Charvel San Dimas wiring question

ICBM

noisepolluter said:

@ICBM so that would be, for instance:

L1: neck pickup green wire
L2: nothing
L3-6: bridge a wire across all of these, and run it to volume pot tag 1
L7: nothing
L8: bridge pickup green wire

Yes, if L1 is then at the end nearest the neck pickup.

noisepolluter

It works! It ruddy well works!

I wouldn’t mind learning at some point *why* it all works, but thanks @ICBM and @Funkfingers for your help. I wouldn’t have resented buying a tele switch or in the worst case taking it to a tech to rescue, but this is the best possible result, I’ve now got the full range of sounds I like, and the treble bypass widget works exactly as it should. Just got to tidy the rat’s nest now... 

Funkfingers

The "problem" with the stock Charvel wiring is that they have elected to use a relatively uncommon switch. Most of the third party schematic diagrams on t'Interweb do not illustrate the four-pole three-way selector switch. 

As suggested in my post of Aug.24th, sometimes, it becomes necessary to create one's own circuit diagram from first principles. Over several years, I have been mostly doing this for bass guitar wiring.

My original reason for registering on the Seymour Duncan User Group Forum was to ask a question about their discontinued Active EQ "switch" pickups. Turned out, I already knew more about these than the technical support staffers.  Their stock reply to all bass wiring questions was to follow the supplied instructions. Jazz Bass with a pan pot? Beyond them. D'oh!

ICBM

Funkfingers said:

The "problem" with the stock Charvel wiring is that they have elected to use a relatively uncommon switch. Most of the third party schematic diagrams on t'Interweb do not illustrate the four-pole three-way selector switch.

All for the sake of getting one less-useful split-coil sound - particularly when it's at the expense of one of the more useful sounds. The new wiring is simpler and (in my opinion) also better.

I am not a fan of wiring or non-standard components like this. Admittedly at one time 5-way superswitches were uncommon as well, and you've got to start somewhere...

Funkfingers said:

As suggested in my post of Aug.24th, sometimes, it becomes necessary to create one's own circuit diagram from first principles. Over several years, I have been mostly doing this for bass guitar wiring.

There used to be a fantastic book called 'Guitar Electronics For Musicians' by a rather amusingly-dressed 1970s fellow (there was a pic on the back!) called Donald Brosnac. I think Craig Anderton did something similar too. I learned most of the first-principles stuff from this book, and it enabled me to get the hang of solving problems like this. I admit you do have to have some sort of natural inclination for it .

noisepolluter

Funkfingers said:

The "problem" with the stock Charvel wiring is that they have elected to use a relatively uncommon switch. Most of the third party schematic diagrams on t'Interweb do not illustrate the four-pole three-way selector switch. 

As suggested in my post of Aug.24th, sometimes, it becomes necessary to create one's own circuit diagram from first principles. Over several years, I have been mostly doing this for bass guitar wiring.

My original reason for registering on the Seymour Duncan User Group Forum was to ask a question about their discontinued Active EQ "switch" pickups. Turned out, I already knew more about these than the technical support staffers.  Their stock reply to all bass wiring questions was to follow the supplied instructions. Jazz Bass with a pan pot? Beyond them. D'oh!

I’d have thought the 4-pole switch is also more expensive, and more labour intensive to wire up. Which is understandable if it’s crucial to a wiring layout but I don’t see that it is. (And maybe my tonal tastes are out of step, but I’d be surprised if many people liked  the both-inner-coils sound enough to sacrifice the standard both-humbuckers one...)

Funkfingers

ICBM said:

There used to be a fantastic book called 'Guitar Electronics For Musicians' by a rather amusingly-dressed 1970s fellow (there was a pic on the back!) called Donald Brosnac. I think Craig Anderton did something similar too. I learned most of the first-principles stuff from this book, and it enabled me to get the hang of solving problems like this. I admit you do have to have some sort of natural inclination for it .

I have those books PLUS the other chestnut, "How To Customise Your Electric Guitar" by Adrian Legg. 

noisepolluter said:
I’d be surprised if many people liked the both-inner-coils sound enough to sacrifice the standard both-humbuckers one.

This is why I suggested the Musicman Axis SS and Ibanez five-way HH circuits. They provide both. I even rewired my old PRS Custom to get the both humbuckers combination (amongst other things).

