a different take on a strat.

[mozz]

3 p90's.

[big_teee]

P90s? Sounds good.
But, I don't have any p90 stuff, and he don't need another Single coil guitar.
I have tons of big Bucker parts, and lots of strat sized rail stuff.
Was mainly wondering if anyone has had any good results with 3 buckers in a strat?

[John_H]

There's no law that says a strat body has to have three pickups. You said you wanted to try one of the filtertron kits from amplified parts?

[Mark Hammer]

There's no law that says a strat body has to have three pickups. You said you wanted to try one of the filtertron kits from amplified parts?

Two buckers on a Strat-type body has never really impeded JImmy Herring's ability to stun us.

[rjb]

There's no law that says a strat body has to have three pickups.

Coodercaster. Just kidding.

[big_teee]

No rules on amount of pickups, that's for sure.
A 21 fret 25-1/2 scale strat, has a lot of area to put 3 pickups.
There's no reason not to.

It is interesting to see what ideas you guys come up with!
One thing I like about strats is the loaded pickguard.
You can build it all up ahead of time.
I have a bunch of Single coil PGs in my shop.

[dmartn149]

I once saw a strat style with 3 p-rails with the switches in the mounting rings in addition to the regular 5 way. It's fun to experiment with that stuff, but on the other hand, I have a HSS tele style with switches that give something like 11 combinations and I only ever used the bridge or neck pups. On the other, other hand, I have a HSH strat with a 5 way. Positions 2 + 4 are half a hb combined with the middle. It offers 5 good sounds. That seems like the best set up for me.

[Fluoroscope 5000]

I'm convinced that part of what gives an LP Jr it's "solid" sustain quality is the lack of string pull from a front pickup creating subtle modulations. For that matter, I'd opt for very low string pull pickups. May give some of the very low inductance Lace Alumitones a try? The high end character can then be shaped with caps and resistors as needed for more classic pickup sounds A Wilde Q-filter can be used if a midrange dip is required, or the pickups can be used as filters via a series wired "blend" knob for the same kind of sound as I have done with my Wilde Microcoil equipped guitar. It's really usefully versatile without a lot of switches. You can always leave the pos 2 and 4 blend knob in one place if and just use the switches to select tones, but I find myself making use of the blend knob more and more over the months. You will eventually get very quick at dialing in certain tones, and making fine adjustments if needed. Here's a link to the wiring I drew up:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bx0...ew?usp=sharing

A few cap values can be changed for the pickup inductance values or for slightly different peak points if needed. Lotta wires to connect, but I love it.

Here's a description of the options:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...it?usp=sharing

Here's a video demo I made using S-Gear amp modeler:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bx0...ew?usp=sharing

It's b4 I added the 250k resistor over the 2 &4 pos, so it's a bit bright. I made some other less complete demos since. I'm still planning to make a demo showing the 2nd harmonic octave sounds it can get in the pos 4 OoP blend settings.

[Mark Hammer]

Not to take away from the considerable possibilities you describe, but the "Contour"/bass-cut control, found on G&L and Reverend guitars is an underexploited addition to the basic 3-knob Strat. Do people normally use both Tone pots? I don't know. But a master volume/tone and master bass-cut offers lots of tonal flexibility without impeding normal sounds or control-use, and doesn't require changing to unfamiliar pickups.

[big_teee]

He has an American strat with noiseless, and the S1 switch.
Plays it some.
Has the Tele with the 4 way switch, I just reworked for him.
Uses it a lot, really likes the bridge pickup, but doesn't use the series part much.
I would never get him to use the blend, or the split positions.
He's a high energy player that solos a lot, and sings, he doesn't even use the tone much.
Likes a 5 way, but it would need to be wired like his other guitars.
He switches guitars a lot on stage, different tuning, and for different styles.
I have a 2 humbucker pickguard rigged up with split, parallel, series, & rev. polarity on neck bucker.
He only played it in series on neck and bridge.
I ended up taking that pickguard off, and putting Single coils back in.
I will probably build up a HSH, with a rail in the middle with MV, Kill button, MT, and 5 way.
All on a custom Warmoth loaded pickguard.
Thanks,
Terry