Anyone ever tried the "Blowout Switch" or the "Spin-a-split" mods?

[Davio]

The blowout switch is where one leg of a switch is wired to bypass tone and volume and give full attention to the bridge pickup. Lets one adjust the tone and volume pot(s) for other than lead sound(s) and go straight to full bridge for lead. Can cut way down on volume and tone pot adjustment during performance.

The Spin-a-Split lets one tone pot pan a humbucker from humbucking to its split coil... and blend between.

Just would love to hear if any of you have tried these (or other "off-the-beaten-path" wiring mods).

I'm playing around with some things (including these). I can tell you that a variable resister (Bourns 0-500K) in a treble bleed circuit (with .002 mfd cap) is a quite useful thing (to my ears, anyway).

 

[Davio]

I guess not. Yawn.

 

[Wraptail]

I had a Peavy T-160 that had the spin a split. It was very cool. If you've got multiple humbucker guitars it'd be cool to have one with it. I wouldn't use it in my main guitar though.

That Peavey had a phase switch a swell, that guitar could get all sorts of cool tones. Weighed a ton though!

 

[MooCheng]

I don't think I need a blowout switch

 

[LeftyF2003]

I disabled the tone pot on my Steinberger as I always have it full out on that guitar. We used to call that mod a blower switch, but we'd wire it to use all pickups at once (very cool on a Strat for instance). I would try it and see what you think as it's a reversible mod.

 

[carydad]

I've called it a blowER switch but I might have gotten that from Suhr. Tried it but didnt really love it. I've tried countless versions of pup switchings. Enough that I cant keep track of what I did on what guitar and had to make maps. End of the day, pretty much all of them have screwed me over playing live. Turn down the volume and it doesnt work! Oops, damn switch. The LES I have to think the better. Eventually I go back to simple mode and find something else to blame my playing on.

Pointy guitars with 3 pups of various coil styles though, that' unnatural and therefore-fair game. I change that stuff weekly. Changed one and gigged it this last Saturday. 5-way, H-S-H, 2 mini switches. By default the single in the middle is in serial with the second half of the next hum. Second switch removes that. I like it because it doesn't drop the volume as much as going from hum to single. The first switch puts the bridge into a version of parallel. It's different because instead of putting both coils in parallel together, one of them is wired to hot so that single coil is added to everywhere in the 5 way. Of course, extra switching goofed me up at the gig, as always.

 

[NYC LP player]

very interesting

I think the 2012 or 2013 trad pros had that feature but it needed a battery. I now have unused push/pulls since I got ECP HGs so this could be fun.

 

[NYC LP player]

OK I was home and I had free time and wired it up since my push pulls were still in there from when I had 4 conductor PUs.

I like the mod thought results will vary. I use very high rating pots and .18 caps on both. The straight signal is very bright and a lil more open sounding. I did both the neck and bridge since I was in there anyway. I can see how this would be useful too if you wanted to go from a turned downed to to sudden max brightness.

Long and the short...if you have the pots handy then why not if you have vintage braid PUs. If you have 4 conductor I would keep my split coil option instead.

I can record some mic'd audio if anyone wants to hear it.

 

[Davio]

Cool! Thanks for the info. It felt like I was beating a long dead horse there for a minute!

Yes, Suhr had the spin-a-split but I think they called it something else.

Since I am playing around, I think I'll try both of these at once on a new set neck tele that has one bucker in the neck position and one hot single at the bridge. I'm thinking that the spin-a-split will give me some in-between tones I would not otherwise have between all bucker and tapped single. And the blower switch will be operated off the volume push-pull (pull for the all out bucker) and I actually HOPE it will be brighter AND more robust. We'll see / hear.

 

[NYC LP player]

Cool! Thanks for the info. It felt like I was beating a long dead horse there for a minute!

Yes, Suhr had the spin-a-split but I think they called it something else.

Since I am playing around, I think I'll try both of these at once on a new set neck tele that has one bucker in the neck position and one hot single at the bridge. I'm thinking that the spin-a-split will give me some in-between tones I would not otherwise have between all bucker and tapped single. And the blower switch will be operated off the volume push-pull (pull for the all out bucker) and I actually HOPE it will be brighter AND more robust. We'll see / hear.

In a single coil with 250k pots I believe it would be quite noticeable but crazy bright. In humbuckers with 500k+ ones it was very lil volume and more treble of almost a harsher quality that could be useful in certain scenarios.

 

[smk506]

I have had the spin a split on a few of my guitars for a few years and like it in that its an easy way to do coil splitting without adding any holes or having to buy and wire in a push pull pot, and keep the original look of the guitar.

I honestly don't think there are a world of sounds to the mod, really it seems to be full on until its cut, then maybe two usable, but honestly very similar single coil sounds. I'm sure theres a good pot out there just for this that would get you more noticeable differences, but for me they were just to minute to really futz with. Still a good mod to try out on a slow saturday, especially if you're soldering iron is already hot.

As to the other, The closest I have is a 2015 isa strat with their bypass tone pot that cuts the tone circuit out of the loop but leaves the volume. It's not the same thing but interesting enough to make me consider cutting everything out of the loop on say my melody maker and seeing what I think.

 

[Davio]

OK I was home and I had free time and wired it up since my push pulls were still in there from when I had 4 conductor PUs.

I can record some mic'd audio if anyone wants to hear it.

That would be great!