ICBM

noisepolluter said:

I’d have thought the 4-pole switch is also more expensive, and more labour intensive to wire up. Which is understandable if it’s crucial to a wiring layout but I don’t see that it is. (And maybe my tonal tastes are out of step, but I’d be surprised if many people liked  the both-inner-coils sound enough to sacrifice the standard both-humbuckers one...)

Likewise.

But there do seem to be a lot of switching systems used now which have some variation of this, either with a 5-way switch (eg H, S, S+S, S, H) or a 3-way (H, S+S, H), so clearly there seems to be a demand for those sounds and not H+H.

Babones

@noisepolluter did you ever make a diagram with the default switch at all? I'd quite like to also wire mine so that middle is both humbuckers as opposed to split coils.

noisepolluter

Babones said:

@noisepolluter did you ever make a diagram with the default switch at all? I'd quite like to also wire mine so that middle is both humbuckers as opposed to split coils.

Let me see what I can dig out
Edit: This is the diagram I worked from, and I followed the additional advice from @ICBM and @Funkfingers on the first page of this thread. 

https://www.seymourduncan.com/images/wiring-diagrams/2H_3B_1VppSPL_1T.jpg

I did also make a pitifully primitive diagram of how to wire up the switch, feel free to laugh at it in your own time. 

https://flic.kr/p/2jBmsYi

I’d suggest reading through my long work-in-progress/thinking out loud post on the first page of this thread. 

noisepolluter

ICBM said:

noisepolluter said:

@ICBM so that would be, for instance:

L1: neck pickup green wire
L2: nothing
L3-6: bridge a wire across all of these, and run it to volume pot tag 1
L7: nothing
L8: bridge pickup green wire

Yes, if L1 is then at the end nearest the neck pickup.

I think this is the bit which summarises how to wire the switch. I’ll see if I can take some closeups of the control cavity in case that helps.

noisepolluter

Ok, I’ll try to set this out in steps:

Step 1: Unsolder all the wires in both pickup leads. 

Step 2: In each lead, solder the ends of the black wire and bare wire together.

Step 3: In each lead, solder the ends of the red and the white wire together. Leave the green wire free for the moment.

Step 4: As per the Seymour Duncan diagram, solder a very short wire across the two bottom tags of the grid on the push-pull volume pot, then link it to the pot casing.

Step 5: Solder each of the joined red/white wires from both pickups to the two middle tags on the grid exactly as shown.

Step 6: solder the joined black/bare wires from each of the pickups to the volume pot casing (on the diagram, this is shown as green/bare)

Step 7: solder the rest of the connections between the volume and tone pots as shown in the Seymour Duncan diagram.

I’ll post again shortly with next steps.

noisepolluter

Looking at the stock switch now:

I’m going to number the two sets of tags L1-8 and R1-8, where tags L1 and R1 are the two nearest the neck pickup on the left and right wafer respectively. Unsolder all the connections.

Step 8: connect neck pickup green wire to L1

Step 9: leave L2 with nothing connected

Step 10: bridge a wire across L3-L6

Step 11: connect the bridged L3-6 switch tags to the furthest clockwise of the 3 tags on the main volume pot.

Step 12: leave L7 with nothing connected. 

Step 13: connect the green bridge pickup wire to L8

Optional step 14: I highly recommend a treble bypass network across the furthest clockwise two tags of the volume pot, as it gives it a more gradual sweep as well as retaining clarity. I used this one:
https://www.northwestguitars.co.uk/sprague-orange-drop-treble-bleed-kit/

Hopefully you should now be done! 

Certainlyunsure

Hi, so I've just purchased a Charvel Pro-Mod San Dimas Style 2 with the same Seymour Duncan JB '59 configuration that you had. I also want to have the middle switch position so that it is both Humbuckers. I found a diagram of the spaghetti of wires. Are you able to upload a photo of the wiring that you hade since redone. I have read what you have done and kind of understand it, I'm more visual learner when it comes to this. Appreciate it if you are able to help. Many thanks.

Charvel San Dimas wiring

noisepolluter said:

Ok, I’ll try to set this out in steps:

Step 1: Unsolder all the wires in both pickup leads. 

Step 2: In each lead, solder the ends of the black wire and bare wire together.

Step 3: In each lead, solder the ends of the red and the white wire together. Leave the green wire free for the moment.

Step 4: As per the Seymour Duncan diagram, solder a very short wire across the two bottom tags of the grid on the push-pull volume pot, then link it to the pot casing.

Step 5: Solder each of the joined red/white wires from both pickups to the two middle tags on the grid exactly as shown.

