Rick 650 New Controls & Pickups

[aoresteen]

Back in 2008 I modded my 650D Dakota and put a set of colorful Seymour Duncans in it.





I even swapped the chrome pick guard for a wood one but eventually went back with the factory chrome one.




Over the last few years I've migrated to guitars that have a single MV & MT controls. Last month I decided to convert my 620-12 & 650D to single MV & MT. I did the 620-12 first:

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=412564


When I swapped the pickups in my 650 I used push-pull pots for coiltaps and a phase switch. In the last 5 years I have hardly ever used them - never live for sure.

So I got rid of the push-pulls and put the factory pots back in. Simplified everything.

I decided to put a chrome cover on the SD blue Jazz pickup at the neck as I have been using covered pickups a lot lately in the neck position. Well, when I put the cover on the Jazz pickup it wouldn't fit in the neck of the 650. The route was just a bit too narrow and I decided not to route out any more wood.

I had also decided to replace the JB at the bridge with a double creme one. I thought it would look better with the chrome cover in the neck. Come to find out Seymour Dundcan does NOT make pickups with double creme bobbins as that is a trade mark of DiMarzio pickups. So I bought a double creme DiMarzio Super Distortion for the bridge and a DiMarzio Air Classic for the neck. I had to do minor routing as the DiMarzios are slightly different in depth to get them level in the existing routes.

Tony Dudzik at Pick Guardian made the replacement chrome plastic pick guard:

http://www.pickguardian.com

Tony does fantastic work! Highly recommended!

Today I finished getting everything wired up and installed. I set it up with a set of .010 to .046 strings.



Closer view:



Sounds good, plays well, and I like the look of the double creme exposed bobbins. And having a single volume control makes it easy for me. Like I did to the 620-12, the pickup selector switch goes left to right rather than up & down to select a pickup.

[aceonbass]

Given the amount od effort you've put into customizing this guitar, I'm surprised that you'd keep any of the stock electronics. The stock electronics in these guitars had 180K pots, and .047uF tone caps. These are far from optimal for use with any humbucking pickups. Although just about anything can be compensated for at the amp, with the tone controls flat, I'd imagine the tone of this guitar to be much like it was with the stock pickups....fairly dull.

[aoresteen]

On the contrary the guitar is very bright and and punchy. Not dull at all. Similar to the SD JB & Jazz pickups that were in it. The tone control has a wider range of roll off before getting into the mud sound as compared to my other humbuckers with 500k pots.

As to the .047 cap, I have used them for years with humbuckers as do lots of players. I've tried many different caps (.01 to .08) with humbuckers and end up back with .047 as the most pleasing to my ears when using a tone control.

With both pots full up it doesn't matter if they are 180K, 250K, 330K, 500K, or 1 meg - the full output of the pickup is delivered to the amp. Only when decreasing the output by turning the vol down does the signal change. I've tried treble bleed circuits and they have a small effect but not enough for me to install them on all my guitars.

[aceonbass]

With both pots full up it doesn't matter if they are 180K, 250K, 330K, 500K, or 1 meg - the full output of the pickup is delivered to the amp. Only when decreasing the output by turning the vol down does the signal change.

Yes, very true, but I think most (including myself) prefer to have some tone and volume control at the guitar that leaves room for adjustability. Since you're always running your controls wide open, why have any at all in that case?

[aoresteen]

I never said that I run them full up all the time. When I use the neck pickup alone I tend to roll down the tone. With the bridge pickup it is full up.

The vol pot I use to make some volume adjustments if needed. I find that I have plenty of control - YMMV.