[nynemusic]

Hey guys,
I'm not happy with the tones i am getting and i am sure i have mismatched components.

I just made a Warmoth Strat, with Walnut body, Satin finish and the neck and fingerboard are all ebony. I know this is a bright instrument to begin with.

So i got Injector Neck/Area 67 Mid/PAF 36th Anniversary Bridge.

The guy who wired my guitar initially got the Bridge and Middle position wrong, there was a huge drop in volume in that position and not the usual quack. U could tell it was a wiring issue.
The guitar has a 500k Vol pot and 2 250k Tone pots. He had wired the tone pots wrong as well and both tones were affecting all pickup positions. So much so that high end was piercing and i had to back off the second tone pot to get normal useable sounds.

In the Neck position i found the Injector almost too tight and not stratty enough. I sounded like a P90 of sorts and took gain well. Neck and Middle were really gorgeous, Middle was great, Middle and Bridge was whacked and the bridge was great too.

Today i had another tech service the guitar and look into the wiring.
By this time i had also ordered a Virtual Vintage Heavy Blues 2 for neck.
This tech now has one Tone dedicated to Neck and one Tone dedicated to Bridge position.
My 2, 3 and 4 positions although, quacky are very bright and i have to back off the tone of either neck or bridge to compensate. He also reversed the wiring on not just the middle but also the neck pickup to make it all work. I not into soldering and circuitry to understand that, but i can tell if something is right or wrong....

I am finding the VVH Blues 2 a bit more stratty but still nowhere close to the stratty tones i am after; in fact i have heard gorgeous stratty tones from both the Injector and VVH Blues 2 on youtube videos, both clean and shreddy overdriven. Also i seem to have lost some low end chunk, even thought i moved from 9's to 10's today and switched from the Inject neck to VVHB2......strangely even the Bridge lost some low end.

The Dimarzio site has SO many different diagrams for HSS combinations that its confusing.

Add to this that the Hum Cancelling pickups are in fact humbuckers in single coil size which confuses as to which diagrams i should be following.

Can i please get some advice to make sure these pickups are wired correctly. Then if i stlll dont like the tones, i shall keep searching for more pickups!

I have:
Dimarzio Injector Neck or Virtual Vintage Heavy Blues 2 Neck
Dimarzio Area '67 Middle
Dimarzio PAF 36th Anniversary Bridge.

5 way selector.

1x 500k Pot (vol)
2x 250k Pot (tones)
.47uf 50Volt Capacitors.
.22uf 50Volt Capacitors.
 * where should these capacitors go ??

Can i please know what the most standard wiring for these is going to be as featured on Fender HSS strats with no coil tap or push pull features.

What value pots should i be using, is the 500k making the sound too piercing ?
In Position 2, (neck & middle) are both pickups wired as full humbuckers or are single coils wired from each ? (They are all 4 conductor humbuckers arent they ?)
In Position 4 (Middle and Bridge, is only a single coil of the humbucker wired with the middle or is the full humbucker wired ?
What should be in series and what should be parallel ??

Sigh......even this post is sooo confusing and long!
I hope someone can offer help.

I know these are fine pickups, and shouldn't sound shrill, sterile and small sounding!
Please help, i am very distraught!
Thanks!
Faisal

[greenlion]

You are looking at quite a few variables here. For one, humbuckers are almost always going to be more powerful than standard-power single coils. If you want them to balance output-wise, you need more powerful singles.

Single coils are more likely going to sound best with a 250k volume pot, where humbuckers are usually going to sound best with 500k volume pots. Some humbuckers sound good with 250k pots, but not many. You can buy 300k volume pots that sort of split the difference. Gibson used them a lot in Les Pauls with humbuckers.

Sounds like the first guy that wired your guitar had two pickups out of phase. He just needed to switch the hot lead on one of them.

The injector is not going to sound very "stratty" no matter what you do to it. The Area 67 will sound much more stratty in the neck. Neither the 67 nor the injectors have a big low end. The area 58 has a bit more and sounds very stratty.

Have you listened to Paul Gilbert's signature guitar videos to see what tones he was getting from the injector neck and 67 middle?

[darkbluemurder]

First of all, going from two 250k tone controls affecting all pickups to a single tone control of 250k each on bridge and neck (and consequently no tone pot on the middle pickup) will make things a lot brighter, thus giving the sonic appearance of having less low end.

It seems what you have now is the following:

A guitar made of rather bright sounding woods.

Pickups:
Anni 36 bridge
Area 67
Injector neck
VV Heavy Blues 2

Pots:
2x 250k
1x 500k

Tone caps:
0.022uf 
0.047uf

Issues: bridge pickup too bright, both Injector neck and VV HB 2 not stratty enough, positions 2, 3 and 4 too bright.

Well, it's no wonder, the Area 67 with a 500k volume pot and no tone control wired to it will be piercingly shrill. The Area 67 to my ears works best with a 250k volume pot, which should also work well with the 36 Anniversary bridge (at least it does work well with the Virtual Hot PAF in my strat). However, both the VV HB 2 and the Injector need a 500k volume pot to sound their best - with a 250k volume pot they would even sound less stratty.

If you want to stay with the 36 Anniversary bridge, I would use a 250k for the volume pot, a 500k pot with the 0.022 cap for the bridge pickup and a 250k pot with the 0.047 cap for the neck pickup (or alternatively one 500k tone control with a 0.022 cap). I would put the Area 67 in the neck position, sell the Injector neck and the VV HB 2 and get an Area 58 or Virtual Vintage 54 Pro for the middle. This set up would be very close to what I use in two strats and would get you the stratty tones in positions 2 - 5 and a not too bright bridge humbucker.

Alternatively, if you are willing to go to a stronger bridge pickup, I recommend to use the 500k as volume pot, put the VV HB2 in the neck and the Injector neck in the middle. Sell the 36 Anni and the Area 67 and get an AT-1, AirZone or any other hotter humbucker that you like. You can use the 250k pots as tone pots. But since you say that the VV HB2 and the Injector neck are not stratty enough you may consider the first set up described.

Here is a diagram which could be used as a starting point: http://www.dimarzio.com/sites/default/files/diagrams/1h2virtualv5w1v1nbtone.pdf

I have not found a diagram for two tone controls but it is easy to convert this one to that. See where the connection from the tone pot goes to the switch. See also the connection from this lug on the switch going to another lug on the same side of the switch. Remove that connection and go from the other lug to another tone pot and wire that up just like the pot in the diagram. Any competent tech should be able to do that.

If you want only one tone control, you could use the following diagram: http://www.dimarzio.com/sites/default/files/diagrams/1h2virtualv5w1v1t.pdf

Good luck,
Stephan

[nynemusic]

Thanks guys! I appreciate the help!