Stuff you guys might like

[frankfalbo]

The Blackouts Modular Preamp

Liberator - change your guitar pickups using only a screwdriver

Figured you guys who want to experiment with actives but don't have any EE chops might like the Blackouts preamp, and if you want screw terminals for your test guitar, the Liberator.

Also if any of you send me your color codes (only if you have remained consistent for many years) I can try to include them in the comprehensive list of corresponding color codes on our website. We only have so much room in the packaging so I'll only have ten or so listed in the schematics in the box, then direct the end user to the website for the full list.

[David Schwab]

Cool stuff!

I use the DiMarzio color codes.

[Rick Turner]

And I'm about to publish/announce a pickup mounted header/connector for the other end of the harness so you can swap pickups without even opening up the back plate of a guitar...the back plate being something I eliminated from the Henman Guitars I'm now making. We're using Duncan pickups in the guitars, and each pickup has a five pin header mounted on it for easy swap-outs. I'll put together a suggested pin-out for compatibility across the industry. It will all be based on a five wire system...four leads plus shield. Cheap, simple, and incredibly easy. I want to establish a standard for start/finish/north/south so any pickups can be swapped out without needing to either take off a back plate or go near a soldering iron if the pickups are equipped with the correct pin assignments for the header. Frank and the rest of the folks at Duncan know about this...

[CRU JONES]

I feel like I am taking crazy pills.

http://www.emginc.com/content/wiring...0230-0174A.pdf

Cru

[David King]

Man o man I tried to get this effort under way in 2002 and got absolutely nowhere then. Thanks Rick, Frank, Evan, Bryan, Seymour and whoever else got this going for pursuing the concept to it's logical next step.

Now where can I get some actual info on the blackout module. The page is not showing me very much. Is the huge terminal bus behind the main one just for extra grounds? What is the gain? Is the frequency response flat? Noise? Current draw? Supply voltage range? Dimensions? Price? Are the two signals combined internally?

Rick, do you mind letting me know via PM what your specs are or is this announcement imminent?

[ajawamnet@comcast.net]

Hey, 2002!!! Sounds familiar... http://home1.gte.net/wamnet/mce/mainblk.gif

http://home1.gte.net/wamnet/mce/pages.pdf. Check out the Parlex flex on page 2. You can get it with a shield too...

What's cool is you can embed active/passives on the flex. Most quick turn PCB houses now can make them... and you eliminate having to terminate any wire at all.

What'd did the lady from Bart say about "standards"? And i recall "herding cats". Sad, cause they're should be a robust standard for cavity interconnect.

[jason lollar]

thanks frank- great idea, I pmed you color codes- see you at NAMM

[Rick Turner]

I'm using the same connector standard as EMG, though, not having seen theirs, I chose a different pin-out. But it probably makes sense for me to change over to what they did before I get too much deeper into this. It's just five pin headers by AmpModu done on .100" centers. I have no intention of trying to make this compatible with some overly complex active system nor trying to make it compatible with sending power up to "active pickups". I just want something that makes it easy and cheap and reliable. With gold plated parts, this should meet all of those requirements. I'm not even yet using PC cards...I'm just cutting out small sections of VectorBoard. Once the five connections have been made from the pickup and the header is on there, I'm doing a down and dirty hot melt glue attachment to the bottom of the pickups. Like I said, easy and cheap and very, very convenient.

[Joe Gwinn]

A little corrosion goes a long way

And I'm about to publish/announce a pickup mounted header/connector for the other end of the harness so you can swap pickups without even opening up the back plate of a guitar...the back plate being something I eliminated from the Henman Guitars I'm now making. We're using Duncan pickups in the guitars, and each pickup has a five pin header mounted on it for easy swap-outs.

This 5-pin header - what kind is it? The fear is that if the contact material isn't right, a little bit of bad air will corrode the surfaces slightly, and make the connection unreliable, especially if the contact force is too low.


War story: In the 1970s I had a Dual turntable, a respected brand that worked very well. Except when it didn't. Well, mechanically it always worked. But one stereo channel would randomly go silent. There was no warning pop or anything. Just unannounced silence, while the other channel continued to work. It was always the same channel that failed.

I would get an idea as to what might be the cause, and try an experiment. The silent channel would then start working, and I would declare victory. But not for long. I eventually realized that it was my touching the turntable that helped; it didn't matter what I did, so long as it was something.

This continued for something like a year, leaving a trail of failed experiments and dead theories. With growing frustration.

Then one day I was looking at the wires that attached to the phono cartridge, a Shure if I recall, looking for inspiration. The wires had little terminals crimped to them, the terminals being designed to be pushed onto the output pins of the cartridge. The crimps looked odd - the barrel that accepted the wire was a perfect cylinder, with insulated wire entering, but no dimple to pinch the copper metal-to-metal. Very odd. Out comes the high-intensity light and 10x magnifier.

