[KWRummie]

Hey all, I'm completely rewiring an Ibanez AR620 on a Cowboy Fancy-ish build, however, my ambition may exceed by abilities on this project. I've done quite a bit of research on here and elsewhere, and am hoping some of those more knowledgeable than me might be willing to take a look at the diagram I put together. Not just on the accuracy of the wiring, but any suggestions/thoughts on what I have going on would be very much appreciated. I’m going for a Bobby-sound first, but with some versatility.

There's no active EQ, but it does have the Dimarzio 36th Anniversary PAF set and middle single coil, which will be either a split SD2 or Area 61. The body wood is mahogany, so I've tried to make choices to brighten up the sound.

It will have Duncan Triple Shot humbucker rings to replace the tri-sounds for series/split/parallel and a phase switch for the middle pickup. There's also a phase switch for the bridge, in case I'm playing just the humbuckers. The HBs are run to a three-way toggle and then to the volume and tone. From there, it's run to an on/on/on mini-switch to select between humbuckers/both/single coil only.

The humbuckers share a 500K volume pot and 500K tone with switchable caps (.047, .022 & .001). The middle single coil has 250K volume and 250K no load tone pot (.022 cap), in case I want a little more brightness. Both volumes have on/off treble bleeds, again, for the flexibility so I can keep the highs or roll them off some.

The mini-switch pickup selector is then run to a buffer bypass switch for a Wald TPC-1 . I know the preferred placement is before the volume, but I'm not running an OBEL and I do want the option of running passive. I left the pot ground wiring off the diagram for simplicity.

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[lovetoboogie]

I appreciate the variety of tones you could potentially get with this. I have done a number of Weir conversions on various client guitars. The consistent theme in Bob's guitars has been a master volume and separate tone controls...On Ibanez guitars I change the wiring real estate to reflect this. With the 4 holes you already have drilled on this guitar you can do the same. Another Weir thing that would serve you well is to install 3 mini-toggle on/off switches for each pickup. You would essentially eliminate the the 3-way stock pickup selector. The buffer after the volume is cool but per chance you would like to place it right after the pups where it will perform much better, you can still rig a bypass matrix with a dual ganged 25k/500k pot. In active mode the signal path would be pups>on/off switches>UGB>Volume Pot, etc...

These are just suggestions of course... Lastly, be mindful that the Triple Shot rings don't always line up with the pre-drilled humbucker ring holes for an import...

[KWRummie]

Thanks for the advice! I like the idea of the master volume and have read up Waldo’s info on building a dual ganged pot. (For tone, but should work the same..) What I may have to do is wire it up to get an idea of how well the pickups interact tone-wise and volume. My volume concern is with the SD2 being much hotter than the PAFs in single coil. I believe Cowboy had trimpots to adjust. My fallback is an Area 61, like on the Cowboy reissue. DiMarzio has suggested that the SD2 isn’t as well balanced as the Area 61.

Great to know about the Triple Shots. Thanks lovetoboogie!