Explain it like I'm 5 years old...

[eeparkinson]

Greetings all. 

So, I'm trying to wire a Gretsch WF style guitar. 2 Humbuckers, Master Tone, Master volume with Individual pickup volumes with 3 way switch. And it never...never, NEVER works. I'd like to ask the simplest question and don't care about getting roasted, but where do all the ground wire attachments go? I think this is my problem, Does everything get soldered to one place? Again, explain like I'm 5, because, obviously I am... Thanks in advance.

 

Eric

 

[Bizman62]

Regarding electronics I'm 5½ years old. But this much I know. As it says under Notes: All Grounds need to be connected. You're partially right in guessing that they should be connected in one place, however that one place can be as big as the control cavity shielding! And finally the combined  Grounds have to be connected to the Output Jack sleeve where it continues to the amp and finally to the ground of the electric socket.

There's been warnings about ground loops but lately I just learned that there's no such thing. If all grounds are connected it doesn't matter if that's done as a star or a loop from point to point and as said, often the components are grounded by the shielding as well and a copper tape covered cavity sure doesn't look like a star or loop!

Just make sure that no hot wire ever touches any ground. I put copper tape into the jack cavity of my Strat and whaddayaknow, when I put the plug in, the tip touched the copper and no sound came out..,

[eeparkinson]

Thank you for the reply. To clarify; I can connect all grounds to the output jack sleeve? Imma have to lengthen everything... The issue also may be that because it's a hollow body, I feel like I'm using feet and feet of wire...

[curtisa]

Essentially any time you see the ground symbol, all points connected to it must somehow find their way to each other. In guitar wiring there's nothing more special to it than that. Your only real hassle is to find a practical way to make all those grounds meet each other. You can bunch them all together and join them all at one common point if you want (the output jack, as you suggest), but it's going to get messy quickly. Another alternative is to group smaller clusters together and then join those clusters with a single jumpers, gradually working your way back to the output jack.

You could conceivably do something like this if you wanted:

Lots of different ways to skin the cat.

Wiring diagrams were traditionally made to allow non-skilled labour working in factories to be able to produce a circuit that worked. The wiring guys didn't have to understand how the circuit functioned, just that wire colour 'x' went to point 'y', and that if you joined the dots together enough the product would operate as intended. Schematics on the other hand are created for people to understand how the circuit functions. Admittedly many wiring diagrams for guitars often blur the line between the two which doesn't help things (the use of the ground symbol in your diagram can be confusing, as unless you're aware of what ground is for it might not be obvious of the requirement to make sure they're all joined together somehow somewhere)

[eeparkinson]

2 hours ago, curtisa said:

Essentially any time you see the ground symbol, all points connected to it must somehow find their way to each other. In guitar wiring there's nothing more special to it than that. Your only real hassle is to find a practical way to make all those grounds meet each other. You can bunch them all together and join them all at one common point if you want (the output jack, as you suggest), but it's going to get messy quickly. Another alternative is to group smaller clusters together and then join those clusters with a single jumpers, gradually working your way back to the output jack.

You could conceivably do something like this if you wanted:

Lots of different ways to skin the cat.

Wiring diagrams were traditionally made to allow non-skilled labour working in factories to be able to produce a circuit that worked. The wiring guys didn't have to understand how the circuit functioned, just that wire colour 'x' went to point 'y', and that if you joined the dots together enough the product would operate as intended. Schematics on the other hand are created for people to understand how the circuit functions. Admittedly many wiring diagrams for guitars often blur the line between the two which doesn't help things (the use of the ground symbol in your diagram can be confusing, as unless you're aware of what ground is for it might not be obvious of the requirement to make sure they're all joined together somehow somewhere)

Duuuuude... Thank you. Apparently I'm a visual learner. I totally understand this. Months (years) watching videos and reading articles and I felt everyone glosses over this, or only focuses on Strats or Les Pauls... Thank you. From the bottom of my heart, thank you!

[curtisa]

Just looking at the picture you added to your diagram of the Gretsch control layout again, I think your best bet is to group your clusters of grounds near the controls that need them the most. Given that your controls are spread out across all corners of the guitar body, the suggested layout I provided above probably isn't the most efficient way of doing it. Rearranging the order of the grounds would give you a slightly more logical flow to them:

[eeparkinson]

8 hours ago, curtisa said:

Just looking at the picture you added to your diagram of the Gretsch control layout again, I think your best bet is to group your clusters of grounds near the controls that need them the most. Given that your controls are spread out across all corners of the guitar body, the suggested layout I provided above probably isn't the most efficient way of doing it. Rearranging the order of the grounds would give you a slightly more logical flow to them:

Man, I can't thank you enough... I'll let you know how it sounds!