This is gonna be an odd question, so bear with me. I need help figuring out my guitar.
I haven't played my first electric guitar, a 1980 "The Strat" in quite awhile. It was stock for about two years, then in 1983 I (very unfortunately) decided to have it routed for a Kahler locking trem. Okay, whatever. It stayed that way for another decade.
Sometime after college I decided to have a guitar tech shield it, but the tech I always used suggested I try stacked single coils instead. This would have been like 1990 or so, maybe 1991. What I know for sure is that they are DiMarzio pickups. He installed push/pull pots on all three pot positions so I could select one coil only, or both coils (hum canceling).
I liked it a lot, but about a year later it began to develop bad problems with the jack. At that time I went on a humbucker kick and didn't pick it up again for years. When I got back into single coils in the late 90s, I went through various Teles and Strats but never really broke out the 81 again.
About two years ago I finally got it out, cleaned it up a bit and installed a new jack. I messed with it briefly, got confused and gave up.
Okay, so I got it out today, and found it sounds pretty darn nice through the DRRI. However, what's perplexing me is that with each pickup, if the push/pull pot is down, there is some buzz to be heard, thus making me believe that's single coil mode. When the pot is up, the buzz goes away.
Fair enough, except that when the pot is up (no buzz) the output is lower than when it's down (with buzz).
Does that make any sense to anyone? I must say that it sounds more humbucker-esque (almost EMG like) in the down position (with hum/buzz). Why would the output be lower with both coils engaged? Nothing sounds out of phase (i.e., thin and nasally) in either position. They both sound good, just one is louder, but louder with buzz.
Second question, if anyone knows, what stacked single coils was DiMarzio making then? I see they have like a zillion now on their website, but I'm just curious as to what I have. The pickups say nothing underneath except "DiMarzio." That guitar tech guy actually died in 1995, so I can't go back and ask him, nor do I still have any receipts from the swap.
Finally, the bridge pickup does not change sound, volume or buzz amount with its pot in either position. That sounds like a wiring glitch to me that I'll try to nail down later.
Okay... long enough. Anyone have any thoughts?