2 x bridge pickup wiring

[Oldskoolrob]

Hi groovers,
Long story short I have two bridge SD Seth Lovers in my LP. I love the tones, but in the middle position with the volumes down I am getting the 'out of phase' quack type tone. The neck pickup is a 4 wire, so I'm wondering if I can change the wiring to compensate for it also being a bridge pickup, even though it's in the neck position? Currently wired as standard with Red/White together, Black hot and Green to ground. If I reverse it to green is hot and black is ground will that lessen the phase effect? Not a big deal, just curious. Cheers, Rob.

 

[ARandall]

All PAF, PAT# and T-top loaded guitars sport 2 bridge pickups. Or 2 neck pickups if you want to see it that way.
Vintage Strats have 3 bridge, 3 middle or 3 neck pickups fitted......also depending on how you want to look at it.
Having 2 of the same is absolutely nothing to do with phase at all. Assuming it's not just regular middle position cluck, and the pickups are actually OOP, you probably just have an incorrectly wired pickup from the factory.....unless you've been swapping magnets.
The wire flip will work if that's the case.

 

[dc007]

I would have thought if they were out of phase you would notice it when the pickups were at equal volumes whether that be low or high volume. I would not know why it only occurs at low volumes.

 

[Oldskoolrob]

Thanks @dc007 I'll double check that, I only experimented with low volumes. When I'm in the middle position the volume is lower than flicking to either pickup independently. I knew old guitars had 2 of the same pickup which is why I didn't baulk at just grabbing the two pickups I got for the best price. I haven't done any magnet swapping etc, but the neck pickup is upside down - I didn't think this had any effect? I thought that in modern set-ups one pickup was reverse wired (or is this just single-coils? I admit I'm not up on the correct terminology of phasing etc) so I assumed that was what was causing the quack. Is it something old guitars did out-of-the-box? @ARandall what is OOP? Appreciate the advice!

It's not terribly unpleasant or unusable - just different to what I expected.

 

[dc007]

No effect on pickup orientation. Has to be wired out of phase or the magnet flipped

 

[Oldskoolrob]

Ok cheers - might try reversing the wires and see what happens.

 

[freefrog]

Ok cheers - might try reversing the wires and see what happens.

Do your pickups have 4 conductors cables allowing to do that? A 2 conductors with braided shielded wire as a ground doesnt permit to reverse the wires... Unless your want one of your pickups to become terribly noisy. If yours have 2 conductors cables, you'll have to flip the mag in one of them in order to reverse the phase.

That being said:
1-a weaker sound in mid pos seems relatively normal to me with identical PU's. The pickups in parallel = twice less DCR and inductance = higher pitched resonant peaks = less output level.
2-I've wired once a LP with two Seth Lover's B as neck and bridge PU's... and I don't remember anything special in mid pos. They did have some "quwack" when enabled together and the sound had less output but once again, it's normal with P.A.F. type PU's.
If yours are OOP ("out of phase"), the tone should be noticeably thinner, with less bass than expected and some phony nasal mids, and not only with a lower output. Is it the case? Post a sound sample if you're not sure... or listen the tonal comparison done in this vid @ 20mn:

Good luck in your tone quest anyway.

 

[Oldskoolrob]

Thanks - that show's (for whatever reason) I'm definitely out of phase. Might leave it for a bit and see if it grows on me....

 

[Oldskoolrob]

Yeah it didn't. One session was enough for me to rip off the cover plate and reverse phase the wiring. Still no idea why it was required - obviously there's a flipped magnet in one for some reason (no signs of covers being removed) - but there you have it. Totally in love with her again now.