A BRIEF DISCUSSION OF WIRING OPTIONS - Deaf Eddie

A LOOK AT SOME HUMBUCKING PICKUPS:The original Gibson humbucker, which is the prototype for most of today's full-sizedhumbuckers, may appear to only have one lead (after looking at typical single-coilpickups with their two separate leads). This single lead is actually a two-conductorbraided shield lead. With this type of lead, the external metal braid serves as the shieldAND ground conductor, with the hot conductor carried on an insulated center (coaxial)wire.Many of today's "vintage-style" pups are built this way. If you have one of these, it hasNOT been manufactured with a coil-reconfiguration option available. To coil-shunt oneof these pickups, you will have to modify it by adding a new lead to the junction betweenthe coils. It's a tricky task, but not beyond most intermediate-level hot-rodders. Please askfor the document, “Adding A Coil-Shunt.” It’s not for the faint of heart, but do-able. Ihave done this to many Gibson 490R and 498T pups, which are commonly found in LesPauls and the like.Lucky for us, the custom/aftermarket pickup industry has developed a new humbuckerconstruction standard, so that most modern humbuckers of the “non-vintage” flavor comewith four-conductor wiring. Fortunately, this is one of the few instances where Gibsonactually may have been paying attention to the market, and they have begun producingfour-conductor humbuckers as well. I have also seen a few older import designs that arethree-conductor (some Ibanez, Squire, others), having the traditional hot and ground leadsAND a coil-shunt, but these are less common.Every manufacture seems to have come up with their own color code and coilarrangement - I call the coil connected to ground the “first coil” and the coil connected tohot the “second coil” – just to help us keep track of the signal path. It is important tohave the correct color code for the specific model pickup you are wiring, and know thearrangement. If you do not have this information about your pickup, please see thedocument “Unknown Color Code.”To coil-shunt a pickup, a "jumper" is added to the junction of the two leads which ties thecoils together leads (first coil "+" and second coil "-"). This jumper then goes to a switch,which allows it to either be OPEN or closed (connected). Open, and the pup stayshumbucker; closed, and the pup is coil-shunt - one coil is "bypassed." The closedconnection path can be to ground, or to the output of the pickup. If the connection goes toground, the first coil is shunted, and the second coil stays active. If the connection goes tothe hot, the second coil is shunted, and the first coil stays active.