Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 19, 2012 Members Share Posted January 19, 2012 I ordered a set of 36th Anni. PAFs for my PRS. I really wanted the black covered versions. Of course, this means that if I want the 5 way rotary to work as it does......bridge/out of phase/both pickups/single-single/neck......I have to flip the magnet in one of the pickups. I have done this with an uncovered pickup, and it wasn't terrible. With having to remove the cover, do I have the potential to destroy the pickup? I found this: http://www.stewmac.com/tsarchive/ts0069.html Which helps, but it looks like a real pain. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members PunkKitty Posted January 19, 2012 Members Share Posted January 19, 2012 No need to flip the magnet. Just connect hot to ground and ground to hot to reverse phase. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members melandy Posted January 19, 2012 Members Share Posted January 19, 2012 Have they arrived yet? If so, inspect them to see how closely the solder joints match the stew mac article. If it looks like a match, were it me, I would flip it. The guys at stew mac know their stuff... just follow directions closely. Disclaimer: yes, the potential for catastrophic failure is there. You could totally bork this. Don't run with scissors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 19, 2012 Author Members Share Posted January 19, 2012 Hmmm.....I thought it was the polarity? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 19, 2012 Author Members Share Posted January 19, 2012 Have they arrived yet? If so, inspect them to see how closely the solder joints match the stew mac article.If it looks like a match, were it me, I would flip it. The guys at stew mac know their stuff... just follow directions closely.Disclaimer: yes, the potential for catastrophic failure is there. You could totally bork this. Don't run with scissors. They should be here today. I'm mostly worried about microphonic issues. Thanks. I'd prefer to keep the 5 way.....while I probably won't utilize it much, it's still nice to have those options. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members jonny guitar Posted January 19, 2012 Members Share Posted January 19, 2012 I am pretty sure that flipping the magnet is the way to go as opposed to switching leads. I did the dremel route when I did mine and it worked really well: just goes as shallow as possible with the dremel (ie. move it across the weld instead of just staying in one place and letting sink it). My only concern would be if they are potted and you end up with microphonic afterwords...you don't really want to get into repotting them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 19, 2012 Author Members Share Posted January 19, 2012 I am pretty sure that flipping the magnet is the way to go as opposed to switching leads. I did the dremel route when I did mine and it worked really well: just goes as shallow as possible with the dremel (ie. move it across the weld instead of just staying in one place and letting sink it). My only concern would be if they are potted and you end up with microphonic afterwords...you don't really want to get into repotting them. dremel route? That's scary! That is my biggest concern....to spend the money on new pickups, and have it be microphonic after surgery.I think I'm going to give it a shot, I'm fairly handy and careful, so it should work without issue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members honeyiscool Posted January 19, 2012 Members Share Posted January 19, 2012 If you do a bit of thinking, a four-wire conductor can be made to have proper phase and polarity under split. That's the beauty of them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members onelife Posted January 20, 2012 Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 I don't believe you can get the full advantage of the PRS five-way switching without flipping the magnet. In a conventional humbucking pickup the coils are electrically out of phase (by 180 degrees) and that is what bucks the hum. Because each coil is coupled to the opposite pole of the magnets they are magnetically out of phase (by 180 degrees) as well. The combined phase relationship from the perspective of the electrical signal generated by the vibrating strings is 180+180=360 degrees which brings them back in phase (it can also be thought of as 180-180=0 degrees). In certain switch positions the PRS design uses individual coils from different pickups wired in humbuking configuration. If it was the inside coil from one pickup and the outside coil from the other then they would work as a humbucker. What Mr Smith discovered is that by combining the two inside coils (the ones that are closest together) on a 25 inch scale 24 fret guitar, he could approximate the classic sound of a stratocaster. In order to achieve this and maintain humbucking configuration he had to put the coils out of phase and flip the magnet in one of the pickups. To attempt this simply by wiring alone would result in the coils being out of phase and weak or in phase but not humbucking. There is a bit about this on the FAQ page of the Seymour Duncan web site. Do Seymour Duncan pickups work with PRS 5 way rotary switching?Yes Seymour Duncan humbuckers are compatible with the PRS-type 5 way switching. If you are replacing the bridge pickup, the magnet will first need to be flipped to correct phase issues related to the parallel wiring and series coils between two split humbuckers that is utilized in the PRS 5 way switching. The Seymour Duncan humbucker will also need to be wired differently from the way it is usually wired into a guitar. The hot lead will be the white wire from the Seymour Duncan humbucker, the black and green wires will be connected together and the red lead will be ground. PRS wiring is white=hot, red=split and black=ground so use these codes to install your Seymour Duncan pickup Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 20, 2012 Author Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 Yeah, I installed some Super Distortions I had sitting around in it....but didn't flip the magnet. Obviously the bridge and neck pickup solo'd worked normally. The out of phase setting was very loud and bassy, the middle (both pickups) was thin and ugly, as was the single coil mode. Does it matter which pickup I flip the magnet in? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 20, 2012 Author Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 SIDE QUESTION: Rather than make a new thread, I'm going to just ask..... Where can one buy the pickup magnet?Say I wanted to covert a set of Alnico V pickups to Alnico II? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members PunkKitty Posted January 20, 2012 Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 SIDE QUESTION:Rather than make a new thread, I'm going to just ask.....Where can one buy the pickup magnet?Say I wanted to covert a set of Alnico V pickups to Alnico II?I usually buy magnets from Addiction-FX. Make sure to check and see that the magnets have been magnetized before you buy them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 20, 2012 Author Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 I usually buy magnets from Addiction-FX. Make sure to check and see that the magnets have been magnetized before you buy them. Thanks! Is it as easy as removing the original magnets......and installing the new ones?