Master Partial Phase, Master Series/Parallel (correct?)

[Joe Garfield]

Hi Everyone,
I took a stab at my first wiring diagram. Sorry it’s messy. I took a diagram from Entwistle that shows partial phase of 1 humbucker on a DPDT switch. I combined 2 pups on a 4pdt switch, then figured a way to use DPDT for a master series/parallel switch.

The idea is: in parallel mode, both pups in parallel (normal) the pup selector works as normal and you have choice of normal or partial phasing both pups. In series mode, both pups in series, choice of both partially phased or not, and the pup selector isn’t really used - assume I’d just be in the middle position since this has both pups active.

Oh, wire colors are Entwistle, same as Seymour Duncan (Black +, Green -). Caps are .002uF on the phase switch, and .047uF on the tone pot. I don’t know which pup is bridge and neck, or if it matters . Any thoughts?

Thank you!

[Joe Garfield]

Nobody?? I’m about to start soldering but I’ll be starting from the input jack and working backwards

[Simon Barden]

It's not something I've ever done or looked into.

I'm not sure that I'd ever be interested in straight humbuckers in series. The resulting huge inductance and DCR will give a very muddy result. So you'd need to thin them out first IMO, so the series + partial phase cancellation might give something useable. It's stuff that I wouldn't drill any holes for the switches for yet, I'd just wire it up and test it out. Maybe use some screw connectors so you can try out different capacitor values.

[Joe Garfield]

I actually am thinking of going the other direction: the guitar is drilled for 4 pots. I will have to use shims or spacers or something for the switches. If it wasn’t such a thin veneer I’d plug the holes, sand them flush and re-drill but I don’t want to sand near the veneer.

I know 4 push-pull knobs is an option but I don’t want 4 knobs - particularly multi volume and multi tone. I guess I could consider a tone trimming pot or two...

[Simon Barden]

Rotary switches instead of pots?

[JimC]

So what holes are in the body at the moment?
I went through this with my ESB-4, more holes than I wanted!

[Joe Garfield]

Right now it has four 5/16" holes for import pots, plus a 1/2" hole for pup switch. The mini switches need a 1/4" hole.

[Joe Garfield]

I posted this same question on Seymour Duncan forum and got a suggestion to change the Master Series switch so that it disables the Pup Selector switch:

[Joe Garfield]

I will say that, after wiring up the harness, this whole thing feels a little over-ambitious. Wiring a 4PDT switch with capacitors and multiple wires sharing lugs is pretty tedious, especially when you've never wired a guitar before. It's all together and checks out with a multi-meter (checking continuity, that is) but if anything happens to go wrong, I don't think I'll be inclined to fix our troubleshoot the 4PDT as it's just too tight to get in there with a soldering iron again.

Shimming the switches isn't going to be ideal, and doing all this work to experiment with low output pickups probably isn't worth it.

But the harness is complete, so I have the option to use it if I want. I just got my PB guitar delivered yesterday and may do a more simple experimentation with it - maybe either just the partial phase, or just the Master series/parallel. But we'll see....

I'll post a pic of the harness in a bit. The wiring is done but I want to add something to stiffen it up so the wires stay to the perimeter of the F-hole.