Originally Posted by colin2121
also I am very confused about this diagram, the Neck, and pickup wires seem to have 2 inside of them, one is insulated and the other is not, how am I supposed to connect something like the yellow pickup wire because it seems to split in two?
I also forgot to ask, the jack is supposed to have a hot and earth wire but mine only came as a single one
Last edited by lotion5238; 30-06-2023 at 03:10 AM. Reason: forgor
Okay I'm starting to lose my mind, is there supposed to be a ground wire for the Jack because I CANNOT FIND WHERE IT GOES
Last edited by lotion5238; 30-06-2023 at 04:16 AM.
For the pickups there is one wire that comes out from the pickup. The hot or active wire is the one that is insulated, the other is the earth or ground wire. Both earth or ground wires solder onto the back of the volume pot. The insulated wires are connected to the pickup selector.
also I am very confused about this diagram, the Neck, and pickup wires seem to have 2 inside of them, one is insulated and the other is not, how am I supposed to connect something like the yellow pickup wire because it seems to split in two?
I also forgot to ask, the jack is supposed to have a hot and earth wire but mine only came as a single one
For the jack, the solid prong is is the one that contacts the plug on the lead when you plug it in. Don't touch that one.
The lug directly opposite coming from under the insulation is the active connection. Your hot wire connects there. That is the yellow wire from the control plate.
The other lug coming up from the metal plate is the earth or ground point. One of the black wires from the control plate is connected to that lug.
If you have any problems locating the correct lugs post a photo as sometimes the jacks can be different. A photo of the pickups is also helpful as sometimes the factory uses different wires.
The yellow wire is the hot wire to the jack.Okay I'm starting to lose my mind, is there supposed to be a ground wire for the Jack because I CANNOT FIND WHERE IT GOES
One of the black wires goes to the ground lug on the jack. The other goes through the body to contact with the base of the bridge. It doesn't matter which you use for the bridge plate or the jack as the ground wires are all looped together.
Any problems send a photo of the jack as well.
With the shielded pickup wire, the outer exposed braid is used as a common screen + ground wire. the central insulated wire carries the 'hot' signal. The end of the wire from the pickup as it comes direct from the kit should look something like this (though the end may be cut off cleanly so no braid is showing):
There is unlikely to be enough slack in the wire end to be able to solder the braid to the back of the volume pot and for the inner signal wire to reach the correct tab on the selector switch. So you need to make the ends longer.
What you don't want (and what the wiring diagram implies) is for there to be long lengths of exposed braid wire floating around inside the control cavity. As it's grounded, all it takes is for it to touch any exposed signal tab or wire on the switch and you get no sound. So you want a short length of exposed braid which you connect to the back of the pot, with a much longer length of the central signal.
Work out how much signal wire you need to comfortably run from the back of the volume pot to the switch, then gently score round the insulation at that distance from the end of the wire. I use a scalpel, but any sharp craft knife will do. Gently, because you don't want to cut through the strands of the brain, but just enough so you can pull the insulation off the end of the wire:
You'll be left with a long length of braid around the signal wire. You should be able to pull the signal wire out through the strands. Twist the strands together then cut the end of this braid so you have maybe 15-20mm left, leaving the long length of central wire untouched like so:
'Tin' (which just putting a bit of melted solder on the item to be tinned) the end of the braid wire and then the back of the volume pot. This makes it easier to solder the two items together as you end up connecting solder to solder, which is easier to do than connecting solder directly to two bits of metal at the same time.
Then solder the braid to the back of the pot. An extra pair of hands is useful here to hold the wires in place (but beware hot soldering iron tips and hot wires as the heat travels up the braid quickly). Tape can be useful, as long as the tape isn't near the soldering area. The exposed braid is now too short to move anywhere, and you can safely then solder the signal wire to the relevant switch tab.
I always add some masking tape to the cables with 'bridge' or 'neck' on so I don't get confused.
Thank you guys for the responses, I actually already figured out through intuition that on the Left Handed Tele, or at least the one I got, the ground and lead wires for the Jack are split, and the 2nd black wire was to be run to the bridge as a ground. I ended up getting the whole thing working before you guys responded even though I am still grateful for the tips for next time. However I think my shitty soldering must have messed something up (I was having some issues with my soldering iron because mine was either A. Too Dirty, or B. Not Strong enough.) because I can only actually get sound from flipping the switch to the top position. I probably need to check some diagrams on the switches to figure out where the problem lies and which part is actually messed up. but I can actually get it to make sound now, even if it is just with one switch position.
The output wire from the switch must be ok because you get sound from the one pickup.
So it’s either the ground wire making a bad contact with the back of the volume pot (soldering to the back of a pot isn’t easy), or the hot wire to the switch isn’t going to the right place, or the grounded braid from the working pickup is touching an exposed part of the switch or exposed signal cable from the non-working pickup. Easy enough to undo the cover plate and check on the last one.
Less likely options are a faulty switch or a faulty pickup with an open circuit/broken wire.
Do you have a multimeter at all?
It is done
I plan to put a set of Elixir Heavy strings on it, right now I'm using standard 42 - 9 strings
My issues with the switch were in fact, shitty wiring too.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
