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Jazzmaster wiring


Dannyyoung23

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Hi,

First of all it's nice to see such a place with so many information and amazing guitar projects.

I need your help with my own rosewood jazzmaster project which I started 6 monts ago.

I bought a ready wiring kit which only had to be soldered to the fender vintage 65 pickups. With the help of a friend we tried to follow the wiring vintage jazzmaster diagram and got it soldered to the kit but the results are that when I check them on the Amp they are both (bridge and neck) magnetic even when i turn one of them off with the pickup selector.
Any suggestion for those results? Was it right to solder the two black pickup wires to the tremolo and bridge?

there is the wiring:
image.jpg
image.jpg
image.jpg

Your help would be much appreciated,
Thanks

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When you operate the main toggle switch and look at the mechanism from behind, can you see a gap opening up between each of the two pairs of two metal contacts, or do they remain closed together?

 

5 hours ago, Dannyyoung23 said:

Was it right to solder the two black pickup wires to the tremolo and bridge?

I believe so, yes. There should also be a connection between all three of those black wires and the rear of the volume pot (also black).

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I would've thought a selector switch that doesn't select anything would be the first area to look at, but from the photo's I can't see anything obviously wrong with it (assuming the switch itself is working correctly).

I still think there's a ground connection missing between the pickups/bridge and the rest of the circuitry. I'd imagine the guitar would buzz fairly badly if this was the case.

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There is a big fair amount of buzz which I thought is typical to the jazzmaster , I actually tried to play it with strings on it and it was impossible to hear a note unless I touched the guitar cable.

DSC_0035.jpg

 

How can I do it? Should I solder another 2 wires from the tremolo and bridge to the 'master' volume pot in to the spot where the black wire is soldered? 

 

Thanks,

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Whatever the case, I cannot see that you've grounded your pickups or your bridge in the photos. The diagram is not clear how the volume pot is grounded, but it must be otherwise it simply will not work. The rest of the grounding scheme is shown on page 5, however as your instrument does not have this same grounding scheme it cannot be used as a direct substitute.

If the pickups are not grounded the guitar will make very little sound. If the bridge is not grounded you will get lots of buzz until you touch a metallic part is the guitar that is already grounded.

The bottom line is that it would seem that the bridge and pickups are currently ungrounded. The easy fix is to connect them to the nearest grounded point, hence my suggestion of the rear of the volume pot. There are other points on your guitar you could use equally well - the rear of the tone pot, the frame lug on the big 3-way switch, the ground lug on the output jack.

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  • 1 month later...

Hi,

I tried to follow your advice  and  soldered the 3 black wires(2 pickups and 1 bridge) to the master volume.

also added a copper shield   that includes a wiring point from the tremolo in order to deal with the buzz issue.,

Now I figured out that the Lead circuit works fine with all the 3 pickups working, the selector switch also functions well .

But the problem is that the Rhythm circuit won't work, there is a buzz noise from the amp when I change it to the rhythm circuit, it won't  let me reduce the volume with the Rhythm volume switch

it would be great to hear if you have any suggestions,

there is a pic:

6yHHOF8.jpg

Thanks,

Edited by Dannyyoung23
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yes! it should be the last missing grounding point :)

Do you think It will make a difference If I solder it to the Master volume(just like the other points) rather than  the copper shield? 

Maybe it's even better to move  the other 3 grounding to the copper in order to avoid background noises?

 

 

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As long as all points that should be grounded are grounded, it shouldn't make a difference. My preference would be to connect the rhythm volume pot ground to the master volume pot ground, simply because then you know that part of the circuit is grounded properly.

Just to clarify - the copper foil you've applied in the cavities also needs to be connected to ground in order to be effective. If it's unconnected it won't be doing anything useful (and may even contribute to any buzzes you may be experiencing).

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It worked out well:) , the guitar sounds great and with less background noise than my other factory Strat.

I'm having some rough time figuring out how to adjust the action lower with the jazzmaster bridge.

it's just Impossible to get low because the string touches the plate when I set the saddles down..

 

at least She looks and sounds  much better ,

sL674G0.jpg

 

 

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Nice one, good job.

 

21 hours ago, Dannyyoung23 said:

I'm having some rough time figuring out how to adjust the action lower with the jazzmaster bridge.

it's just Impossible to get low because the string touches the plate when I set the saddles down..

You probably need to shim the neck a little.. If you only shim the bridge end of the neck pocket so that the neck sits at a slight downward angle, you'll be surprised how very little shimming you need to introduce to get the bridge up to a more acceptable height without the strings bottoming out on the plate. 0.5mm may be all that it takes.

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DSC_0049.jpg 

the downward angle is crucial? I shimmed the whole neck pocket without getting the angle.

the action is now  playable but I still want to have the option to adjust it even lower without a buzz that comes from the neck.

Do you think that filing the neck's nut can also help it?  other than that I was thinking about changing the bridge to a mustang.

 

 

DSC_0052.jpg

 

DSC_0055.jpg

 

 

 

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On 3/6/2017 at 8:36 PM, Dannyyoung23 said:

the downward angle is crucial? I shimmed the whole neck pocket without getting the angle.

the action is now  playable but I still want to have the option to adjust it even lower without a buzz that comes from the neck

It's not crucial, but it takes less shimming to achieve the same amount of change in string height at the bridge by angling the neck downward. Up to you.

 

On 3/6/2017 at 8:36 PM, Dannyyoung23 said:

Do you think that filing the neck's nut can also help it?

Not enough to make a significant difference. Only change the nut height if the action at that end of the neck feels too uncomfortable or you're experiencing significant intonation errors in the first few frets due to excessive string height near the nut..

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