This is how mine ended up.
----------------------------------
Love the job you've made of that blue finish!
So what's the gap between your bridge plate and pickguard now—am I seeing about 3 mm in your picture?
Mark
Printable View
This is how mine ended up.
----------------------------------
Love the job you've made of that blue finish!
So what's the gap between your bridge plate and pickguard now—am I seeing about 3 mm in your picture?
Mark
Yeah around 3mm. I was trying to get an even gap all the way around. It's pretty close. Colour is just automotive rattle can spray. You can get pretty good results with it.
----------------------------------Quote:
Originally Posted by Sonic Mountain
Wow, the possibilities of what you can do with the body are endless...
Thank again!
Mark
Yep, part of why this hobby is so addictive, there is always something to try!
Can someone field another dim question for me? Shouldn't there be an earth cable attached to this bridge pickup..?
Mark
Attachment 24720
Hi Mark, the earth usually goes from each of your pots to the bridge plate, not from the pickups. See the link below:
https://www.pitbullguitars.com/wp-co...f/PBG-TL-1.pdf
Hi Mark. Yes, the bridge plate is normally connected to the pickup ground wire. From your photo, from the blob of solder on the bridge plate it looks like the braid on the red wire was once connected to the solder, but wasn't soldered well and it's pulled away from it.
Cue Mission Impossible music....
Your task, should you wish to accept it, is to do a better job and reconnect it so that it doesn't pull off again. It might be easier to wrap some bare wire round the braid, solder that to the braid and then solder the wire to the base plate.
This post will fail to self-destruct in 5 seconds.
Oh, ok. Thanks FrankenQuote:
Originally Posted by FrankenWashie
Once I've done all that I'll have to go and lie down in a dark room, with a cool flannel over my eyes, and a mint juelp in hand..Quote:
Originally Posted by Simon Barden
You'll be right. I think making a little bridge wire as Simons suggests is the most sensible approach. It'll give you a bit of flexibility with moving the wire around during install and you won't have to worry about it pulling away again.
Well, it looks like I’ve totally made a dog’s dinner of this. I tried to sand it a bit after I’d already put too much stain into the wood—like sanding toffee—and now it’s marked up like a ski slope in January. I don’t like the Tried and True oil either, as it just seemed to leave the surface greasy. Maybe I’ll just have to bite the bullet, sand the whole thing down deep, and rattle-can it. sigh…
Attachment 24843Attachment 24844
How long had the TO been on before you tried sanding it? Just curious as I’ve never had it leave a guitar feel greasy.
No, I only sanded after the stain. I put the Tried and True on anyway afterwards just to see if it improved things (but it magnified the imperfections).Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnH
Maybe I'll see if any oil will come off with napthat before I start again and re-sand
John H, I don't think it was actually the fault of the Tried and True—I think too much stain had just gunked the whole thing up too much.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Gill
Attachment 25033
And the answer is: none… none more black.
I think it’s physically impossible for light to escape its gravitational pull.
Sanded the stain off, went for Duplicolor lacquer after being warned by a number of people that spraying enamel was not for the faint-hearted.
Horrible results (runs, no matter how I angled the can or snuck up on the job from the side) meant that I went through a whole bottle of the lacquer before I went back to researching it. Turned out low temperature = runs. I’ll bet you all knew that. So I put the guitar body in bed with a hot water bottle, and sat the can in some hot water for ten minutes. Results much, much better, though it certainly ain’t perfect. I had no idea how spraying a chunk of wood served to magnify all the imperfections in the sanding job.
If any noobies are going to try the same thing, I would say (and I'm sorry, because doing research on the forum shows that a lot of information has already been posted):
Don't put too much on with each spray.
If you do have to sand mistakes between coats, be very gentle to avoid going through the primer as well as the topcoat.
Laying it flat seems to stop the paint running down.
Do it in a dedicated indoor spray booth which is as free of possible contaminents as a Nikon clean room (ha! I know we've all got one of them on the premises!). Seriously, do you all find that any crud floating round in the air seems to get sucked onto the body of the instrument when you spray outside?
Its all a learning curve Mark, I've mucked up plenty of paint jobs in my time, usually through impatience. Even with research it takes actually doing it yourself to really learn the lessons. The good thing is that you can always let it dry hard, sand bank and have another go. It does take time, but I wouldn't write it off just yet.
Temperature is very important to pay attention to for any kind of spraying and as you've discovered its far better to do lots of very light coats and be patient.
Dust is always a pain if you don't have a good area. Again doing a lot of light coats lets you knock it off between them. It can also be a good idea to hose down the general area (Before you bring the guitar out) to settle any floating dust before you spray. Sometimes its just a case of being prepared and waiting for the right conditions, clear, warm, no wind. At the moment I'm spraying outside then (Very carefully) bringing it inside to hang and dry while its still wet. So far dust specks have been minimal.
Machine Heads: I've got a couple builds on the go, and after screwing in to the limit, both sets of machine heads are still swimming around.
