Cant Hear Any Distortion When I Plug In?

[Syndacite]

i just installed 2 Pickups into a Jackson Js30RR

Neck:Dimarzio Super Distortion

Bridge:Seymour Duncan Full Shred

and now i cant hear or my amps or pickups cant pickup any distortion and the volume has to be cranked to hear anything and i cant figure out whats wrong or what happend?

need help badly plz

[GregP]

I assume your amp has a distortion stage? The pickups don't generate their own distortion. You probably knew that, but I thought I'd throw it out there anyhow because the name "Super Distortion" is sort of misleading to people not in the know, IMO.

Next, though, if you have to crank to get anything, you need to double-check your wiring. One of two things is happening:

1. Your signal return (ground) of your pickups isn't connected properly-- it's either completely not connected, or it's short-circuiting somewhere. Without the right "ground", you won't get a signal.

2. You have wired your pickups out of phase with each other, and the frequencies are cancelling out. This produces a very thin sound throughout the majority of the guitar's usable frequency spectrum, leaving a little bit leftover in the lows and highs, but obliterating the mids (where the heart of a guitar's tone lives).

Both of these require double-checking your wiring diagrams and possibly re-soldering.

One thing to be aware of is that not all pickups use the same coloured leads. So even if you drew a picture of your old pickups with coloured wires, and replicated it with the new pickups, you might be wired up incorrectly because of differences in colour coding. Dimarzio and Duncan are definitely different from one another, which is leading me to suspect that you didn't know that and therefore ended up wiring them out of phase with each other or even with themselves (the two individual coils being out of phase). Can you get a usable signal out of -any- of the positions of your switch?

Greg

[Syndacite]

I assume your amp has a distortion stage? The pickups don't generate their own distortion. You probably knew that, but I thought I'd throw it out there anyhow because the name "Super Distortion" is sort of misleading to people not in the know, IMO.

Next, though, if you have to crank to get anything, you need to double-check your wiring. One of two things is happening:

1. Your signal return (ground) of your pickups isn't connected properly-- it's either completely not connected, or it's short-circuiting somewhere. Without the right "ground", you won't get a signal.

2. You have wired your pickups out of phase with each other, and the frequencies are cancelling out. This produces a very thin sound throughout the majority of the guitar's usable frequency spectrum, leaving a little bit leftover in the lows and highs, but obliterating the mids (where the heart of a guitar's tone lives).

Both of these require double-checking your wiring diagrams and possibly re-soldering.

One thing to be aware of is that not all pickups use the same coloured leads. So even if you drew a picture of your old pickups with coloured wires, and replicated it with the new pickups, you might be wired up incorrectly because of differences in colour coding. Dimarzio and Duncan are definitely different from one another, which is leading me to suspect that you didn't know that and therefore ended up wiring them out of phase with each other or even with themselves (the two individual coils being out of phase). Can you get a usable signal out of -any- of the positions of your switch?

Greg

i think i might have mixed the wires up and used the same color codeing as the stock pickups whichs was green one way black the other i might have to take it to a guitar tech guy and have him check it out but thanks alot

[GregP]

I wouldn't pay for a tech to fix it up-- if you've already installed them, that means you have access to a soldering iron. It's a simple matter of knowing:

- Which pickup is bridge and which is neck

- Your configuration of knobs and switch(es)

And one of us can probably sort you out with a diagram. Heck, I could probably do it for you later on.

Greg