(of course making sure you install them the same way) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members PunkKitty Posted January 20, 2012 Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 Thanks!Is it as easy as removing the original magnets......and installing the new ones?(of course making sure you install them the same way)Here's a primer http://www.projectguitar.com/tut/barmagswap.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 20, 2012 Author Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 awesome, thank you so much. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members onelife Posted January 20, 2012 Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 Does it matter which pickup I flip the magnet in? No it doesn't - as long as they are opposite with respect to each other. Don't forget the wiring needs to be "backwards" for one of the pickups as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members honeyiscool Posted January 20, 2012 Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 I don't believe you can get the full advantage of the PRS five-way switching without flipping the magnet.Yes you can. It's pretty simple. For instance, if you have two Seymour Duncan pickups (and I use SD because their colors are most common), normally the hot wire is BLACK, the coil-split is WHITE & RED tied together, and GREEN is ground. If you want the split coils to be in phase but reverse polarity, then you wire one humbucker normally, and the other one has hot wire RED, coil-split is GREEN & BLACK together, then WHITE is ground. I've done this many times before and it works fine. Never mind what the Seymour Duncan site says. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 20, 2012 Author Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 No it doesn't - as long as they are opposite with respect to each other.Don't forget the wiring needs to be "backwards" for one of the pickups as well. I was not aware of that. What I did was make a quick sketch of the PRS wiring with the stock PRS pickups, and took a bunch of pictures of the cavity. Then I found the Dimarzio wire color conversion.....like Dimarzio this color = PRS that color. I figured I'd just swap them out based on that? Will that work? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members honeyiscool Posted January 20, 2012 Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 Really, GAS KING, there's a way you can do this without flipping the magnet. Believe me on this one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 20, 2012 Author Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 I quickly tried a Dimarzio EJ Custom in it quickly.......it did not work properly until I flipped the magnet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members honeyiscool Posted January 20, 2012 Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 You can't use the stock wiring colors, that's the thing. With DiMarzio, if you want to change polarity of the split with changing the phase, you swap red with white, black with green. If you want to change phase, you swap red with black, green with white. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cliff Fiscal Posted January 20, 2012 Author Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 Then why does PRS just manufacture 4 wire pickups?why doesn't the stew Mac guide tell me to do that?why do all of the PRS owners flip their magnets in their aftermarket replacements? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members honeyiscool Posted January 20, 2012 Members Share Posted January 20, 2012 For any humbucking pickup with four conductors, there are four different wiring combinations that are possible for any humbucker that still maintains phase. There are also four wiring combinations that {censored} up phase. Then there are 16 combinations that just don't work at all. This is confusing for the average person. It's easier for pickup manufacturers to just suggest that people stick to one set of wiring colors because given a certain wiring, only one of the 24 will be ideal. Hell, most people who wire splits in their guitar don't even realize they can be humcancelling while split because they use factory colors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members onelife Posted January 21, 2012 Members Share Posted January 21, 2012 Yes you can. It's pretty simple.For instance, if you have two Seymour Duncan pickups (and I use SD because their colors are most common), normally the hot wire is BLACK, the coil-split is WHITE & RED tied together, and GREEN is ground.If you want the split coils to be in phase but reverse polarity, then you wire one humbucker normally, and the other one has hot wire RED, coil-split is GREEN & BLACK together, then WHITE is ground.I've done this many times before and it works fine. Never mind what the Seymour Duncan site says. I really don't think you get it (no insult intended). The PRS wiring uses one coil from one pickup and one coil from the other pickup and combines them in humbucking configuration. In order to get specific sounds, one combination is the two inside coils (the ones closest to each other- without the adjustable pole pieces) and another combination is the two outside coils (the ones farthest apart from each other - with the adjustable pole pieces). If the magnets are the same - for example the south pole facing the adjustable pole pieces - then the two outside coils will be magnetically in phase. If the coils are then wired out of phase to cancel the electromagnetic interference that causes the hum, the signal produced by the vibration of the strings will also be out of phase and weak. If the coils are wired in phase, the signal from the strings will be strong but there will not be any noise cancellation. The only way to get this to work the way PRS intended it to is to reverse the polarity of one of the magnets so the coils can be wired out of phase for noise cancellation without the signal from the strings being out of phase. Do you understand how a humbucking pickup works, why it 'bucks' the hum and why it is louder than a single coil? (again, no insult intended - I'm just trying to get an idea how much of my explanation makes sense to you) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members honeyiscool Posted January 21, 2012 Members Share Posted January 21, 2012 Yes, you can achieve the exact same thing by changing which coil you split to, and physically reversing the humbucker, which is exactly what those alternative colors do, and because DiMarzio pickups don't have writing on them, it's not offensive to try. Try it some time. Something makes me think you never have. Four conductor wiring is extremely powerful. Most people barely scratch the possibilities because they dutifully wire their humbucker from N+ to N- to S- to S+. If you change which leads you use (as I have described), your humbucker will go from S- to S+ to N+ to N- without having to change the polarity of the magnet, and without changing the phase of the signal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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