HSS or dual humbuckers?

Dpoirier

Dpoirier

Fractal Fanatic
In all my playing years, I've only ever owned HSS guitars (except for one HSH). With technologies like coil splitting, series/parallel, and boutique pickup makers, I am not at all current on what can be done with a dual humbucker guitar, or how it can sound.

I'm about to spec a guitar for a build and was going to blindly go into my familiar HSS territory, the only departure being that the pickups will probably be some variation of Bare Knuckles. But then I thought I'd try to educate myself on dual humbuckers first, just in case.

Is there a consensus? Can you get pristine neck cleans from a split humbucker? Can you get a strat in-between tone? Is the middle pickup on an HSS guitar useful for anything other than in combination with the neck or bridge? What's your favorite 5-way switch operation mode on a dual humbucker?

Please be gentle with me. I'm genuinely uneducated about these things, and really need input (while realizing that there are many different opinions). Thanks in advance!
 
I don't have much in a way of answer to your questions, but I have never found a neck HB to split or tap the same as having a single coil, even noiseless/staked singles. Not that it is a bad thing, just different. I never used to play HSS guitars , usually HSH, HH or SSS, but these days my main guitars are HSS to get those inbetween sounds and the neck single coil thing, but I still have an use HH, tele, etc. Not very helpful, but my .02c worth.

Cheers
Anthony
 
Anthony76 said:
I don't have much in a way of answer to your questions, but I have never found a neck HB to split or tap the same as having a single coil, even noiseless/staked singles. Not that it is a bad thing, just different. I never used to play HSS guitars , usually HSH, HH or SSS, but these days my main guitars are HSS to get those inbetween sounds and the neck single coil thing, but I still have an use HH, tele, etc. Not very helpful, but my .02c worth.

Cheers
Anthony
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No, it absolutely is helpful. Thanks
 
I have a 1992 Strat with Lace sensor pickups (SSS) so not very typical but I quite like the middle pickup on its own. I actually don't care much for positions 2 and 4 and have pondered swapping my 5-way switch for a 3-way.
 
I mostly have HSS and it's been my preference for a long time.

I do have a handful of HSH and HH guitars as well.

The Tom Anderson HC-1 is the best split HB I've found but I haven't tried a lot.

If you love neck single coil, I don't know that you'll find a split offering that comes close.

I often like HBs with the coils in parallel better than split.

I just finished a full pickup swap out on my HSH Suhr Modern. Replaced the Thornbucker / Thornbucker+ with Anderson HC-1 / HC-3 and the V63 middle with a Duncan SSL-6.

The 5-way puts the middle with split HBs in positions 2/4 and both HBs in position 3. Volume and Tone pots are push-push that put them in parallel, including in 2/4.
 
Well, where to start!

I have three Peavy Wolfgangs HH, with coil taps. I have a Les Paul with a Seymour Duncan Jeff Beck and a Jazz, again with coil taps - this is one of the best sounding guitars I have, probably becasue it forgot it used to be a tree... I have an Ibanez Jem 10th with HSH, and "in between" switch positions 2 and 4. I have a Strat with SSS and and another with HSS, and I have a DIY Frankenstrat with HH (no taps, and no in between). All of them sound great in their own way, and there is no right or wrong here.

I am pretty sure that Seymour Duncan do loaded scratch plates, with matching or complimentary sets - I am thinking of putting one of these into my SSS strat.

What is the music you want to play - who are your inspirational players, and what do they use? You do you, and you'll be fine :)
 
Without hesitation double humbucker splittable. I like the sound of the singles but I always come back to the double in the neck position. I like the roundness of the humbucker in this position.
 