Did I sand the head that much?
Or does this happen a lot and you should just double up on washers?
Are they kit machine heads, or did you upgrade. The kit ones aren't great, and I have had issues with the bit that screws in from the top side jamming and not screwing in all the way on some of them. It's often advisable to cough up an extra $40-$50 to get some Wilkinsons or Gotohs.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Gill
Kit. I hear what you’re saying. I understand people wanting to upgrade the likes of pickups, it just seems so wasteful to produce something that doesn’t actually function (..?)
Across 3 kits using stock guitar tuners never encountered this problem? More washers under front retaining nut might help but if the winding action feels odd, as is often the case, that tends to force you to buy an upgrade set. I bought a set of Gotoh non locking on ebay a while back for around $50 for one of my Tele's and it was money well spent.
Cheers, Waz
Sent from my SM-A520F using Tapatalk
So far my experience is that the most of the kit hardware is good, apart from the screws and the machine heads. They are the real weakest link. That is one of the reasons Adam now offers the upgrade options for the machine heads.
Finally got a chance to get back to this build.
Wiring question: Pretty much finished, but I've messed up the wiring somehow.
Here's the problem: When I set the switch and tap the bridge pickup I get nothing; when I flick the switch and tap the neck pickup it's the same—nothing. But when I set the switch in the middle, I get a signal from both pickups when I tap them in turn.
The middle knob seems broken and spins without stopping when turned—maybe I should see Pitbull about that—but is this connected with the lack of signal problem..?
Not a wiring expert but would suggest swapping the way you connected pickup wires as you may have connected ground to hot position on the 3 way switch and hot to ground as that might explain why only sound is in middle (both on) and not for each PUP on their own.
As for the spinning pot, sounds dodgy and being the middle one it is probably the volume knob? The one with a small green tab already pre-wired is the tone control.
Thanks for the suggestion Waz, but I wired it exactly like Adam and his mate did in the YouTube video (and the earth wires were bare, making them difficult to confuse)
No idea what the problem is then. Photos may help.
I usually upgrade switches, pots & caps and that makes things more reliable.
Sent from my SM-A520F using Tapatalk
Yep, some photos will help us get you sorted.
Attachment 27566
Neck pup wire to right side of switch (live wire to switch, bare earth to middle pot)
Bridge pup wire to left side of switch (live wire to switch, bare earth to middle pot)
Middle pot black wire to center of jack (second black free to earth under bridge later); Middle pot white wire to tip of jack
This should solve your switching issue:
Attachment 27568
The 'dots' indicate solder connections. The Pit Bull diagram is for a 7 lug switch, but the factory also uses 8 lug switches sometimes where there are two output lugs instead of just one. Your switch is an 8 lug so you need to solder the two centre output lugs together, and each pickup needs to connect across the two lugs indicated. That should give you bridge, bridge + neck, neck in positions 1, 2 & 3.
Regarding the pot issue, once you've re-wired the switch you can check to see what's happening with the pot. Make sure the knob isn't slipping on the shaft, see if there are any volume changes when it's turned etc. and then let us know. It may be a damaged/broken pot, but best to do some testing to be sure.
Attachment 27579
WeirdBits, I rewired it according to your instruction, but now I don't have anything at all (just a scratch of static when I plug the amp cable into the jack...)
Well that volume pot could potentially be toast which wouldn't help. That black earth wire that passes over the vol pot in the photo looks like it might be damaged, like there is a crimp in the middle of it?
Otherwise to my amateur eye - it looks like it should at least make sound...
I'd also check to see that nothing is earthing against your copper foil at the jack plug.
Caught me out more than once.
cheers, Mark.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sonic Mountain
Don't think so, mate (and would that prevent it producing sound?)
Thanks King, but i can't see anything there..Quote:
Originally Posted by king casey
It looks like the wire to the jack, so yeah, if its broken internally you have an open circuit.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark Gill
I looked at my tele wiring and the main difference is that I have my cap soldered to the middle lug on the tone pot. My switch is different, but from what I can tell what you have there looks right.
You mentioned earlier that the volume knob just turns without stopping? Have you looked into whether that's the knob or the pot. If the pot shaft just turns freely I'd say it's buggered. Might be worth swapping that out.
I'm still learning regarding wiring these things - it's confusing as there is more than one way to skin a cat in most cases and different wiring produce different results (beyond working or not). The important thing to remember is that you are essentially managing the signal produced by the pickups on its way to earth - most problems seem stem from poor or incorrect earthing.
Anyway, best bet is to wait for Wierdbits to have another look and see what he reckons. You'll work it out eventually.
Test it out of the body like it is in the photo to check that it isn’t any copper shielding shorting out the signal when it’s all squeezed into the cavity (including the jack). If you’not getting anything give some of the wires a bit of a jiggle to see if it’s a dodgy connection.
If still no sound then I’d disconnect the white and blue wires from the volume pot and join them together temporarily to bypass the volume and see if that gives you sound.