Need help from a wiring master..

[Aka Nameless]

I ran the diagram by someone on another wiring forum and he mentioned that for the pickup selector, instead of a 2p3t to use a 4p3t switch (only using 3 of the poles) so you can ground the inactive hot wire. Says the open hot circuit could cause hum and other noise in the signal.

Sounds logical to me, what you guys think?

 

[A440Hz]

Wow, thanks to both of you for taking the time to put these diagrams together.

Line6man,after thinking about that wiring scheme, I like it a lot, and will use it on one of my personal guitars cause it offers more tones, however the guitar i'm making atm, is for the other guitarist in my metal band, and he pretty much keeps his guitar in bridge humbucker always.. I think a wiring scheme like this would confuse him and most people heh, but for my next personal guitar, i'm probably gonna try this one out.

A440hz I think you figured out the original wiring scheme which is Awesome, hopefully someone can look over it and double check it to make sure everything is right (i'm not good enough for that). Like I said above, my other guitarist, and most people would be ok with a wiring setup like this with everything humbucking, they can keep it in series mode if they want the standard humbucking, and switch over to parallel for a little variety. It's a fine line between just enough tone control, and scaring people away with the ammount of tonal options. I think this scheme is a perfect balance.

You both are my heros!

But now you both have to fight to the death to see who wins my heart.

Umm, line6man, POD X3s at dawn from 30 paces?

Glad to have helped, Aka.

 

[A440Hz]

I ran the diagram by someone on another wiring forum and he mentioned that for the pickup selector, instead of a 2p3t to use a 4p3t switch (only using 3 of the poles) so you can ground the inactive hot wire. Says the open hot circuit could cause hum and other noise in the signal.

Sounds logical to me, what you guys think?

The only issue that I've had in the past with an open circuit instead of a short circuit to ground is that if you open circuit a pickup and play a lot, then turn the pup on, you can get a 'pop'. If this happens (incidentally, with the killswitch I drew, this situation could arise), you can put a huge resistor (like 10MOhms) across the hot lead to ground so that any current generated by the opened circuit will bleed to ground, but the impedance is high enough that it won't interfere if the pup is switched on.

Hum and noise aren't usually caused by open circuits, so I'm not sure what the other person means. Open circuits don't contribute to the output, any more than short circuits to ground do. However, grounding inactive hot wires is perfectly fine, and if you want to do it, more power to you! 4PDT switches are awfully expensive, tho. The Dimarzio one is $30, IIRC. DPDT on-on-on switches are usually less than half of that.

 

[Aka Nameless]

Ya, here is the diagram edit he did, its pretty much making the hot inputs go to a their own pole selector instead of both going to the center lug on the series/parallel switch, said it would reduce hum.

In the picture below, dp3t connector that he added on top would be added to the left side of the dp3t in the original diagram, and make it a 4p3t, with the second pole unused.

 

[A440Hz]

Meh. I'm just not sure how it reduces hum. It's an open circuit. Maybe I'm wrong here, so you may want to do some testing and see if you can tell any difference. I just haven't seen any difference IME with floating, open-circuited leads.

Do whatever you feel comfortable with.