Partial splits sound better than a normal split. That is just a resistor in series to ground. The volume drop isn’t as bad. Real singles are better but split buckers are still worth having. You get some Strat flavor in the middle position. I have splits on a couple guitars and use them for some songs. Middle singles are ok by themselves with the tone rolled off. Mayer was using the middle for leads when I saw Dead and Co last year. Sounded great so I’ve been doing that when I play my HSS guitars. For dual buckers I usually don’t split cause the full pickup sounds better. If you already have HSS guitars you should consider a double bucker guitar. For me having individual volumes is a plus. There are tones in there you can’t get with a single volume control.
 
If you really love the tone of the neck single alone or the neck / middle single coils together then I think you'd miss a lot with an HH configured guitar. The split sounds on an HH guitar are closer to the telecaster sound than the stratocaster sound in my experience.
 
unix-guy said:
I just finished a full pickup swap out on my HSH Suhr Modern. Replaced the Thornbucker / Thornbucker+ with Anderson HC-1 / HC-3 and the V63 middle with a Duncan SSL-6.
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Anderson pickups are under rated. I'm surprised that they aren't used as aftermarket replacements on a more regular basis. The Thornbucker seems to be a fairly polarizing pickup set. Perhaps my perception is incorrect, but it seems like a lot of people swap them out of their guitars.
 
OrganicZed said:
Anderson pickups are under rated. I'm surprised that they aren't used as aftermarket replacements on a more regular basis. The Thornbucker seems to be a fairly polarizing pickup set. Perhaps my perception is incorrect, but it seems like a lot of people swap them out of their guitars.
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Funny thing - Anderson started as a pickup maker ;)

Interestingly I have a TB in the bridge of my MIM DK-24 and I like it... Didn't work with the Modern.
 
I always wondered if Eddie wanted a neck pickup on his EBMM's and Wolfgang's or if he was talked into it.
 
I'm such a fan of 2 and 4, HH just wouldn't get it for me. I've never heard splits, series-parallel, or any other permutations come close to that sound, including the much praised PRS stuff. Interesting tones maybe, but not those.

That said, my Collings City Limits is HH and i love it. Do i wish it had an S in the middle? Yeah sometimes i do, but they don't make that, and I'm not considering hacking mine up. I think.

Plus i don't know what that would actually sound like, so at least for now, i do the 2 4 thing on other guitars.
 
Dual humbucker with passive mid cuts give me what I'm looking for. I just wired in a passive mid cut at 851Hz at about -13 dB, and it works beautifully for Strat tones for me. With a 5-way I reserve positions 1 and 5 for Les Paul tones (shifting down the resonant peak with a cap and resistor), and 2 - 4 are routed through the mid cut to get bridge, neck, and combined Strat tones. I use a careful treble bleed, so if I want to sound sparkly, I just roll back the volume knob.
 
HSS for me. The PRS modern eagle v is the closest ive felt a split neck humbucker to be truly worth it. But in general it really just matters what music youre doing. I feel like for a cover band/working band, HSS just makes a ton of sense.
 
Vhalen50 said:
HSS for me. The PRS modern eagle v is the closest ive felt a split neck humbucker to be truly worth it. But in general it really just matters what music youre doing. I feel like for a cover band/working band, HSS just makes a ton of sense.
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Agreed. An HH guitar just will not do what an HSS or HSH can. And the "split" humbucker on the modern eagle v is really good, both neck and bridge pickups. That's a supremely versatile guitar.
 
Not the same pickup combos as the OP was asking but, the switching on the HSH Suhr in my avatar has both humbuckers in switch position 3 and in switch positions 2 and 4 it has the split neck/bridge humbucker mixed with the middle single coil which gives a great single coil tone in each position.
My HSS Strat automatically splits the humbucker when in the 2nd switch position giving me a good bridge middle combo.
In the 1st position, it's full bridge humbucker, but I have a push/push switch that puts the bridge humbucker in parallel which gives me an almost Tele sound.
I would go with a push/push on each humbucker to put it unparallel if I had an HH.

I probably grab my HSH more but if I'm craving the Strat neck pickup sound I grab the HSS.
 
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