Cowboy Owners - I Need Help

[michaelkaufman]

I installed the DiMarzio Virtual PAF's in my 2617 (same pups as the Cowboy).   Although the guitar sounded great, it didn't have the Cowboy sound that I must have.  I didn't have that very glassy, almost crystalline sound when running in single coil.

I realized that adjusting the pickup heights might make a difference, so I lowered them substantially and now the sound is much closer.  Still, I'm not sure I'm there yet.

So...could you Cowboy owners please measure the distance between the strings and all three pups.  I would greatly appreciate it.  I'm assume they're still at the height they were when the guitar left the factory...

tnx,
mk

[michaelkaufman]

As long as you have your Cowboys out, please answer one more question:

When using just the neck & bridge pups and using them in single coil, how glassy is the sound as when compared vs. using all three pups in single coil?  I still don't have a middle single coil so I'm wondering if adding the single coil will make it more glassy.

tnx,
mk

[aliensporebomb]

You know you want a real Cowboy.  I'm sure you could find one too.

Yeah, it would be interesting how close you can get the new guitar to sound like a Cowboy, it's kind of a clear,
glassy glossy clean tone type sound that is not really a fender clean nor a gibson. 

Dare I say it kind of has an Alembic type of sound?  That kind of gets in the ballpark I think.

[dave_g]

Methinks Mike misses his Cowboy......

[michaelkaufman]

bump!

[Tiho]

If it s any help, I think if you put one more single coil in the middle you will get more glassy sound (even more if you move pickups away from the strings), but I never heard an Cowboy, so I don t know what sound you are looking for...
Do pickups work together in series or parallel connection?

[michaelkaufman]

Neck & bridge when combined are in series.

mk

[Tiho]

I guess you were thinking about cowboy guitar when you wrote series... But if the neck and bridge are in series, how is third pickup connected with them?
Do you have wiring schematics for cowboy?...there is a lot of switches on it...

[michaelkaufman]

I do have the Cowboy wiring diagram.

Each pickup has an on/off toggle switch, so any combination of pickups is possible.  All of the pickups are in parallel.  I made a mistake in my last post:  pickups are in parallel, not series.

In addition, one switch toggles the neck & bridge pickup between humbucker & single coil.

That takes care of the 4 toggles on the upper horn.

The toggle down below turns on the eq/pre-amp.

mk

[Tiho]

As I understand it, when you wire or switch two pickups in parallel, they have less power output then one pickup on it s own, so if you should put another one to work with them in parallel you should get even less power output therefore a thinner,more glassy tone...maybe..I guess if you would switch bridge and neck pickup in single coil mode together with middle pickup it should make a difference. ....I am not an expert, just trying to figure this out, same as you MK...
Is there any way you could try this without actually drilling the guitar?

[michaelkaufman]

That's a good question.  I'm not sure the single coil will fit between the body and the strings for testing.  I could possibly place it in the control cavity and wire it in parallel just to see how it affects the tone of the two pickups that are currently installed.

mk

[Tiho]

I will wait for results of your test, looking forward....

[michaelkaufman]

Some please help me...

When using the neck & bridge pups in single coil, which single coil is active?

For the neck pickup, is it the coil on the neck side or bridge side?
For the bridge pickup, is it the coil on the neck side or bridge side?

It's easy to tell - just tap gently on the poles w/ a screwdriver.

Tnx,
mk