JSM Posted July 15, 2012 Report Share Posted July 15, 2012 Hey guys.. All of a sudden the neck on my LP Standard just stopped working. The bridge works fine, but when I switch to the neck I get nothing. I removed covers to see if any cables were fried or diconnected, but everything looks good even behind the 3 way toggle. Can you please help me troubleshoot this to figure out where is the problem? I bought a multimeter in order to do this but I have no idea what I am looking for or how to use it. I know it is simple but I need to know what I'm doing which I don't in this case. I have some experience soldering/swapping pickups but that is all. Anyone savvy here would like to guide me through? I'd greatly appreciate it!! thanks a lot. Guitar is a Standard with Coil Tap for both pups. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SwedishLuthier Posted July 15, 2012 Report Share Posted July 15, 2012 Fist you need to eliminate other factors. Unsolder the leads from the pickup to the first switch/pot of whatever is in the signal path. Take a picture or make any other type of record of what wire goes were. Then measure the pickup. Lets say that the four wires are white, black, red, grean (most connom combo). Start with white and measure DCR (DC resistance) between the white and the other leads. You should find one that measures somewere in the range of 2-8 Kohms and infinite between the white and the others. Then take the black and repeat. You chould in the end have two "pair" that have this type of measurement. If you get 0Ohm somewere you got a short, if you only get one "pair" (or none) you have an open cuircuit. Starting from that you can search the rest of the pickup for errors. If you get these two "pairs" the problem is in the switches or pots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Workingman Posted July 15, 2012 Report Share Posted July 15, 2012 SwedishLuthier has the right way to test a pup clearly explained. I would be inclined to test the pup selector switch before soldering anything. They go bad more often than pups and you don't have to unsolder anything to check them. With a continuity detector you can check by touching one end to the pole on the switch that the pup is wired to. The other probe goes on the output pole. With the switch selecting the pup in question only, you should have continuity. If you don't it is a bad switch which can be replaced or possibly cleaned. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ansil Posted July 17, 2012 Report Share Posted July 17, 2012 when you switch it to the neck do you get a hum, or just complete silence. if you get silence then one of two things somewhere the signal is grounded out or switch is not connecting. check your output lead an ground with meter set on continuity. you don't even have to have the back of the guitar off. just unscrew your guitar cable with it plugged in, one probe on the shield one probe on the center lug. also having aligator clips helps here put all pots on 10 check on bridge does it show resistance. if it does move to both positions ie neck and bridge. does it show resistance or does it beep. if it beeps then you have short to ground if it does show resistance then go to the neck pickup position. does it beep or does it show resistance. if it does not beep, then you are not shorting to ground. which is always a good thing. from there it is definitely listed as above there is nothing really more to be done than already posted Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JSM Posted July 17, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 17, 2012 UPDATE: It was the solder on the volume pot that apparently was not making enough contact, but it looked very well attached at a glance. re soldered it and now it is all good!!! thanks all 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ansil Posted July 18, 2012 Report Share Posted July 18, 2012 good deal my friend glad it worked out for you. as a side note i found while re wiring an old Gibson i had to replace the pots and i found and interesting way to solder a ground tab on them. instead of trying heat up the entire pot i used my lithium ion battery tab welder to attach a smaller tab on the side so now i can solder all the ground connections quite easily. you can make a capacitive discharge system for free from a camera flash unit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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