Question Steve Morse Music Man pickup selector rewiring

[Jeff Cook]

Greetings

I have an original Steve Morse Music Man with the three-way blade switch. I don't like the neck pickup being in the middle position, so I want to rewire the switch so that the neck pickup is selected when the switch is in the more traditional up position. I haven't yet had a peek inside, but I'm assuming that I simply need to swap a couple of wires around. Is that correct? Have any of you done this modification?

Does anyone know why Steve wanted the neck pickup to be selected in the middle position? It went back to the up position on the Y2D. I like to just slap the switch up or down, so getting it to stop in the middle is a dilemma that I'd only want to face on odd occasions rather than "business as usual".

Thanks folks

Jeff

 

[LegGodt]

Yes, its just swapping a few wires, and is easy as long as you have some soldering experience.

While you are in there ... there are a few mods you can do to the pickup configuration. Search the forum for them. Below is the mod I came up with and have in both of the Steve Morse guitars.

I replaced the 3-way switch with a 5-way switch to allow for a more traditional pickup configuration. The cool thing about this mod is that it puts the 2 middle single coils on the small 3-way toggle and allows you to pick what single coil you want to use. I left the Bridge on/off switch as is ... so it can be added to any combination below.

1. Neck Humbucker
2. Neck Humbucker + 3-way toggle (Neck, Bridge or both middle single coils)
3. 3-way toggle (Neck, Bridge or both middle single coils)
4. Bridge Humbucker + 3-way toggle (Neck, Bridge or both middle single coils)
5. Bridge Humbucker

 

[Jeff Cook]

Thank you very much for your reply

I have plenty of soldering experience from a previous job, although I've installed pickups and other guitar components for over 30 years. My dad did avionics in the navy, so I've been tinkering with all sorts of things since I was kid.

As much as I like your mod suggestion, I'm simply going to reverse what I'd refer to as positions 2 and 3 (2 and 1 in your world - I live in Australia, so everything's upside down here!!). I'm happy enough with the three-way switch and the available combinations.

The guitar actually has the original factory strings. Despite living in a humid environment, they haven't developed that raspy feel on the frets yet. I'm going to change them soon, however, which will be a good opportunity to correct what I perceive to be a flaw (although not a defect because it's what was intended for some strange reason).

Thanks again for your response and suggestions.

Jeff

 

[beej]

Hi Jeff,

As LegGodt said, it's a pretty simple swap of two wires.

Though the wiring seems odd, Steve has it like that out of convenience. Mostly he's going back and forth between the bridge and neck pickups, so it's quicker for him to switch when they're in adjacent positions.

I've also re-wired mine a bunch of times. Currently I have a 5-way switch in there, also though it's a bit different than LegGodt. I've got it set up like the Y2D, so the neck single is still controlled by the 3-way toggle.

 

[mogwai73]

Hi there...

Allow me to resuscitate this thred some 7 years after.
I'm adding a 3-way switch to my Y2D model (already added the 4th pickup) and I was wandering if the switch is a DiMarzio EP 1111.

My idea is to have this 3-way add a selection of the single-coils (1, parallel, 2) in lieu of adding one single-coil alone.

Thanks in advance!
Hugo