mmaehler IB5 Build

First build. I'm stuck on Pickup installation and wiring.

The springs that are meant to be mounted under the standard kit pickups are so long they only allow the screws to bite in about one full thread depth. (I already stripped one out of it's hole.) More troubling - With the springs installed, the lowest pickup height is looking way too high. I can't figure out what the deal is. Were the pickup cavities not routed deep enough? Do I need to drill a countersink for the springs to sit in?

Also, the wiring diagram lists the wires coming from the pickups as - White (Hot) and Bare (Ground). The wires coming out of the pickups with my kit are - Bare and Green wrapped together (which I assume to be Ground), Red and White wrapped together (Hot?), and Black(???). How do I make sense of this?

Lastly, the Humbucking Pickups I've seen are always installed in opposite orientation. My pickups are just black plastic rectangles so the only clue I have to orientation is the position of the wire coming out. Does it matter which way they are oriented?

Anyone deal with these issues already or have some advice? Thanks!

I haven't built one of these but a pic of the springs and cavity etc may help .
If all is correct I don't see why you couldn't cut a spring down to suit

Plenty of these have been built so some of the build threads may answer your questions, have a look while waiting for others more knowledgable than me to see your thread

Enjoy the build these are great looking guitars

Here's what the wires look like and another shot showing how little of the screws extend even with the springs completely compressed. It's weird because usually if there is a spring there is also a hole that the spring sits in. That's not the case with these pickups. The spring just rides on the screw which also makes them a real chore to get in as they like to fall off the screws when you flip the pickup over to instal it. I'm stumped.

no hole underneath for the spring?
Spring normally sits on the underside of the pickup, there should be room around the screw for it

I'm guessing - and it's only that - that white/red is hot, green/bare is ground, black for a coil split ...

I know, right? I put the spring where it is in the photo just so it would be clear how much of the screw extends. The hole on the underside of the pickup is only large enough for the screw. No place for the spring to seat nicely.

I'll put up a photo of the bottom of the pickup along with an end view of the spring. Not sure if it's clear but the outer diameter of the spring is larger than the hole and the hole has the same inner diameter from top to bottom. No seat for the spring.

Thanks. Maybe I'll wire it up like that and test it out.

Hey, with the pickups, are the white and red soldered together?
If so it could be the 'middle wires', the wires that link south and north coils and allows you to wire for coil splitting.
Green would be ground and black hot.

If you have a multimeter test resistance between green and red/white, and then between red/white and black.
If I'm correct the sum of these 2 should equal what you measure between green and black.

So you would cable with green as ground, black as hot.
With white and red you can ignore them (wrap them in sparky tape to isolate them), or you can wire them to a switch or push pull pot for coil tapping.

With the springs, just cut them to the length you want. I'd start by removing a third and check and cut more if needed.

With pickup orientation see which corner the wires come out of the pickup from and put this toward control cavity.

Hope this helps.

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Thanks. Yes, the red and white are soldered. I'll run the test.

The original IB-5 kit had 2 wire pickups, just hot and ground. Now the kits have started coming with 4+1 wire pups (4 wire plus ground/shield), hence the discrepancy with the diagram. Typically, the colours will be:

Green & bare: negative/ground
Red & White: series link (linking the two coils)
Black: hot/positive.

(but, the colours can vary from batch to batch from the factory)

If you're not going to be doing any coil splits etc, make sure you insulate the soldered tips of the red/white wires. Usually, the higher resistance pickup will be for the bridge position, but if the values are the same then the pup with the longer wire will be the neck. And, as Fred said, orientate them with the wires towards the cavity.

There's no problem with trimming the pickup springs if needed, or you could use foam blocks under the pups or even swap out the springs for some shorter Strat style ones. The body of the IB-5 is pretty thin so be careful when considering drilling or deepening holes/routs.

Another thing to check with the IB-5 is fit of the long thread flush-mount jack, as sometimes it may be necessary to tweak the cavity so that the jack nut can be fitted properly. The lugs on the jack can also be confusing as it's a stereo jack with an unusual lug layout. From memory, I think it's the two shorter lugs that are the hot and ground, but it's wise to test with a multimeter to be certain before tryng to wire it.

