Dimarzio Ultra Jazz wiring question.

[Artdroid]

I'm replacing the stock jazz pickups in my Fernandes Gravity X bass with Ultra Jazz's. Everything fits fine. Having been a long time player but only recently starting to mod my equipment this is new to me.

The stock pickups were Black and White two wire pickups.

The new Dimarzio's are 4 wire, Black, White, Green, Red.

The Dimarzio instructions say to wire the Red and Green where the stock B&W were and to Bundle the remaining new B&W wires together.

Did all that and am only getting a very faint bass sound if any. So assuming something's not right, so here I am. My first guess was to try the B&W rather than Green and Red on the new pickups but I thought I'd check here first.

Here's how I recall things were wired to the stock pickups. It was Vol, Vol, Tone functionality. Only wires that were removed were the original pickup wires in anticipation of an easy replacement.

Pickup 1:
White to mid pole Vol 1
Black to back of Vol 1

Pickup 2:
White to mid pole Vol2
Black to back of Vol 1

Bridge ground wire also to back of Vol 1


Any guidance would be greatly appreciated.


Thanks.

[joelb79]

black and white should be shorted together. I chose to do this with my Ultra Jazz sets by soldering the wires to each other and tucking the excess underneath the pickups.

The Red is your middle pole of volume pot. The green goes to back or ground.

If your getting weak output using that configuration, you could have cold solder joints or back pots.

[Artdroid]

Cold solder Joints or Back Pots?

Explanation? Not soldered well enough?


Another thought. The two sets of B&W's that are to be soldered together. Do they need to stay two separate groups of two or can they be bulked into one set of 4?

[Artdroid]

Took another shot at the soldering last night. I got everything working intermittentily, but things are still on and off with it.

I've been wanting to replace the pots also away from the stock pots anyhow.

So... knowing I have two new working Ultra-Jazz pickups, what would be good suggestions for Pots, etc for the rest of the guts if I replaced everything from the guitar cable up to the new pickups?

250k pots likely to help out with my search for a older passive sound I assume.

[Cochise]

I wouldn't even consider changing the pots until you have got everything working. Your pots and jack were OK before I guess. So by replacing them you are introducing more variables to your problem. To clarify the wiring for you...

Take the black and white from the bridge pickup and solder them together, making sure you have a good joint, then insulate them.

Do the same with the neck pup. Do NOT connect these two pairs together.

Take the red from the bridge pup and connect it to the terminal where the white wire from the same pup used to be. Take the green wire from the bridge pup and connect it to the ground point where the black from the same pup used to be

Take the red wire from the neck pup and connect it to the terminal where the white wire from the same pup used to be. Take the green wire from the neck pup and connect it to where the black wire from the same pup used to be.

Assuming you have done this, and all your soldering is good, it'll work. If it doesn't, sounds like you may have faulty pups.

I've just put DP123s in my Jazz using the stock pots without any probs using the above wiring. Hope this helps.

[BillMason]

I'm about to do this too with a pair of DP123s.

I have a Squier VM fretless jazz.

On Stock:
both pickups have a black and white wire coming from them. The neck black and the bridge black are both soldered onto the back of the Neck volume pot...!

The white from each is soldered onto the respective volume pot, on the little thingy sticking up for that purpose.

Why would both blacks be soldered onto the neck pot? I am able to use the bridge pot to control the volume of the bridge pup, so to my rudimentary understanding of electronics, it doesn't make a lot of sense. All pots are joined by a red wire, so maybe this is carrying the signal from the bridge pickup through the neck pot to the bridge pot??

Anyway, when I solder the Dimarzios - do I solder the red from each pickup to the neck pot as was done by Fender, or do I solder the bridge pup red wire to the bridge pot?

[BillMason]

Never mind - the black wire on the old ones was ground, white was signal. I was thinking like electrical, that their had to be a circuit. :-) I know, I know...

Anyway the dimarzios sound great.

[bgavin]

If the OP is still hunting for a solution, I suggest searching TB for "star ground". It is under a good thread about shielding the bass with copper foil.

Going to a single (star) ground eliminates ground loops and makes an easier mental picture for newbies. Soldering to the pot back runs the risk of damaging the pot from over temperature. Especially if the iron is low wattage and requires a long time to heat the pot.

I have DP123 in my MIM-J fretless. If you want it bright, use 500K volume pots, and a 250k no-load tone pot. These pots put less impedance drag on passive pickups. The no-load tone pot switches completely out of the circuit when dimed, and presents no impedance load of any kind. Straight wire. The no-load pot is a standard Fender part.