Fender/DiMarzio PJ wiring problem

[pbassnut]

I have a USA Custom Guitars parts Precision that had a set of DiMarzio DP 126 P+J pickups when I got it. The depth of tone of the DiMarzio P pickup was a bit of a mismatch with the inherently deep sounding mahogany body on the bass so I decided to replace it with a Fender Original '62 Precision pickup in an effort to get more midrange response. A good buddy of mine (who is not a professional bass repairman, but has successfully installed several pickups for me in the past) swapped the Fender for the DiMarzio P pickup by soldering the two leads from the Fender pickup to the same two points on the volume pot that the DiMarzio was soldered to. The result is kind of weird. The Fender P pickup by itself sounds WONDERFUL and the added midrange response this pickup has compared to the DiMarzio turned out to be just the ticket. However, with both pickups full on, the sound is VERY thin and quite frankly, unusable. I am well aware of the typical phase cancellation that takes place when two pickups are run wide open ... the original DP 126 P+J set on this bass thinned out when both pickups were wide open, only it was a decent and very usable tone. When I back the DiMarzio bridge pickup back about a quarter turn, the sound opens up and becomes useable again. I know the DiMarzio DP 126 P+J set has series/parallel wiring options ... could this be some kind of series/parallel mismatch problem? Anybody ever pair these two pickups together successfully? ... I wonder if they are just plain incompatible. Any ideas? Thanks!

 

[-=DanAtkinson=-]

Those should work fine together. They are both split pickups. Have you tried reversing the red and green wires on the bridge pickup?

 

[pbassnut]

Those should work fine together. They are both split pickups. Have you tried reversing the red and green wires on the bridge pickup?

Thanks for the quick response, Dan ... No, I have not tried reversing the red and green wires on the DiMarzio bridge pickup. What would that do? I recently acquired a bridge position Fender Noiseless Jazz pickup from a fellow TalkBasser (Thanks, TMAX!) and am considering replacing the DiMarzio Jazz pickup with it. What do you think of that combination and is there anything special I should know installation-wise to make that Noiseless Jazz pickup "play nicely" with the Fender Original '62 Precision pickup that was recently installed on that bass?

 

[Koeda]

Zombie confirm of this.
Parting together an original style Frankin' Franklin with a '98 MIA P Pickup and a Model J. Using a 3-way switch with stock standard P and Standard Model J wiring (series R+ B&W G-). Tap test prior to stringing up all good. Once strung the EA with both pup's on out of phase. DG sounded great. DiMarzio PJ work nicely together and do not exhibit this common mixed PJ phase problem.
Wired originally like this (with a three way):
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
Was late when strung last night so will address later. Am guessing will reverse the wires on the EA side of the P to see how it is.
Like this older SD:
Invalid Link Removed
Or have also seen - reverse the EA side of the Model J for it to be out of phase? ie make black the output and connect white to red (series B+ R&W G-).
Not sure which is best....
More later -

 

[walterw]

for the OP, just reverse the red and green wires of the bridge pickup and all will be well. maybe too late now, but i'd take the dimarzio over the fender noiseless any day.

for koeda, yeah, you've got some split pairs out of polarity with each other.

weird, because you should be getting hum from an individual pickup if its pickup coils are not right with each other.

fire up some overdrive or something, and see if either the P or the J has more hum; if one is humming, then flip the wires of that one's coil.

 

[Koeda]

Thanks Walter -
I am guessing the op had his pup's wired the standard way for both pups individually - so as stated by us both each solo'd soud great. Not sure w/op but for me only the EA were out of phase when both pups on. Thought I would get some clarity with a beer after practice last night by taking out the compas, but that (and the beer) seemed to make it less clear...

Here is what I found for polarity of my basses -
Fender P (orig 62's)
N S
Franken' Franklin
N S (Fender P)
N S (Model J)
Dimarzio PJ (DP126)
S N
N S
DiMarzio Area J
N S
N S
Assuming Fender convention that winds the P's CW for the South side and CCW for the North side. Was left scratching my head trying to figure this out.[DEL] Leaning to swapping the EA side of the Model J's wires and see how it sounds (series B+ R&W G-). Here is the diagram of what I have now.[/DEL] Update: Ended up swapping the wires on the P - below is now the final updated wiring diagram. Tried to copy the switching on the original Tony Franklin and the pots of the current Tony Franklin. We know his worked (and now mine rocks too!), but can't see how the individual pup's are wired between each other.

On his site - we can see the Red and Green from the Model J, White and Black from the P but that's it.

Won't be able to get in there for a day or two, was hoping to play it tonight but will have to wait til next week.

 

[walterw]

magnetism is one thing, but wire direction is the other; thing is, with these split-coil pickups where both coils of one pickup never sense the same string, you could have a coil wired backwards and the pickup will still sound fine by itself. it'll just not hum-cancel anymore.

it also doesn't matter if a neck or bridge pickup is N or S under a given string, as long as the two pickups produce output in the same polarity (like a vintage J bass pair, one entirely N and the other S).

the fact that both your pickup coil pairs are opposite polarity from their "partners" is good, it means you didn't somehow get stuck with two "N" or two "S" coils in one pickup.

i still think you should listen for more hum from one pickup or the other, that might mean a backwards-wired coil on that pickup.

the pickup that hums has a backwards-wired coil under the two strings that don't sound right.

