Grateful Dead Music Forum

I was wondering if anyone has ever attempted to connect a set of Kinman noiseless pickups with the K7 harness to a guitar with UGB & OBEL?

I have not been able to gig the strat in current configuration (fralin 42's, buffer, OBEL) b/c of the extreme interference i have gotten at the gigs. I do get some of this interference at home, but only if the vol is on 10 and i am aiming at some source (elec. box, lights, etc.). I use Furman pwr at home and shows, this does not alleviate the noise. I wired the guitar to the schematics avaialabe round these parts and even included the 10 gauge ground wire across the pots. So at this point i am willing to sacrifice some "real" single coil character if i can abate this noise.

I have a pair of Kinman woodstocks that used to reside in the strat. It came with the no-solder K7 switching harness. There is a board attached to the 5-way with some capacitors and such and a brown wire tha leads to the volume pot. Each of the pickups attach to the board at the 5-way via two-prong adaptors (with one of the prongs labelled "hot"). Wonder if it would be best to simply try to connect the p/us to the existing 5-way in the strat?

You may want to try a dummy coil somewhere in the guitar. I found it to be quite effective with the same issue.

mk

Intersting. What were your issues and how did the dummy coil help?

I think i understand the concept of that (the dummy coil removes the interference??), but have no clue how to employ such an idea.

Thanks for the reply!

I am using DiMarzzo's Area '58's they even make hotter ones if one prefers, but they are a god send for noise. It is dead quiet, they're just mini humbuckers. I am sure you don't want to buy more pickups, I wonder if that dummy coil would be a good idea? I may be wrong but I think that's what they're using in the noiseless singles, because they said splitting them would give you no difference in sound, just un wanted noise. maybe if you wire together one of those pickups in the chain properly it would solve your problems... I can play some nice Jerry tones with my strat with these humbucking singles, they're not as hot as a split super II and no where near an SDS-1 but I can dial them in nicely. Sometimes I think I get nicer tones out of less hot guitar pickups.

I removed my UGB from my single pu strat, I just got too much noise from its operation, especially in my effects. It seems to work better in my humbucker guitars. That may just be a fluke.

thanks for the reply JB!

The Kinmans are stacked i believe. I did some research on the Kinman site and think i may be able to mate them with the UGB/OBEL. Its worth a shot any way!

On an aside, this place has emptied out quicker than an office at 5pm on a friday!

Ever think of wiring so positions 2 & 4 were series therefore avoiding the issue in noisy rooms?

Hi Strumminsix:

No i have not. I am not sure i understand what that would do. Can you explain?

The guitar is highly usable at home and only gets noisy is vol is above 8 and/or in combo with OD/Dist or facing electrical panel, etc..

At the dives i play, it is unusable and hums from 2 to 10 and only gets worse.

Thanks for the reply.

Strat wiring has a 5 way switch which does this:
Neck
Neck & Mid parallel
Mid
Mid & Bridge parallel
Bridge

You can add a toggle so that positions 2 & 4 are mid & xxx series.

Strumminsix: I see. Its a blend pot at that point, similar to the Kinmans?

I took the plunge and removed the Fralins and 5-way, then installed the Kinmans and the K-7 5 way swith with the two pots (tone & blend) and left the 25K volume pot in tact.

There is no more hum at all with the guitar to 10 and only the slightest bit of hum with guitar cranked and OD or Dist active, but at that point, no ones going to hear the hum!

I did not install the treble bleed caps that come standards with the Kinmans on the volume pot, b/c i wasnt sure if it needed it or would react badly with buffer, etc...
i do notice that the tone/blend pots dont work quite the same as they did in the original setup. Specifically in the taper down of teh tone, just sounds different. I am sure it has to do with the UGB/OBEL somehow... But, realistically, i dont play with the tone down that far and overall it sounds quite good. Atleast ill get to use this set up at this fridays show to see how it will perform live.

Thanks for all the replies and thoughts!

Peace
AC