mule questions

[Iced Dragon]

Hi,

sorry to bother you guys again.

How does The Mule sound when split? I could use a nice SC-sound at the bridge. Will this work out?

To recapitulate stuff: swamp-ash Hamer Centaura, HSS.
looking for a humbucker with nice cleans and a good lead-tone for ('80s ) pop/rock, jazzy stuff, and when split with a good sc-sound is a surplus.
The Mule will do the job or other suggestions?


Also, a more general question: does oxidation of the magnetic pole bars/screws affect the tone?


thanks

[gingataff]

Do you want a single coil sound at the bridge only or will you use it in combination with the middle single coil? If it's only the latter I'd just wire it so it splits in that position on the selector switch and you should get something fairly Strattish. I think a Mule split may be too low powered on it's own, so another alternative is fit a push/pull pot for parallel wiring.

[Iced Dragon]

well, I'd like a bridge SC-sound, indeed.

The Hamer centaura has an extra toggle switch to select more mids. I was thinking of either using that one or mounting an extra one.

So I'd have 5 positions for SC-sounds and a humbucker sound ...

[Brow]

I have a Crawler in a HSS setup (with Irish Tours) and that's wired to automatically split in position 2, and also has a push/pull knob for coil split.

Due to the higher output of the Crawler, it has a a strong enough split to keep up with the Irish Tours :)

[Iced Dragon]

How does that one sound clean (humbucking)?
Won't it break-up too early?

[Brow]

How does that one sound clean (humbucking)?
Won't it break-up too early?

To my ears it sounds like a slightly hollower, higher output PAF. The Crawler seems very receptive of how hard you pick, so you can clean the sound up by picking slightly lighter :)

[Iced Dragon]

Ok guys,

hate to bother you with this, but I don't find any decent answer.

I installed the Mule in my Hamer Centaura and I must say, after having a SD '59 I didn't think this would work out but I am amazed!

Now, I have just installed it the standard way, black and bare wire to ground, red to switch and green and white together.
Now, I'd like to have the Mule splt when combined with the middle single coil.

Can anyone pass me a scheme or just tell me were to attach the wires (green and white one I suppose  :? ).
It's a 5 way switch so it should split when in second position.

Sorry for this, but thanks in advance!  8)

[Iced Dragon]

ok, think I found it.  :D

green and white should be soldered together at the other side of the switch.

This is called 'autosplitting', right?

[tremblox]

A split Mule in the bridge sounds ok but to be honest it's not the best S/C sound you've ever heard and certainly not in the league of the normal BKP S/Cs in terms of tonal balance.
Nevertheless the sound is "alright" and  can be a useful one to have in your arsenal for certain tunes or styles (for example if you wanna sit low in a live mix with some trebly reggae skank or something like that).  It is also a useful sound to have to switch in with your neck pickup for example - to give you that sort of tele in-bewteen kinda sound . There are some lovely complex rythmn sounds to be had here, (the bridge giving sparkle to the mids of the neck)

If you do this use the coil that is furthest away from the bridge for your sound. This position simulates most closely the position of a strat neck pickup and the splitting off will give you treble galore (especially if you are using a 500K volume pot).  

I use a 3-way toggle on one of my guitars to split the bridge (pos 1) and to add it the pickup combination selected by the 5-was PU selector (pos 2). Pos 3 adds the non-split i.e. stock Mule to the  pickup combination selected by the 5-was PU selector.

This makes the guitar very versatile indeed. However my least fave, and least used, sound from all the pickup combintions (11 in total) is that split  Mule coil alone.

Hope this helps,

  tremblox