The 8-string project - with Bareknuckles!

[dpmasunder]

Dude, I have tiny hands.
Perhaps there's some deep psychological reason for this.
Overcoming my digital inadequacies  :roll:

[Ratrod]

I once tried a 7-string Ibanez. All my fingers are quite long exept for my pinky. I could wrap my fingers around the fretboard but I had trouble getting my pinky on the low E-string. Same with those 'Police-chords', I sometimes think I should get a short scale guitar for that stuff, like a Jag.

[dpmasunder]

Just buy a bass and play that occasionally. Those stretches won't bother you anymore :lol:

[Ratrod]

In that case, I'd get me an upright bass. :lol:

[dpmasunder]

I haven't put a great deal of thought into it but using a four pole 5-way with 6 conductor
this might work, I've done something similar with 3 hb's before

1 - Bridge pickup
2 - Bridge pickup tapped
3 - One coil from each pickup, maybe tapped
4 - Neck pickup tapped
5 - Neck pickup

Wire the five-way switch so the output of it is equivalent to standard 4-con then run that to a series/parallel switch. So you get 5 series sounds
and 5 parallel.

[PhilKing]

You can also do the PRS settings with this:

Bridge pu
Screw bridge/Screw neck parallel
Screw bridge/Screw neck series*
Slug Bridge/Slug neck parallel**
Neck pu

I would change this so that * is both hb's and ** is the Screw coils in series.

You would have to really think about phase if you are putting a series/parallel switch after the 5-way.  I've wired a 4 pole 5 way for all series settings and series/parallel within the switch, but it would be difficult to change the phase for all coils the same way after the switch.   :crazy2:

[dpmasunder]

Phase would be the same in series and parallel modes.
Sorry, I don't quite understand your concern??
Essentially the 5-way just selects which coils (or taps) are active and spits
it out as a single 4-conductor humbucker.

+1 on the upright Ratrod. I'd love one, but they ain't cheap!

[PhilKing]

i was thinking about the direction of the winding.  As I understand it, if you want the coils to be hum cancelling you normally need rw/rp for one coil against the other.  So depending which coil set you are picking in your 1 coil from each pu, it might be a problem.  It might be that I didn't think mine out well enough, but it is easy to get a non-hum cancelling combination when you are selecting different coils.

With the 4 way I guess you would be using one coil on each switch.  I was thinking that as sometimes you need to go to ground vs to another coil, doing the series/parallel after the switch might be a problem depending on which coil combination is selected on the 5-way.

[dpmasunder]

you're absolutely right re. coil selection.
I guess I've been doing this a while so I automatically think like that now, sad eh? :lol:
I'll go through that wiring on paper later, it's not something I'd put a lot of thought into yet.
F@#$'s with your head sometimes wiring up 4-poles doesn't it :lol:
It's even worse when you've got pickups from different makers, dummy coils and that kind of cr@p

[HJM]

Even more confusing when you forget which magnets you've flipped....

[PhilKing]

It really does your head in.  I spent about 2 hours working out how to get H/S/S series wiring in all 5 positions!  In the end I settled for both P/U in parallel because I couldn't work out how to get all 4 coils in series  :idiot2:

[Ratrod]

+1 on the upright Ratrod. I'd love one, but they ain't cheap!

You can get a cheap one for about 600 Euro's. King basses are indeed priceless.

[dpmasunder]

Grrrrrrr. Well, after waiting many weeks for a quote on the cover machining (a contact of my bro) it turns out the dude can't do it.
Very frustrating. Looks like I'll have to go back to the bare forbon look.

Tim, I'm a little paranoid about the fly lead concept, do you think that method of wiring has much durability? Have you got a pic of something similar?
I can put room for eyelets on it.

[R/2e]

I made an experimental 8 string many years ago, around '67 I think, with one string above the standard 6, and one below. The top string was the problem, there weren't many gauges available then and I broke many banjo 5th strings before giving up and making it a 9 strng with the top three doubled. It was......er.....interesting to play, but didn't really do a lot for me. I guess if I did it again I would add two bass strings below the standard 6. I much preferred the 9 which was a lot easier to play than a 12 string, but gave a similar effect.  However, I have more than enough trouble with 6 strings to want any more now.................

Good luck though!

[dpmasunder]

Very cool R/2e! Mine will have two lower strings.
I think I've got the pickup flatwork sorted now, finally.