Humbucker split wiring, coils, etc.

[joe1962]

I recently changed the bridge pickup on my HDT. I wired the new pickup in just like the old one and everything worked like it should. After playing with it for a while I noticed that the split sound I was getting, while pretty good, wasn't as edgy as the bridge pickups I'm used to on a Strat, and the bridge/middle sound wasn't quite what I expected either. I did a little testing and realized that the coil thet was being turned off was the one closest to the bridge. Since changing the wiring would mess up the noise cancelling effect when the tapped pickup was added to the middle pickup, I decided to just turn the pickup around in the mounting ring. I did this and now I get the coil closest to the bridge when I split the pickup, which (to me) sounds more like what I expect to hear from a Strat in both the bridge and bridge/mid positions.

So my question is this: Did I put the pickup in wrong to begin with (I just put it in like the one that came out) or do the HDTs come wired to turn off the back coil?

[tom]

you did everything correct. i like the front coil best. i could never make the strat bridge pickup work for me. the tele lead is farther forward, so i chose the front coil. since you like the strat bridge pickup, you did exactly the right thing.

[njjessee]

So Tom, as a rule, you set up bridge humbuckers so that the neck coil is on when the humbucker is split?

And it's just a matter of turning the humbucker around if we'd like to try it vice versa?

Noah

[tom]

yes, that will work fine. there are some slight differences when combining pickups with magnetic polarities reversed in the guitar, but that complicates the objective here.