Venture to the dark side : H-S-S

[BigDaveyTwinkle]

I wanted to see what the fuss was that I was missing out on with the Fat Strat thing. I had an old Epiphone bridge pickup that was lying about and for the cost of a new GFS pickguard in H-S-S config., I have wired up. I have only had time to check the wiring and doa quick adjust of pickup height. The Epi. humbucker is definitely hot - a lot hotter than the vintage single coils. there's a part of me that is really excited about having that humbucker versatility in the Strat and I could really understand the appeal of a PAF 59 kind of vintage wind that wouldn't just overwhelm the single coils as my Epi. hot bridge seems to do.

How is everyone running a H-S-S system balancing their pickup output? What do you think about the usefulness of the rig as a "one and only" guitar?

Thanks for the feedback -

[TonyBabagan00sh]

I got a Dimarzio Super Distortion in the bridge of my strat, i think it's wound to about 16k. I usually love the sound of a high output humbucker mixed with the low output of the single coils in the mid and neck.

[Wally]

I run a Lil '59 in the bridge with two Duckbuckers in the other positions. 16 sounds...all of them humbucking....Gibson h'bucking, Strat sonics---A/B'd against a '59 I had refretted, some Gretsch tyep thigns, and some /gutbucket' out of phase things that are useful depending on what amp one is playing on, ime. I run one trebel pot and one bass roll-off pot...very useful.

[HWY1Strat]

I have DiMarzio Area series pickups......I have all the varietys of them in my guitars.
I've paired them off with a combination of Dimarzio 36th Anniv. PAF's, DiMarzio Air Classic's, and some Gibson Humbuckers.
All AlNico magnets....NO Ceramic!!!
The balance between all of them is pretty even. No loud surprises when putting down the 5 way switch!

[D.Allen]

That's why I made two options one for the vintage vibe with 5.8k singles and a 7.88 bucker and one for the Texas Rick n blues sound with 6.4k neck and middle and an 8.38k bucker.
I am working on a RAWK set as well.

[gpmedium]

My solution was to go intentionally hot on the bridge humbucker and add a push-pull pot so I can split it. When I want the guitar to be balanced across all three pickups I split the humbucker, but when I want to rawk I have the humbucker full on.

[ClassicRockGTR]

I just installed a SD '59/Custom hybrid in my HSS w/ samarium colbalt single coils. Sounds great ... But I tore an extensor muscle and can't play it until after surgery. An HSS or HSH is how I like my Strats. Much more interesting tones!

[pjholland]

Dimarzio Tone Zone in the bridge for me in my 62 hot rod. Not wired to tone control. SRV on the neck, Clapton and/or Cray on the middle, VanHalen on the bridge.