Humbuckers: Eschewing Parallel and Quack for Series

[State of Epicicity]

For several months I've been using a wiring scheme for my superstrat, a Schecter Sun Valley Super Shredder FR Black Limba,, with the two stock humbuckers, where the layout looked like this for the five positions:

1. Bridge Series
2. Bridge Parallel
3. Bridge Inner Coil in Parallel with Neck Outer Coil
4. Neck Parallel
5. Neck Series

with two volume controls and no tone controls. Bridge volume positions controls positions 1 and 2, and the rest are controlled by the neck volume knob. I'm using a parallel 82nF 150k treble bleed, which keeps the tone remarkably even across the pot travel.

But I always have to be really careful with the parallel and middle quack positions, becuase they can easily get harsh if I don't watch it. I used parallel wiring on my humbuckers to substitute for a good strat single coil emulation, and the same for the middle quack position.

So recently I decided to experiment with getting my single coil emulations from my humbuckers in series instead, just rolling back my volume on the guitar not to overload the amp models in the Axe-FX III, and I found that, with any amp with ample treble, I actually prefered the response of the humbuckers in series vs parallel or the actual quack I had. With the humbuckers in series I was still able to get tones that are very stratty to my ears, but I'm not fighting harshness. So yesterday I rewired with a three way blade switch for this:

1. Bridge Series
2. Bridge Series in parallel with Neck Series
3. Neck Series

Bridge volume knob controls position 1, and neck volume knob controls positions 2 and 3; same treble bleed as before. The rewiring took no time, and I love the results.

The significance of this to me is my coming to grips that I am loving the way my guitar is, when I had been pining for something different for a while now. I had been pining after a 22 fret guitar to get that fat Strat neck position tone, and I had been wanting to get a pair of ZexCoil Tribuckers to get a noiseless split tone to go between humbucker and single coil tones. I really don't feel anything lacking now though, letting the Axe-FX III do the work with the amp emulations to get radically different tones. For my single coil emulations, my favorite amp model is the Wrecker Rocket. I find it so easy to get my neck humbucker in series to sound stratty with that amp, with just the right amount of push to sound rude and dirty.

Has anyone else had a similar experience, wanting single coil tones but preferring the full range of what humbuckers can do instead?

My guitar is very bright on its own, so maybe this only works because of that, that I can get good Les Paul type tones because the humbuckers are hot enough to compress and tamp down the shrillness if I use a darker amp and IR, but maybe this wouldn't work with a nice fat dark Les Paul. I don't know, but I'd love to experiment.

 

[State of Epicicity]

If anyone is interested in either wiring, here are the diagrams I created:

For the old wiring, with these settings:

1. Bridge Series, controlled by bridge position volume knob
2. Bridge Parallel, controlled by bridge position volume knob
3. Bridge Inner Coil in Parallel with Neck Outer Coil, controlled by neck position volume knob
4. Neck Parallel, controlled by neck position volume knob
5. Neck Series, controlled by neck position volume knob

Then the new one, with a 3-way with these positions:

1. Bridge Series, controlled by bridge position volume knob
2. Bridge Series in parallel with Neck Series, controlled by neck position volume knob
3. Neck Series, controlled by neck position volume knob

With both schemes I'm using the parallel 82nF 150k treble bleed, which keeps the tones extremely similar as you roll back the volume knob. I'm using 250k pots to simulate having a volume pot at 500k and tone pot also at 500k always on 10.