Ezo McGribbin Posted February 27, 2005 Report Posted February 27, 2005 So I decided to overhaul my beloved Squier Jagmaster. Two humbuckers, one volume and tone, standard three-way toggle switch. I installed two new buckers and replaced the old volume and tone controls with push/pull pots with the intention of having series/parallel switching for each bucker. The closest schematic I could find to guide me was this. I just wired the neck hb up the same way as the bridge hb. Was this wrong? Also, I'm not completely convinced I've got all the ground points correct. I didn't ground the left lug of the two pots as in the schematic because my Dad told me there was no need to seeing as how the green and bare pickup wires were grounded on the attached DPDT mini switches. The result of my attempt is that I am getting some sound, but it's clearly not working properly. For one thing the sound I'm getting is with the volume turned down, the volume and tone controls aren't responding. For another thing there's only sound when the pots are pulled up. Basically it seems like a complete shambles so if anyone could guide me through what exactly I should be doing I'd be very grateful. Quote
jnewman Posted February 27, 2005 Report Posted February 27, 2005 (edited) So I decided to overhaul my beloved Squier Jagmaster. Two humbuckers, one volume and tone, standard three-way toggle switch. I installed two new buckers and replaced the old volume and tone controls with push/pull pots with the intention of having series/parallel switching for each bucker. The closest schematic I could find to guide me was this. I just wired the neck hb up the same way as the bridge hb. Was this wrong? Also, I'm not completely convinced I've got all the ground points correct. I didn't ground the left lug of the two pots as in the schematic because my Dad told me there was no need to seeing as how the green and bare pickup wires were grounded on the attached DPDT mini switches. The result of my attempt is that I am getting some sound, but it's clearly not working properly. For one thing the sound I'm getting is with the volume turned down, the volume and tone controls aren't responding. For another thing there's only sound when the pots are pulled up. Basically it seems like a complete shambles so if anyone could guide me through what exactly I should be doing I'd be very grateful. ← You HAVE to ground one terminal on the pot for it to work properly as a voltage divider. This may not be what's causing your problem, but it's still true. Here's how a pot works as a voltage divider: you have a strip of resistive material attached at one end to your input signal and at one end to ground. Your output signal is the center lug, it is the wiper that moves along the strip of resistive material. As you move from the input end to the ground end, your output signal decreases slowly from exactly the same as the input signal to 0. (I just used 2V as a reference so I could put in some numbers). If you don't ground that terminal, however, the voltage divider aspect goes away - there's no 0V reference at the other end, and all you're doing is adding a series resistance between your pups and the output - which isn't going to do you any good at all, and probably will screw things up (I've never actually tried it before). I can't promise that's your only problem, that's a fairly complex wiring scheme. Edited February 27, 2005 by jnewman Quote
lovekraft Posted February 28, 2005 Report Posted February 28, 2005 Fix one problem at a time. I'd recommend you temporarily remove the push/pull switches from the signal path completely until you get the basic ciruit working, and only wire them back in once the volume and tone controls are fully functional. Quote
Ezo McGribbin Posted February 28, 2005 Author Report Posted February 28, 2005 Thanks for the input guys. Just to clarify, if I wire the neck pickup in exactly the same way the bridge pickup is wired in that Duncan schematic, then follow the rest of the schematic to the letter it should work right? Quote
lovekraft Posted February 28, 2005 Report Posted February 28, 2005 Yes, that switch setup will work for both pickups. Quote
Ezo McGribbin Posted March 3, 2005 Author Report Posted March 3, 2005 OK, so I've made a second attempt at getting this right. Things have improved but there's still a big problem. The good news is the volume and tone controls are now functioning correctly. The big problem is that I'm still only getting sound when the pots are pulled up. I can't understand it because as far as I can see I've followed the schematic exactly. Any ideas? Quote
jnewman Posted March 3, 2005 Report Posted March 3, 2005 (edited) OK, so I've made a second attempt at getting this right. Things have improved but there's still a big problem. The good news is the volume and tone controls are now functioning correctly. The big problem is that I'm still only getting sound when the pots are pulled up. I can't understand it because as far as I can see I've followed the schematic exactly. Any ideas? ← How do you have the switch portion of the push-pull pots wired? Could you possibly draw it out and post it? (Exactly as you have all the wires connected, not the schematic you're kinda-sorta working from) Are you sure you've actually connected every ground point in the schematic to ground? Edited March 3, 2005 by jnewman Quote
lovekraft Posted March 3, 2005 Report Posted March 3, 2005 Try wiring the switch like this: Click on the image for a larger view I know that this one will work - if you'll let us know what brand humbuckers you have, I can even tell you what color each wire needs to be. Quote
Ezo McGribbin Posted March 3, 2005 Author Report Posted March 3, 2005 How do you have the switch portion of the push-pull pots wired? Could you possibly draw it out and post it? (Exactly as you have all the wires connected, not the schematic you're kinda-sorta working from) Are you sure you've actually connected every ground point in the schematic to ground? ← The pots are wired exactly the same as is shown here. As for ground points, I'm not so sure of myself. I've got ground points from the bridge, the 3-way switch, the left lug of each pot, the bottom left lug of each switch and the jack all together at one central point. Is this overkill or underkill? The part I'm always unsure of is having ground points on both the lug of the pot and the attached switch. I keep thinking needing two points would only apply if the pot and switch were separate entities. Quote
lovekraft Posted March 3, 2005 Report Posted March 3, 2005 The pot and the switch are separate entities!! They share no electrical connections, and have to be treated as separate components. Every point marked as ground in that diagram has to be explicitly connected to your ground point, or it won't work correctly. Quote
Ezo McGribbin Posted March 3, 2005 Author Report Posted March 3, 2005 The pot and the switch are separate entities!! They share no electrical connections, and have to be treated as separate components. Every point marked as ground in that diagram has to be explicitly connected to your ground point, or it won't work correctly. ← Ahh, I see. So now I know for sure that all my required ground points are present and correct. That's one less thing to worry about. Regarding your alternative wiring suggestion, this is also for series/parallel switching yes? The pickups' brand name is One Louder. You probably haven't heard of them but looking here I see that Anderson and Peavey use the same colour code. Quote
lovekraft Posted March 3, 2005 Report Posted March 3, 2005 Yes, this is series/parallel switching, just a little more straight-forward. If that color code is correct, referring to the diagram above, the pickup wires from top to bottom will be red, white, green and black. Let me know if it doesn't work. Quote
Ezo McGribbin Posted March 9, 2005 Author Report Posted March 9, 2005 Just an update to this - It's finally working! It turns out I was mistaken about the pickups colour code. Green and white were the wrong way around. Boy is my face red Thanks to jnewman and lovekraft for helping me resolve this. Quote
lovekraft Posted March 9, 2005 Report Posted March 9, 2005 Congrats for working it out! That's how most of us learn this stuff! Quote
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