Step 6: solder the joined black/bare wires from each of the pickups to the volume pot casing (on the diagram, this is shown as green/bare)

Step 7: solder the rest of the connections between the volume and tone pots as shown in the Seymour Duncan diagram.

I’ll post again shortly with next steps.

https://flic.kr/p/2pArWwS

noisepolluter

I’m sure I’ve still got the pics somewhere. 

There’s a slight complicating factor in that I’ve since installed a set of Blackbird pickups from @OilCityPickups, in the same wiring scheme, but with a different set of colour codes on the leads.

 Ash, I think you said your 4 conductor pickup colour codes are the same as Gibson’s? 

Sporky

fastonebaz said:

How does anyone understand this voodoo

I actually worked out a method for creating complicated wiring. I'm just that cool.

It was useful when wiring up a Dimarzio EP1111 and two push/pull pots with two humbuckers and a Sustainiac. 

OilCityPickups

noisepolluter said:

I’m sure I’ve still got the pics somewhere. 

There’s a slight complicating factor in that I’ve since installed a set of Blackbird pickups from @OilCityPickups, in the same wiring scheme, but with a different set of colour codes on the leads.

 Ash, I think you said your 4 conductor pickup colour codes are the same as Gibson’s? 

Gibson and Bare Knuckle ... red is slug coil start, white is slug coil finish, black is screw coil start, green is screw coil finish. 
So white and green are connected together, black and braid go to ground and red is 'signal'. :-)

Certainlyunsure

First of all, many thanks for your replys. Using the steps laid out and the Seymour Duncan diagram, I have done my best to do a diagram of my own. I say my best, I'm not talking about the drawing I mean the information, the drawing is terrible

https://flic.kr/p/2pAV52C

Funkfingers

The selector switch part of your drawing is incorrect. 

You have misapplied the terminal numbering convention. On a CRL switch, the terminals would be numbered thus.

5 6 7 8
1 2 3 4

On the eight-terminals-in-line switch, 4 and 5 are the common/collector/wiper contacts. 

You can employ the switch in either of two ways. 

Either, pickups to 4 and 5, respectively, plus a jumper wire connecting 1, 2, 7 and 8 to the volume pot.

Or, 4 and 5 linked to each other and the volume pot. Bridge pickup to 1 and 2, neck pickup to 7 and 8.



There is a third option - a variation on the second - but I shall not bore you with that here.

I'm surprised that ICBM did not reply before me and managed to explain more clearly, using half as many words.

Just to confuse matters further, some eight-in-line switches have the "bridging" connectors between adjacent terminals engineered into the design.

Certainlyunsure

Thanks @Funkfingers , I was using the step by step guide that @noisepolluter had posted on this thread a year ago to get the same push pull and switching configuration.

noisepolluter said:

I’ve just bought a San Dimas HH with a 3 way blade switch and a push-pull coil split on the volume. Pickups are the usual JB/59 combo.

The coil combinations are as follows:
(with push-pull *in*)
Bridge Humbucker
both inner coils (not hum cancelling)
neck humbucker

(with p-p out)
Bridge outer coil
both outer coils (not hum cancelling)
Neck outer coil

I like all these sounds *except* the both-inner-coils middle combination. I’d much rather have the Gibson-style both-humbuckers sound.

Is there a way to tweak the connections so I can get that sound while still keeping all the outer-coil split sounds as they are?

I found out that this is how the Charvel is wired https://flic.kr/p/2pArWwS which is over my head. This is my first time dealing with switches other than Gibson style switch so a little bit in the deep end with this 3 way double wafer "super" switch. 

I could opt for a regular 3 way Tele style switch and follow the Seymour Duncan wiring diagram. But if possible I would like to modify what is in the guitar just now.

I believe this is the switch that is in the Chavel. It's been refered to in previous posts - https://www.retroamplis.com/3-way-guitar-switch-GOeLDO-double-wafer    There is a datesheet on that -- https://www.retroamplis.com/WebRoot/StoreES2/Shops/62070367/618B/8C4D/5A62/1632/C9D7/0A0C/6D12/3625/GTS-US2X3.pdf    -- * Edit -sorry these links don't seem to be working.

That shows different numbering which is confusing me now as the switch was in past posts being refered to as L left 1-8 and R right 1-8.

Apologies for information overload

noisepolluter

Sorry I’ve not checked back in on this - I will post photos asap