Thinking Of Activating all Pups on my strat copy

[Starlancer120]

Juz though i'd like to try it out for fun,a little experiment..i know it depends on the pickup but u ppl think this is a gd idea??? ...i noe brian may's axe has no selector so it is assumed the pups are connected in series,which means r all active. But he did poke around wif his Sonic pickups..like he reverse the polarity of the pups or sumthing like dat....i juz need ur thoughts abt this softies and ur comments/opinion would be much appreciated

 

[Ratboy]

i tot brian may's guitar each single coil got its own toggle switch ?

 

[le_Doucereux]

I've tried all 3 pups in parallel before and personally, I don't really like the sound. I found it a bit lacking in distinction and little muddy. Sorry I can't be more descriptive than that. Let's just say, though, that if you're going to spend money JUST to get all 3 pups, I'd think pretty hard about it first. Neck and bridge in parallel on a Strat is worth having, though.

If I'm not mistaken, Brian May's guitar had it's pickups wired in series (instead of parallel like most stock guitars) and, like Ratboy mentioned, each pickup had its own on/off toggle switch. He also added controls to reverse the phase of the pickup. I'm not sure how much difference his reverse wound/reverse polarity thing made in his sound, though.

 

[ShredCow]

a pickup that is out of phase with another = a lower output than if the pups were in parallel. Sounds very thin, oink-ish - excellent for funky stuff with some gain.