Super Tele with 5 way switch and two "humbuckers"

[wazkelly]

Yes but then I am dealing with the dreaded hum and I really don't want that. /Markus

Hi Markus, I have split Tonerider Alnico IV's in my EX-1 and being HB's there is no hum or unwanted noise when they are reduced down to the one coil. The split SC sound is not as sharp or bright as a Strat or Tele and in your option 2 above that way they should combine reasonably well to provide similar sound to middle position on a Tele. Tend to think it will be hard to pick the difference between positions 2 & 4 though, probably very subtle if any at all.

Cheers, Waz

[bruunm]

Hi Markus, I have split Tonerider Alnico IV's in my EX-1 and being HB's there is no hum or unwanted noise when they are reduced down to the one coil. The split SC sound is not as sharp or bright as a Strat or Tele and in your option 2 above that way they should combine reasonably well to provide similar sound to middle position on a Tele. Tend to think it will be hard to pick the difference between positions 2 & 4 though, probably very subtle if any at all.

Cheers, Waz

Hi Waz,

Yes 2 & 4 will be veeeeery subtle. I used to have a '91 PRS Custom 24 and it had those selections out of (obviously) two full sized buckers. But from my experience I will only be using 1,3,5 and either 3 or 4 whichever sounds better. I just want to avoid hum at all cost, something I never dealt with before moving Aus from Europe, matter of fact I used to be disgusted with people that used noisecancelling pickups at all ;-)

[Simon Barden]

Your stacked pickup doesn't have inner and outer coils. The second coil on it isn't wrapped round the magnets, so you'll get no sound! It's only there to provide hum cancelling. So what you are likely to get in positions 2 and 4 is one single coil + single coil in parallel, and one bridge single coil + hum cancelling coil sound. Since SD have stopped doing individual pickup wiring diagrams (boo!) it's a lot harder to check how individual pickups are wired and the only STK-T1N pickup diagram I could find doesn't show any split, so there's no way of telling which is the coil with the magnets and which is the dummy coil. So you may end up swapping some of the connections around in order to get a modicum of hum cancelling in all positions.

Note that as the stacked pickup coils will have a different number of turns on each coil to the Li'l 59 coils, you won't get perfect hum cancelling in the mixed positions, but hum will be reduced.

The up side is that you'll get more variation with positions 2 and 4 than you thought.

But simply shielding the control and pickup cavities will get rid of most of your hum problems anyway.

[bruunm]

Your stacked pickup doesn't have inner and outer coils. The second coil on it isn't wrapped round the magnets, so you'll get no sound! It's only there to provide hum cancelling. So what you are likely to get in positions 2 and 4 is one single coil + single coil in parallel, and one bridge single coil + hum cancelling coil sound. Since SD have stopped doing individual pickup wiring diagrams (boo!) it's a lot harder to check how individual pickups are wired and the only STK-T1N pickup diagram I could find doesn't show any split, so there's no way of telling which is the coil with the magnets and which is the dummy coil. So you may end up swapping some of the connections around in order to get a modicum of hum cancelling in all positions.

Note that as the stacked pickup coils will have a different number of turns on each coil to the Li'l 59 coils, you won't get perfect hum cancelling in the mixed positions, but hum will be reduced.

The up side is that you'll get more variation with positions 2 and 4 than you thought.

But simply shielding the control and pickup cavities will get rid of most of your hum problems anyway.

Thanks Simon,

Valid points...

Guitar is fully shielded and nope... its noisy... annoyingly so as I love the "hot for tele" that is currently in the neck position.

If they both have four wires, yet aren't split-able then what good are the four wires?

Either way, its all ordered now, so I will update here and maybe throw some tones up on Soundcloud or something.

[Simon Barden]

They put in the four wires so that you can access just the standard single coil part of the pickup, as some people like to have a non-hum cancelling option as the extra coil does affect the sound a bit.

I'm surprised that you've got so much hum even after shielding the cavities. It's normally pretty good at stopping or really reducing hum levels. You must be playing in a very electrically noisy environment.

[bruunm]

You must be playing in a very electrically noisy environment.

I am, it is called Australia :-D.... never worried about it when growing up in Switzerland or later living in Denmark (I am danish, don't ask its complicated, hehehehe)

[bruunm]

Also just realised my title of this thread...

Should have said Tele with Super 5 way switch... NOT.... Super Tele with 5 way switch... I mean it could become a super tele...

[D.K]

Super tele sounds about right to me.

[bruunm]

Super tele sounds about right to me.

Hehe.. maybe once I whack a new neck on it... with a nice flamed maple and thick ebony board and premium treatment for frets... ;-)