Today we’re going to talk about the standard 5-way switch used in Fender Strat-style guitars—how it works, how to wire it up and variations of the switch itself.
Back when Strats were first made, they came with a 3-way
switch (one position for each pickup), but some savvy guitarists soon realized
that if they moved the switch into a position midway between two of the
“official” positions, they could get two of the pickups to turn on at the same
time, resulting in new sound options. This happened because the switch was what is
known as a “make before break” switch, which means it touches the next contact
before disconnecting from the previous one. It wasn’t easy to keep the switches
in these in-between positions and guitarists often resorted to sticking
matchsticks, etc., into the switch slot to hold them in position.
Here’s how the switch looks as more of an electrical
diagram. As with all images, click to enlarge.
Seeing how customers were doing this, Fender eventually
started installing 5-position switches. Note that these were still really 3-way
switches, just with a couple of in-between positions added on so that matches
were no longer required to hold the switch in those positions.
Also of note is that the switch is “dual pole”, which means
that it is basically two switches in parallel that move at exactly the same
time, without being electrically connected to each other. If you take a good look at the switch below,
you will see that there is a second row of contacts on the other side.
Here’s how THAT looks as more of an electrical diagram:
This allows for more wiring possibilities, which we’ll
discuss later.
Looking at the photo of the switch a couple of images back, you can see that there are
four contacts on the side facing us (and four on the other side that aren’t so
easy to see). Of the four on this side, the left-most one is the “common”
contact, which is to say that it is always connected. The three contacts to the
right correspond with the three main switch positions (with the additional two positions
being in-between 1 & 2 and 2 & 3 respectively). The other side of the
switch has a similar setup.
Now given that there are only (normally) three pickups, and
the switch has three contacts on each side (in addition to the common contact),
you may be wondering why we need two sets of contacts in the first place. Well,
this is so that you can have a bit more freedom when it comes to choosing how
to control the volume and tone of each pickup. For example, with standard Strat
wiring, the volume pot controls all three pickups, whereas the two tone pots control
one pickup each (with the bridge pickup having no tone control at all). Older
Strat versions had one of the tone pots controlling two of the pickups at the
same time (and there are many more options too!)
Here’s how the switch
would look from below. Rather than numbering the pins--which I think can be
confusing given that there are 3 pins (not counting the common pins), but five
positions—I’ve named them B (for bridge), M (for middle), N (for neck) and C
(for common).
Again, remember that you also have two additional positions,
as mentioned previously, in-between bridge and middle (so pins B and M would
both be connected to C at the same time), and in-between middle and neck (so
pins M and N would both be connected to C at the same time).
As for the other side of the switch, despite the fact that the
pins appear to be in a different order, they still work the same way, so when the
switch is in the Bridge position, the left-hand pin B is connected to the left-hand
pin C, and the right-hand pin B is connected to the right-hand pin C.
I hope you’re still with us here. The above can be a bit of
a brain melter, but once it clicks it makes a lot of sense.
In an effort to make this as simple as possible, here’s what
a standard Strat’s wiring looks like just around the switch itself (remember
that there are many, many ways to wire up a Strat and this is just one of the
more common ones):
When the switch is in the neck position, left-hand pin N
(neck) is connected to left-hand pin C (common). This allows the signal from
the neck pickup to pass to the common pin on this side of the switch. Since left-hand
pin C is shorted to right-hand pin C, the signal from the neck pickup continues
to right-hand pin C, where it then goes to the volume control. Additionally, right-hand
pin C is currently connected to right-hand pin N, allowing the signal from the
neck pickup to ALSO travel to the neck tone control.
When the switch is in the middle position, left-hand pin M
(middle) is connected to left-hand pin C (common). This allows the signal from
the middle pickup to pass to the common pin on this side of the switch. Since
left-hand pin C is shorted to right-hand pin C, the signal from the middle
pickup continues to right-hand pin C, where it then goes to the volume control.
Additionally, right-hand pin C is currently connected to right-hand pin M,
allowing the signal from the middle pickup to ALSO travel to the middle tone
control.
When the switch is in the bridge position, left-hand pin B
(bridge) is connected to left-hand pin C (common). This allows the signal from
the bridge pickup to pass to the common pin on this side of the switch. Since
left-hand pin C is shorted to right-hand pin C, the signal from the bridge
pickup continues to right-hand pin C, where it then goes to the volume control.
Additionally, right-hand pin C is currently connected to right-hand pin N, but right-hand
pin N is not connected to anything else, the sound is unaffected by any tone
control.
Remember that we also have those two additional in-between
positions, but all that happens there is that everything is true for both
positions either side of it, so for example in the in-between position between
the neck and the middle pickup, everything I wrote about the neck position AND
everything I wrote about the middle position is true.
Finally, in addition to a standard Stratocaster 5-way
switch, you can also get import types, which look more like this:
Note that these are just wired up in the same way as the
switch that I’ve already been describing, except that the pins are laid out a
bit differently. In the above image, the pins are numbered (left to right)
3,2,1,0,0,3,2,1. These represent the following positions:
3 – Bridge
2 – Middle
1 – Neck
0 – Common
0 – Common
3 – Bridge
2 – Middle
1 – Neck
Finally, if you want to get all fancy with your wiring, you
can get “super switches”, which have many more contacts, allowing you a much greater
range of wiring options. Here’s an example of one below:
