Brightening up a 360

[MrWilson]

Hey guys,

Thanks for your answers. I totally understand your thing IrishStratFan. Whenever I plug my Jazzmaster or even a Tele in my Deluxe, and switch to the Rick, I realize how thin and dull a Rick with hi-gains can sound. Now, my 360 has been my main guitar for years and don't get me wrong, I absolutely love that guitar. As it has been said before, the Hi-Gain sounds very midrangy, and the value of the pots (and the wiring itself) tend to roll-off a lot of high frequencies and clarity out of these pickups. Some people here don't understand this "my guitar sounds dull" thing since one may have the impression than newer Ricks are already on the bright and thin side of the guitar world. But it's obvious when you switch to other guitars.


I've come to realize that the main difference with -say Fenders- is the pots values and the wiring. There's a loss in the high-frequencies due to the load in the wiring, and this translates into a certain lack of attack/transients on the notes. Even with the right height, the pickups sound a bit too "soft" and "spongy", and the notes lack transients. Take a Jazzmaster : the pickups are known to give you that very "broad" sound (I'm talking about frequency content here), but most of it comes from the 1Meg pots, which allows a lot of higher frequencies and gives you that very open/bright sound, with a clear attack and strong transients.

I've always had the impression that the 330 sounded a little bit "rawer" than a 360, and I suspect the Rick-O-Sound wiring to be responsible for this little difference. The signal encounters less load in the wiring of a 330 compared to a 360, making it sound just a hair brighter, which is what I'm after. I'd like to remove some of the load of the circuit of the 360 to have it slightly more open sounding. So, two questions : is it true than the Rick-O-Sound wiring slightly increases the overall load of the circuit ? Apart from using different pots value, is there a simple way to disconnect the Rick-O-Sound output and simply use a 330 wiring style in my 360 ?

[MrWilson]

[quote="MrWilson"]Hey guys,

Thanks for your answers. I totally understand your thing IrishStratFan. Whenever I plug my Jazzmaster or even a Tele in my Deluxe, and switch to the Rick, I realize how thin and dull a Rick with hi-gains can sound. Now, my 360 has been my main guitar for years and don't get me wrong, I absolutely love that guitar. As it has been said before, the Hi-Gain sounds very midrangy, and the value of the pots (and the wiring itself) tend to roll-off a lot of high frequencies and clarity out of these pickups. Some people here don't understand this "my guitar sounds dull" thing since one may have the impression than newer Ricks are already on the bright and thin side of the guitar world. But it's obvious when you switch to other guitars.


I've come to realize that the main difference with -say Fenders- is the pots values and the wiring. There's a loss in the high-frequencies due to the load in the wiring, and this translates into a certain lack of attack/transients on the notes. Even with the right height, the pickups sound a bit too "soft" and "spongy", and the notes lack transients. Take a Jazzmaster : the pickups are known to give you that very "broad" sound (I'm talking about frequency content here), but most of it comes from the 1Meg pots, which allows a lot of higher frequencies and gives you that very open/bright sound, with a clear attack and strong transients.

I've always had the impression that the 330 sounded a little bit "rawer" than a 360, and I wonder if the Rick-O-Sound wiring is responsible for this little difference. Does the signal encounter less load in the wiring of a 330 compared to a 360 ? What I noticed with the 360, is that there is a slight difference between the mono ouptut and the ROS output in terms of load. And the sound is indeed a bit fuller/brighter when you use ROS instead of the mono out. A quick look at the schematics confirms this. Is there a way to have that sound out of the ordinary mono jack ? I don't have any use for ROS, and I'd like to know if I could do a simple wiring mod to prevent the signal from going into the bass AND treble volume pots regardless of the pickup chosen, and getting an overall clearer signal out of that baby. If it makes any sense

[iiipopes]

No. There is a finger in the mono jack that sums both sides of the Ric-O-Sound, making the guitar function exactly the same way as a 330 or any other guitar that has a volume and tone pot for each pickup. Yes, this adds a little bit of loading, but not enough to cause the guitar to sound the way the OP describes it.

No, something else is wrong. It could be pots that are too low a value, causing too much loading to ground. It could be the .0047 capacitor being not in spec so that too much low end is siphoned off the bridge pickup; or a number of other things.

I would try carefully unsoldering the hot lead of each pickup in turn from the selector switch and temporarily jumpering it directly to a jack to see how the pickup sounds by itself without any of the accompanying electronics.

[Dr. Frankenrick]

Mr Wilson, if you are happy with how the individual pickups sound on the stereo output and want to recreate it on the mono out, it's an easy enough mod to do.

At the moment it goes:
Pickups - 3-way selector - volume and tone controls - stereo jack - mono jack

You want it to go:
Pickups - volume and tone controls - 3-way selector - mono jack

Not taking the fifth knob into consideration, this is the same as the wiring you would find on a Les Paul. You will find plenty of illustrations online on how to wire that one up.

[LenMinNJ]

Maybe I'm way off base, but have you tried roundwound strings instead of flatwounds?

[aceonbass]

Not taking the fifth knob into consideration, this is the same as the wiring you would find on a Les Paul. You will find plenty of illustrations online on how to wire that one up.

This is not the same wiring. Gibsons and Ricks are wired COMPLETELY differently. But what do I know....

[Dr. Frankenrick]

Not taking the fifth knob into consideration, this is the same as the wiring you would find on a Les Paul. You will find plenty of illustrations online on how to wire that one up.

This is not the same wiring. Gibsons and Ricks are wired COMPLETELY differently. But what do I know....

I don't think I'm wrong in saying that the wiring on a Les Paul goes:
Pickups - Volume and tone controls - 3-way selector - mono output jack.

[jps]

Not taking the fifth knob into consideration, this is the same as the wiring you would find on a Les Paul. You will find plenty of illustrations online on how to wire that one up.

This is not the same wiring. Gibsons and Ricks are wired COMPLETELY differently. But what do I know....

I don't think I'm wrong in saying that the wiring on a Les Paul goes:
Pickups - Volume and tone controls - 3-way selector - mono output jack.

There's more to it IIRC. On Les Pauls that I have played, with both pickup selected, when you turn down either volume all the way both pickup get cut off, not so on a Rick.

[Dr. Frankenrick]

This is not the same wiring. Gibsons and Ricks are wired COMPLETELY differently. But what do I know....

I don't think I'm wrong in saying that the wiring on a Les Paul goes:
Pickups - Volume and tone controls - 3-way selector - mono output jack.

There's more to it IIRC. On Les Pauls that I have played, with both pickup selected, when you turn down either volume all the way both pickup get cut off, not so on a Rick.

The original poster asked about how to wire his Rickenbacker for mono, removing the stereo Rickosound output and the loading that results when usin the mono output from having the volume and tone controls for the bridge still in the circuit when the neck pickup is selected and vice vearsa. If he wants to do this and keep separate volume and tone controls for each pickup, he needs to put the pickup selector switch last before the output jack. The issue isn't the sound he is getting when both pickups are selected but rather the sound when either the neck or the bridge are selected on their own. In terms of the interactivity between the volume and tone controls for each pickup when in the middle position, I'd advise someone to take a look at the advantages/disadvantages of 50s wiring vs modern wiring. Indeed, if the Les Pauls you have played were wired 50s style, they would have behaved differently with both pickups selected compared to a Rick.