2 Humbucker guitar- Options for push/pull switch besides coil tap

[Eric Blankenship]

I am nearing completion of a guitar and will be wiring it soon. It's a 25" scale, thinline tele shape with two humbuckers and single volume and tone controls. I was planning on coil tapping the pickups, with one push/pull controlling the neck and the other the bridge pickup. But after thinking about it, I don't think I really need that fine grained control. A single switch would likely make more sense to tap both at the same time.

So I read up on some other options. Phase switching, series vs parallel. I read one place where someone recommended using one switch per pickup and having the switch make the coils parallel which gives a similar sound to a single coil while remaining humfree. This was intriguing.

So quickly I got a little overwhelmed at my options. I wanted to poll the crowd and ask what you might have tried before and liked. I'm looking for a nice versatile guitar, but I want the tones to remain musical useful. I'm primarily a rock/blues guy.

I suppose it doesn't make a difference, but the pickups are Bare Knuckle Mules.

[Mark Swanson]

For me, switching to parallel is not as good as a real single-coil sound. So what I would do is use one pot to switch both pickups to single coil, and use the other to switch in an active preamp!

[Eric Blankenship]

Thanks, Mark. Tell me more about this preamp. What might I expect from it? Stronger output signal? I should have room for a battery in there.

[Mark Swanson]

Yes, a preamp will boost your signal as much as you want, there are many types of applications for active electronics in a guitar. Pull out that pot and have instant power! There are a bunch of preamps on the market, some of us make our own. There's a lot of info in our Library Archive here about building your own, and Guitar Fetish has some good ones too.

[Eric Blankenship]

I will check those out. Thanks!

Here is what I had been leaning towards.

http://www.guitarelectronics.com/produc ... ne005.html

[Eric Blankenship]

And this one to reverse phase.

http://www.guitarelectronics.com/produc ... ml#reviews

[Eric Blankenship]

Ok, after a few more hours of searching this morning, I think this is what I've been looking for. I'd really appreciate any feedback.