 

[Koeda]

Again good points, the wire direction was what was causing the head scratching last night (or was it the beer?). Both the pup's when solo'd sound outstanding and dead quite, so am going to conclude they are wound correctly.

Me thinks one of the North coils need to have the wires direction swapped. Since the South coils sound fine on all accounts solo'd or together, I think if we swapped the wires at the switch end we would throw the south coils out of phase. That would be the easy one to try, so may start there to confirm suspicions.

Stick mostly to the P side on my fretted, but this one is now defretted so it made the quandry on which one to swap muddier. Do have an issue with single coils in the city so am guessing the switch will cause some unwanted hum on the pup of the coil we reverse ???

 

[walterw]

...am guessing the switch will cause some unwanted hum on the pup of the coil we reverse ???

that's just it; you should get hum-canceling and everything sounding right!

i don't see how it's physically possible that these RWRP pickup pairs can be both hum-canceling by themselves and not perfectly in phase with the other pickup. the one that's "wrong" should already be humming, and flipping it will make both the hum and the sound "right".

we've got "1+1=3" here.

 

[iiipopes]

It's not just the wiring. It's the polarity of the magnets have to match as well for optimum noise & hum reduction.

I used a DiMarzio Ultra Jazz with a Rickenbacker HB-1 in my custom half-fanned P/J bass. In order to get the right phase relationship both magnetically and polarity, I had to try all four permutations of which color wire was the "hot" lead to find the combination of wiring that was compatable with the HB-1.

A simple swap of the wires was all that was necessary to get the polarity fixed so the DiMarzio would sound good with the Fender.

 

[walterw]

It's not just the wiring. It's the polarity of the magnets have to match as well for optimum noise & hum reduction.

i dunno about that one.

RW/RP means that the two coils of each pickup create the actual signal in the same "direction"; as such, it shouldn't matter which one is under which string.

 

[Koeda]

Well first thing I tried did the trick. Swapped the wires of the P under the EA strings. Fixed the phase issue as guessed, but to my suprise stayed silent. Choose this because saw one drawn up on a old PJ Special and have the grounding plate & foil on pickguard for shielding. Case closed.

 

[iiipopes]

i dunno about that one.

RW/RP means that the two coils of each pickup create the actual signal in the same "direction"; as such, it shouldn't matter which one is under which string.

I meant pickup-to-pickup and match the coil to the magnet. Of course I didn't mean match from the stand point of everything going the same direction.

SHEEZ!!! Can't anybody take anything in the context in which it is written?!!!

How many out there besides me have actually studied the original patent diagrams like I have to make sure that the pickups have the proper wiring and magnet directions; How many out there actually keep a reference chart of various manufacturers' color-coding so that when presented with a repair scenario will hook it up correctly instead of reflexively simply going color-to-color, when they all do it differently; How many folks out there actually remember Larry DiMarzio's and Seymour Duncan's first advertisements in Guitar Player (decades before Bass Player magazine split off) magazine, and can dig them out of storage if you really want to see them?

SHEEZ!!!

 

[Koeda]

How many out there besides me have actually studied the original patent diagrams like I have to make sure that the pickups have the proper wiring and magnet directions; How many out there actually keep a reference chart of various manufacturers' color-coding so that when presented with a repair scenario will hook it up correctly instead of reflexively simply going color-to-color, when they all do it differently;

Thanks for the comments, for future ref and relief of me scratching head... can I tap on some of them studies of yours?

Was my assuming Fender convention that winds the P's CW for the South side and CCW for the North side correct?

For the Model P's and J's, can get the polarity, but can't figure how they are wound, is that something you can fill in for me? Seems the DiMarzio's play nice with each other no matter how they are placed.

 

[PawleeP]

need a neck j pup (split coil) with provision to wire ser-par (4 wires identified) to a dpdt! anyone have one? probably don't want an area j...

 

[ricardol]

It's not just the wiring. It's the polarity of the magnets have to match as well for optimum noise & hum reduction.

I used a DiMarzio Ultra Jazz with a Rickenbacker HB-1 in my custom half-fanned P/J bass. In order to get the right phase relationship both magnetically and polarity, I had to try all four permutations of which color wire was the "hot" lead to find the combination of wiring that was compatable with the HB-1.

A simple swap of the wires was all that was necessary to get the polarity fixed so the DiMarzio would sound good with the Fender.

I bought a second hand 7jaguar Player Series that had the original controls replaced by previous owner to Volume, PU balance, Tone:

Bridge PU: DiMarzio UltraJazz (installed by previous owner);
Neck PU: CUSTOM SHOP '62 PU (according to previous owner);
The wiring diagram is the following:

You can see that red is connected to ground and green to the blend pot.
Previous owner said he tried several connections before settling on this one.