Only then could I see what was going on. The wire had been stripped 4mm and the conductors folded back outside the insulation, and the terminal crimped onto this assembly. This meant that the pressure forcing conductors against terminal barrel was only that of the very soft vinyl wire insulation. In the pure air of Industrial Baltimore, the wires and barrel had corroded slightly, but more than enough to stop a millivolt phono signal. When I moved anything, the wire shifted in the barrel, reestablishing contact. But Baltimore was not to be denied, and it soon failed again. And, this was not a hack repair, this was straight from the factory. It looked just perfect.

What to do? There was no way to get this apart, and soldering would have melted the insulation. Eventually, the lightbulb went on. I removed the phono cartridge to a safe distance and disconnected the turntable from everything, and then one by one hooked each terminal into a circuit including a 100 watt 110 volt incandescent lamp and an AC plug, and plugged it into the wall a few times. Brutal, but effective. The 110 volts punched right through that little corrosion layer, and the 10-amp cold-filament surge welded the wire to the barrel, once and for all time. The wire had no problem carrying the one amp normal draw of the lamp, so no exploding wires. There was no visible drama. The 100-watt light came on, and that was it.

[Rick Turner]

Joe, fully understood, and been dealing with this kind of stuff for many, many years. I'm using the gold plated phosphor bronze contacts then treated with Cramolin or whatever they call the stuff these days. I am very keen for these Henman guitars to go together in final assembly without soldering irons being turned on, and I've also eliminated back plates on all the guitars which do not need battery access. One of the salable features is easy pickup interchange. Ditto with aftermarket changes. Out there in the real world, "they" simply do not know how to solder. I've been using these connectors in my Model 1s for a number of years with good reliability.

[David King]

Rick,
Yes, please regularize your pinouts with EMG! I wish emg would indicate polarity on the back of the pickup as I'm always putting those connectors on upside down and that takes longer to fix than resoldering if the guitar has been reassembled and strung up...

[Rick Turner]

All it takes is marking one end of the two mating connectors with a silver pen. And I'll do it! The good thing about the EMG method is that you can flip pickup polarity quite easily unless I'm missing something there...

[David King]

Rick the only benefit of the EMG 3 pin connector is that reversing them doesn't melt the preamp...

[CRU JONES]

I am "regularized" with EMG. I use:

Mouser p/n: 538-50-57-90005 (5 pin single row header) this thing has an arrow to pin 1, it is very faint. This is what EMG uses.
Mouser p/n: 538-16-02-0098 (24-30 ga crimp connector, gold plated)

Both these things are made by molex, and I have used them for stompboxes and pickups for awhile. Definitely don't want any problems. So, Joe, maybe you could check them out!

I send my pickups with two female ends crimped to the pickup lead. I include in the package two male ends that are then soldered by the end user to the switch or whatever. The crimper is expensive, so I understand why screw terminals are used. And if you don't want to use it, just cut it off. Most people are totally stoked.

The male ends are:
Mouser P/n: 538-16-02-0110

My comments above are not meant to be discouraging. This is good for Duncan, custom winders, guitarists, and possibly EMG. EMG does already do 5 pin connectors and screw terminals. So in my opinion, we all love Duncan and hate sterile 81's... But, EMG is who I copied when I started doing quick connects. And I don't see much credit for their innovation or individuality.

I am glad to hear David King encourage compliance with EMG... The more the merrier!

Peace!
Cru

[Rick Turner]

I'm going five pin, and EMG has that, too, for passive humbuckers. I'm not addressing active pickups at this time. I just want each end of each coil plus shield in a logical array for being able to do coil cut and absolute pickup phase, and it would be nice to standardize north-up coil start and finish and south-up coil start and finish. I can't really do anything about clockwise/anti-clockwise windings with this, but that could be dealt with between two different maker's pickups with absolute phase, and putting the shield in the middle would allow for that if, for instance, "starts" were pins 1 & 5, and "ends" were 2 & 4. The rest of the game is in the harness at that point.

BTW, doing the coil cut on the tone control and all pots bypass on the volume is working really nicely. The bypass position takes away the loading of the pots, and it also allows for a preset if you turn the volume control down a bit. Pull it up, and you're turbocharged. Might even justify a separate switch...easy enough to do.

I must say, it's interesting delving back into the world of "normal" pickups and passive wiring after so many years of being off on another planet with my own pickups and active circuits. I also have to say that I am really liking the Duncan pickups I'm using (Seth Lovers, JBs, and '59s). I know they don't have the cachet of being boutique anymore...they're not flavor of the month... but those guys are using 100% proprietary parts...no bobbins and slugs and screws and covers and base plates from some off-shore supplier. In fact, they're as boutique and hand made as it gets, particularly if you get into Seymour's custom shop stuff, and even the production pickups are exquisitely made with the highest of quality control standards. Other winders may be able to equal Duncan's QC, but none are doing better.

Disclaimer...I'm a partner in a venture (D-TAR...acoustic amplification products) with the Duncan folks, but I'm using their magnetic pickups in Henman guitars simply because I don't think we can find better.