Same PUP's as in my EX-5 and Fred & Weirdy are spot on with their description as to which wires to use.

Yes, they are rather chunky units that don't seem to want to sit down in the PUP cavities but you should also check how far under the strings they might sit as the lower you go you also incur a drop in output, which is something these PUP's already lack. From memory I may have tossed the springs and used some 3-4mm high density foam underneath but that is all about to change shortly when my custom hand wired John Benson PUP's arrive, hopefully within the next 10 days or so.

Thanks! I did have to tweak the cavity a bit to get the Jack in. To get a good fit for the pickups I opted to drill the screw holes so that the springs could sit inside them. This worked out great. The springs stick inside the holes so they stay put when I flip the pickup over to install it. I saw in another thread that someone had depth problems due to the wires running under the pickups. I had already shielded the cavities so rather than carve out a groove for the wires I notched the bottom of the plastic pickup casing so the wires could pass through. Everything fits great now. Time to solder. Thank you so much for the wiring advice. It was going to come down to a lot of messy trial and error without it. I've included a photo of the pickup with the holes drilled to fit the springs.

Anybody good at troubleshooting electronics? I followed the wiring diagram from the website for four pots (2 Volume & 2 Tone) and the pickups are hot. I have volume control and tone control for both. However... With the neck pickup volume pot turned all the way down I still get sound from the neck pickup unless I turn the bridge volume pot all the way up. I should mention that the cavity is shielded with copper foil and I went ahead and ran all the grounding wires in the diagram even though the directions said this might not be necessary. Not sure if that's the problem... I figured ground is ground. Here's a photo of the wiring diagram I followed. Help, I'm stuck!

Have you soldered the left hand lugs of the volumes (as per the image above) to the back of the pots? The diagram is showing the lugs bent back to the casings but is missing the solder 'dots'. Without those grounded lugs the volumes will turn down but not completely silence a pickup.

If you still can't solve it post some images of your wiring, as clear as possible, and we'll take a look.

I did bend the left hand lugs over and solder them. Unfortunately, they are quite short and in an effort to make them reach even the side of the pots I broke the lug off on the neck volume pot. I soldered it back to the board and to the back of the pot hoping I'd fixed it. Guess I need a new volume pot. Bummer. Thanks for your help. I think that about solves this mystery.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mmaehler

I did bend the left hand lugs over and solder them. Unfortunately, they are quite short and in an effort to make them reach even the side of the pots I broke the lug off on the neck volume pot. I soldered it back to the board and to the back of the pot hoping I'd fixed it. Guess I need a new volume pot. Bummer. Thanks for your help. I think that about solves this mystery.

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great work with the pickups

instead of soldering the leg back on you could use a piece of wire, which may make more reliable contact

As Stan said, just use a short wire link to connect lug/stub to the back of the pot. Try that before buying a new pot.

Thanks again! That solved the problem. Sorry to be such a squeaky wheel but despite grounding everything and shielding every cavity I still seem to have a substantial hum. Not sure if it's my amateur soldering, the orientation of the pickups (both with wire facing cavity), the stereo output jack (hot to shorter of two short pins, ground to longer of two short pins, and long pin left alone), or some other problem I haven't conceived of. I should note that I have not installed the bridge or the neck yet. Which raises another question... The bridge is painted black as are the screws. What should I do to make sure it's good and grounded? I've assumed the ground wire wraps around on of the screws as there is no obvious grounding site on the bridge itself. But so far my assumptions haven't really panned out so well.

Hey, for the jack, did you check you got the right pins with a multimeter?
The parts are not really consistent between different kits so I wouldn't rely purely on what others have done.
When I did mine I plugged a jack lead in the socket and tested with multimeter to see which pin correspond to tip (hot) and which one to sleeve (ground).
For the bridge I'd sand the area where the wires will touch to bare metal to remove the paint. But you can actually test with a multimeter again. Screw your bridge in place on top of ground wire and test you have continuity between bridge and the ground wire in control cavity.
I usually test all my grounds before closing. Super quick test, one side of the multimeter on the bridge and with the other side touch back of each pots, ground lug of jack, etc. To make sure all ground are happily connected.

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