2 x J + 1 P in one bass passive wiring?

[Owen]

I have two pickups wound for me by Arron Armstrong. They are two MM humbucker cases but both have a full J and half a P pickup in them. The idea is to have both so close to each other that the P will stradle the gap fairly easily. My problem is how to wire it. I want to stay passive. I have a 4 pot limit. I guess I could have a twin dual concentric vol/tone vol/tone set up for the J side and a single Vol and single tone for the P side. Would chucking them all out of the same output prove to be a bit of a loading/impedance issue? Would it be just be wiser to have a switch to have either J or P setups running or could they all live happily together?

TIA as usual.

[brensabre79]

A rotary switch? Fender strat type wiring, (N, N&M, M, M&B, although you could add a 6th and 7th position for the two Js and all three if you wanted - would be a lot of wiring under there though.

Or you could have the P vol, J blend, J master vol & master tone. might get confusing.
Or a volume for each and a master tone.

Or if you're happy with stacks, do a vol/tone stack for all three then have a master volume.

Whole thing seems overkill to me, but I get confused enough with two pickups! if it works for you then go for it
I think the P will overpower the Js slightly (depending on how they are all wound) so balancing all 3 could be an issue.

[iiipopes]

There is nothing new but the history you don't know. Fender has done it twice with the Stu Hamm. The originals are from the early 1990's, the second version is from the early 2000's.

[Owen]

Thanks for the replies. I am more than aware of the Stu Hamm scenario, but there is an active element going on there which I am hoping to avoid. I am just trying to see if it is possible to do it passively and not run into buffering etc issues if all the pickups are on at the same time. My guess is probably not, but unless you ask you do not know. It might well be that all 3 pickups at the same time would be too much of a good thing.

[tommorichards]

ive got this one, with technically 4 pickups (two coils in the MM) and wired passively.



Im sure there is a way yours could be done. Id probably go for the above mentioned 3vol/ 1 tone if you're not into anything fancy. If you ARE, however, you could have some crazy stuff.

[skater dan0]

I think the easiest way to get the most pickup configurations is wire it with 2 volumes, 1 tone and a 3 way switch

Run 2 of the pickups into the 3 way switch then into a volume pot and then into a master tone, run the 3rd pickup into it's own volume pot then into the master tone. It would be pretty straight forward to wire. You're basically wiring a p bass and 2 pickup guitar into the same body and joining them at the tone pot.

I would wire the J's to the 3 way and give the P its own volume control. That you get every combination you need and if the P is overpowering the J's you can roll the volume back on it.

[iiipopes]

A friend of mine had one of the '90's versions. The pickups are wired for bypass passive, if I remember correctly, as well. The neck J pickup and the P pickup are on an either/or switch.

On the Rickenbacker forum, there is a member whose avatar is Cassius987. He has three pickups on a Rick 4001 which he rebuilt from a carcass that had been abused years before he got it, and had no other option. He can tell you about the various ways to wire it and the pros/cons of the various pickup combinations and impedance issues.