Help wiring pickup/preamp

[Eric Penzer]

Hi all. I wonder if anyone can help me. I have a set of Hotwire pickups that have 5 wires - black, red, white, green, yellow. I am trying to connect them to a Lusithand Double NFP preamp. I have no idea what goes where. I asked Hotwire for the wiring diagram and they sent me this description, which I find comically unhelpful:

“dualcoil humbucker

start / black start / red
end / white end / green

series:
red and white soldered together and isolated, black +
green (and yellow) -

parallel:
black and red +
green and white (and yellow) -“

And here is a link to the Lusithand installation instructions.

https://lusithanddevices.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Double-NFP-SPECIAL-manualupdated.pdf

Can anyone help me please?!


Much thanks, in advance!

 

[Crater]

The pickups you bought are not of the "multi-coil" type that the Double NFP Special preamp is designed for. Either use the Double NFP model of preamp, or buy true multi-coil pickups if that was your original intention.

 

[Eric Penzer]

Sorry, posted the wrong photo a link. It’s the Double NFP, not the special!

https://lusithanddevices.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Double-NFP.pdf

 

[Eric Penzer]

 

[Matt Liebenau]

Assuming you want to run the pickups in series, solder the red and white wires together and heat shrink the joint to insulate it. The neck black goes to 1 in the second manual. The neck green and yellow go to 2. The bridge black goes to 3 and the bridge green and yellow go to 4. It sounds like the yellow is a separate shield ground wire so that could alternately be connected to 10 and if the pickups are noisy or act oddly definitely connect the yellow to 10.

 

[Eric Penzer]

Much thanks!

 

[Matt Liebenau]

I thought about that a little more and maybe someone who is more familiar with that preamp will chime in but if you have a multimeter check for an ohm reading between the yellow wire and any of the other 4. If there’s no reading, which should be in the 3-4Kohm range or higher then it’s definitely a ground wire for internal shielding and should probably go on one of the number 10 terminals.

 

[Reedt2000]

@Matt Liebenau is correct. The only thing to maybe add is that with the coils separated on your pickups, you could add series/parallel, or series/single/parallel switches before you hit the preamps.

 

[rojo412]

Which Hotwire pickups are they? Because they do make a multicoil version.
And if it's the Double NFP, not made for them, then you'd have to wire the pickups according to Hotwire's instructions, sending the output from them into the input section of the NFP.

 

[logdrum]

Nunu of Lusithand is very helpful. Do you have his email? He responds very quickly.

No you can't do series wiring here. It's all parallel and goes to the blend board. You can if you want use only one filter.

 

[Reedt2000]

Nunu of Lusithand is very helpful. Do you have his email? He responds very quickly.

No you can't do series wiring here. It's all parallel and goes to the blend board. You can if you want use only one filter.

You can't put the pickups in series with each other. But you can put the coils inside each pickup in series (or parallel, or have it switched before the preamp). The preamp (each preamp respectively) only accepts hot and ground, the OP's pickups are 4 conductor so either they get hard wired in series or parallel, or you can put switches between them and the pre, but whichever you do you have to only send 2 conductors from each to the preamps.

 

[Eric Penzer]

I thought about that a little more and maybe someone who is more familiar with that preamp will chime in but if you have a multimeter check for an ohm reading between the yellow wire and any of the other 4. If there’s no reading, which should be in the 3-4Kohm range or higher then it’s definitely a ground wire for internal shielding and should probably go on one of the number 10 terminals.

Assuming you want to run the pickups in series, solder the red and white wires together and heat shrink the joint to insulate it. The neck black goes to 1 in the second manual. The neck green and yellow go to 2. The bridge black goes to 3 and the bridge green and yellow go to 4. It sounds like the yellow is a separate shield ground wire so that could alternately be connected to 10 and if the pickups are noisy or act oddly definitely connect the yellow to 10.

Worked like a charm, much thanks!

 

[Matt Liebenau]

Worked like a charm, much thanks!

Cool! If you want to experiment in the future you can still add series parallel and single coil switches to the pickups.

How’s that preamp sound? I’ve heard nothing but good things. I might get one for an upcoming build.

 

[Reedt2000]

Nice!

Now pics and sound samples please

 

[Eric Penzer]

It’s great!