Hey iiipopes, have you done any experimentation for bass wiring? Mark

Yes. Definitely. I put a push-pull in my 4002 on the neck pickup, as both pickups on that guitar have inline .01 caps, and I wanted a straight through pickup. I have an entire thread about that in the basses section and the phasing that was caused by having both pickups with a cap. I have also added the .0047 cap inline to every J-bass bridge pickup I can, because by cutting out the lows and changing the phase of the overtones, it lines up better with any mid or neck pickup and I don't get the volume drop from the fundamental phasing and impedance drop that comes with any two pickups in parallel. On my custom bass with the HB-1 in the classic mid position, I had to go through all four wiring permutations on a neck noise cancelling pickup before I found the lead order that matches the HB-1 both electrically and magnetically in phase.

Hello - I have a v59 also and am currently trying to get my luthier to make some mods to the wiring. I was wondering if you would share your ideas/plans?

Hey Deerstalker -- post your email address and I'll send you a pdf of the mods you can show your tech.

Sorry for the delay responding - hope your offer still stands as we couldn't come up with anything otherwise. You are the MAN!!! Please send to pyngme (at) yahoo (dot) com

Many thanks in advance...!!!

--G

Hey Deerstaker -- done.

One item on any '59 variant 325: there are only 4 knobs. My mods are designed around the 5th knob. So if you want to mod a 325V59 or any other similar guitar or bass with the 4-knob configuration, you'll either have to add the 5th knob or modify the wiring so the push-pull is on another knob. It can be done, and rather easily; I even modded my 4002 to have the cap switchable to the neck pickup, but it will take a little time and planning before hand to determine which knob you will actually use it on to best match your particular playing style and ergonomics.

Yes I've got 4 controls and want the tech to install a push/pull knob to use as you describe.

This is a "Lennonized" v59 which had the middle pickup disabled, caps installed and pickups unwound to match the older specs. About the only thing it needs is the elongated jackplate to be complete! Awesome guitar...

Now that the tech hooked up the middle pickup, I really like the additional tones and want to have them all available such as you mention.

Thanks!

Regarding which pickup JL "unhooked," because of the character of the tonality of what I hear on the records, and some obscure references I can't recall right now, I wonder if it wasn't the neck pickup he disabled instead of the middle pickup. After all, he was a rocker, and at the time a brighter guitar tonality was the favored tonality rather than the more mellow neck pickup which had been standard fare until then, especially on jazzbox guitars. I get some tones really, really close to some of the earliest recordings with the bridge and middle together with no cap. Of course, unlike today's recording studios, nothing was digital; nothing was direct until later; and everything was recorded through a miked amp, sometimes not even a guitar amp, but a small PA amp with a "cleaner" signal (less hum) onto analog equipement, so anything can sound like anything. But just the relative tonality leads me to believe it is not an automatic conclusion that it was the mid pickup that JL unhooked. And as the guitar was taken apart and put back together several times, as can be shown by the different state of different controls either present or missing (having the knob come off, the nut worked loose and the control dropping down into the guitar) in some of the archival photographs, it's even conceivable that at some point the neck or the mid or both or neither were working at different times on the '59.

But then again, these veteran toasters were probably only wound to somewhere between 5.5 and 7 kohms, more likely in the low 6-ish kohms, instead of the modern reissue @7.4 kohms. I believe the C59 variant actually also has the lighter wound pickups as a stock item. So there is another source of a "cleaner" or "thinner" or "more transparent" sound as well. In the end, we'll never know for sure, as no records were kept at the time as to exactly the guitar technical details.

SO, the point of my mods is to have a choice in the matter, with a wider palette of tone colors available.

The change of tones when disabling/enabling the middle pickup is very noticeable to my ear. When disabled, the guitar to me sounds more 'beatlesque' or vintage. When enabled, the sound changes to a more powerful jazzy/strat sound.

As you mention, to get that original tone 100% would take more than a few mods to the guitar. For what this guitar does deliver thru my newer AC15, I am very pleased with the results which make an old Beatle fan very happy.

What I was striving for initially was to use two push/pulls to control on/off and vol/tone for the middle pickup independent of the others. That sent the tech into an infinite loop trying to figure out how.

OK, I need to clarify some things after a private discourse with another gentleman about what these mods do: my mods are NOT a simple mid pickup cut/add. Moreover, they do not give the mid its own volume control per se, but uses the "bass" volume and tone controls selectively, but still with stock functionality.

My wiring mods, which work best with a three pickup instrument with a 5th knob, but can be adapted otherwise, do two things simultaneously:

1) With the push pull down:
a) the .0047 cap is inline to the bridge pickup, and
b) only the neck pickup is sent to the up position of the selector switch.

This is what most people prefer for "vintage 60's" maximum jangle.

2) With the push pull up:
a) the .0047 cap is NOT in the bridge circuit, and
b) only the middle pickup is sent to the up position of the selector switch.

This gives a completely different palette of tone colors to the instrument.

I had posted this in various threads beforehand, but these threads are probably now buried in the back pages of the forum, so it's time to refresh what my mods actually do.

Thank you for your time, and thanks to Mr. JH & all at RIC for the bandwidth to restate what these mods do.

Use only RIC approved parts. These are my personal mods not connected with RIC in any way except they have been gracious to extend their permission to post about them here on the forum. Modifying a guitar can void the warranty and may not work for you as described, depending on the quality of the labor. Your milage will vary. You do these mods at your own risk.

That said, others have really enjoyed them as much as I do. Rock on!