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I could use some help here! The whole electronics thing is a mystery to me. I'm thinking about how I'm going to wire up my Streamliner project and hopefully someone here will tell me how to do it. My goal is to have as much flexibility in pickup selection as I can get as well as in the tone.

What I have is 3 Kent Armstrong P90's and 2 StellarTone ToneStyler pots. That's it.

I know I need a pot for the master volume. What should I get for that?

Should I get another tone pot so each pickup has it's own pot?

I would like to have a kill switch. How do I do that and what do I need to buy?

I know my Mosrites have capacitors, do I need to do that and if so, what do I do?

Would someone who understands this stuff please, please draw a wiring diagram for me?

I think that covers it. If someone thinks of another consideration I should be aware of, please let me know.

For flexibility and that cool retro look I'd wire the baby up like an old Harmony H77. 1 switch per pup. If you can find the room
A tone and Vol for each pup might be nice but given your double cats, the clutter might not be offset by the small extra bit of control.
You will however need cap/caps. They are the key part of the tone circuit. Logic dictates 22 uf on those singles but I'd experiment with values between 022 and 047. If you find a good value with cheap caps, maybe invest the 10 bucks in some Russian Paper In Oil (old style)

I'm looking foreward to the sound demo of this puppy. With the 3 hot singles and the double cats me thinks its gonna be a bit hard the tame live Chet would have been filling in those sound holes hehe

Rich

I've got a bit of experience with three pickup circuits, so I guess I'll chime in...

Keeping in the Gretsch flavor, here's the circuit I propose:


Two three way switches on the upper bout, one controlling the neck/middle and the other the bridge and the neck/middle output. Master volume, Bridge pickup volume, Master tone and standby.

If you like this I'll write up the circuit.

Mel, if you take out the standby switch and the bridge neck switch you have the 6122-59 circuit. Of course that is with only 2 pickups.

Jim

sleeperNY wrote:Mel, if you take out the standby switch and the bridge neck switch you have the 6122-59 circuit. Of course that is with only 2 pickups.

Jim

Exactly! I think that adds a good Gretsch factor.

I like the double switch idea, it gives you all of the possible combinations of three pickups. I had a friend that used to wire Strats like that back in the day.

The Stellar Tonestyler pots are really switches with a series of different caps that are added to the circuit, so they do not need tone caps added to them.

Hey--

I don't think I've ever seen a standby switch on a guitar before, but there have been many times I could have used one. That's a smart idea.

--Jim

JimPage wrote:Hey--

I don't think I've ever seen a standby switch on a guitar before, but there have been many times I could have used one. That's a smart idea.

--Jim

Thanks! I've been wanting to add one for a long time.

Mel, I'm trying to understand you image so please be patient with me while I'm "getting it". So the two switches on the bass side horn will give me all of the possible pickup combinations?

As in seven choices:

1. Neck
2. Middle
3. Bridge
4. Neck/Bridge
5. Neck Middle
6. Middle Bridge
7. Neck/Middle/Bridge

Is that done with the two switches? I like the idea of that as it will look like a Pro line Gretsch. I also like having a Master Volume but I don't think I'd use another volume knob. I have two ToneStylers. I was thinking of dedicating one to the Bridge pickup and the other to either the Neck pickup, or the Neck and Middle pickup combined. If I use it only for the neck pickup, then should't I buy another tone pot for the middle pickup? If so, then I could have three tone knobs kinda how you have it at the end of the Cat Eyes. I'm thinking of a micro switch, or push button for the kill switch.

What do you think?

Standby switches were standard issue on most of the Gretsch hollowbodies in the '60s, like the Country Gents and the Tennesseans.

The two, three way switches will give you all seven possibilities, even though you will probably never use some of them.