Trying to put lipstick on a pig.

[MrArose13]

I’m looking for a little help, digging through my shop I came across this pick up



(Pretty sure it’s nothing special… “Yet”).

 

[MrArose13]

close up

 

[MrArose13]

And a P. set



I’m sure neither pick up is anything good but I get a reading on my multi-meter so why not use them. What I’d like to do is put a wood cover on them and install the soap bar in bridge position and the P. pickups in P position (and get a P.H. balance… HA, HA, HA .) The P. pickup looks OK, though I thought about trying to replace the leeds. I’m not sure I should go there. The wire looks ugly and it’s very thin but it’s not brittle. The soap bar/hum bucker appears to be sealed into the cover with wax. How do I get the pickup out? Not to mention I have no idea how to wire them (the blue wire is throwing me off). I’m not trying to do anything complicated just a passive volume-tone-volume-tone set up. Maybe I’ll throw a switch on the soap bar, depending on what I can learn from you guys. I’ll be honest, typically I buy the pickup, read the diagram, and solder. Now the woodworking is not an issue. I build guitars all the time. I just don’t usually mess with the pickups. This is hopefully a useable learning experience. If all goes well, I’ll gain some new skills for my Luthiery bag of tricks. Please offer any and all tips, info, opinions and questions.

 

[MrArose13]

Really... no takers on this goofy project

 

[gnjpowell]

Pickups have leads. Leeds is a city and a metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England, as in The Who's first live album (remember those?) "Live at Leeds", an awesome performance but with terrible technical recording problems and noise (which was from John Entwistle's bass cable). The New York Times acclaimed it as "the best live rock album ever made."
Sorry, couldn't resist...

 

[Lo-E]

As for wiring, the Seymour Duncan website has generic wiring diagrams that may make the wiring clear to you.

It should be pretty simple: Just follow any P pickup wiring diagram for the P and any humbucker diagram for the soap bar.

If you're unsure about the polarity of the soap bar, put an analog ohmmeter across the leads and tap a pole piece with a scribe or small screwdriver. You'll see the needle jump a little bit. When the needle jumps in the same direction for both coils of the soap bar and the P pickup, then everything is in phase and you're good to go.

To unpot the soap bar, try putting it plastic-side down in a warm water bath to soften the wax enough to get it out of the cover. If it is wax, that should do it. If it's hot-melt glue or something.... good luck!

 

[testing1two]

Well, getting the dual coil pickup out of the cover is straightforward enough provided it's actually wax inside and not silicone or epoxy. You can heat the wax with a hairdryer enough to remove the cover (don't try to melt the wax obviously) and then clean off the excess with Naptha. I've heard that you can soak the entire pickup in Naptha and the wax will dissolve but I have no first hand experience with that take that with a grain of salt.

The dual coil wiring is also very straightforward. The two coils can either be hard-wired in series or in parallel, or to a switch. Depending on the type of switch you could potentially choose between series, parallel, and a single coil.

Here are some diagrams to ponder: Invalid Link Removed

 

[MrArose13]

Pickups have leads. Leeds is a city and a metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England, as in The Who's first live album (remember those?) "Live at Leeds", an awesome performance but with terrible technical recording problems and noise (which was from John Entwistle's bass cable). The New York Times acclaimed it as "the best live rock album ever made."
Sorry, couldn't resist...

Yes I remember, I'm not that old and I'm not that yong , but I did not know that piece of info. Thank you for the spell check.

As for wiring, the Seymour Duncan website has generic wiring diagrams that may make the wiring clear to you.

If you're unsure about the polarity of the soap bar, put an analog ohmmeter across the leads and tap a pole piece with a scribe or small screwdriver. You'll see the needle jump a little bit. When the needle jumps in the same direction for both coils of the soap bar and the P pickup, then everything is in phase and you're good to go.

To unpot the soap bar, try putting it plastic-side down in a warm water bath to soften the wax enough to get it out of the cover. If it is wax, that should do it. If it's hot-melt glue or something.... good luck!

thanks for the info. I got the P pickup worked out

I looked at Seymour, (I know this is sad ) But the color coding is thrwing me off. I don't have an analog ohmmeter, only a digital multi-meter. So I'm not sure what's ground, what"s hot, should something be spliced, etcetera. I'm guessing the white wire on the brass plate is just a ground for shielding perpossess. as you might see, I'm totllay lost with this soap bar . But I'm learning something new .

 

[MrArose13]

Thanks, testing1two that will help.

It's that blue wire that's driving me mad, who uses a blue wire.

 

[MrArose13]

O.K. here’s what I’ve come up with, tell me what-ch think.

First, The P. pup is pretty straight forward as mentioned (I was just thinking about putting new “lead” wire on it to go with the fancy new covers I’ll be building to make it all nice and clean looking. If someone can tell me how to do that without making a mess of things, I still might) with a volume and tone pot, unless someone knows something cool to do with it that I don’t.

Second, the soapbar that’s been driving me mad for a while now, (even before I sought out help). I’m almost positive it’s wax; it compressed and flaked when scratched with my awl, just like a candle would. So now it’s back to the wires. (Again I ask, who uses blue wire?) Not sure how to test this short of wiring the whole thing up, but, assuming red = white and BLUE = black I figure I’ll wire the one Soapbar like Two J bass pups with a series/parallel switch ([Invalid or Expired Link Removed]) or try to think of it as a humbucker and decipher the code,( not sure how to do that). I’m thinking something like this ([Invalid or Expired Link Removed]) with a series/split/parallel switch. Am I at least on the right track?

 

[MrArose13]

Already messing with this humbucker this morning, it’s all coming together. As far as getting it out of the cover goes, it’s a trifle hot in Atlanta, GA today, so I thought I’d stick it out in the sun (cover up) on a piece of aluminum foil wile typing up this post and drinking my morning coffee. Definitely wax, it’s already started to soften.

I had to think of it like a guitar humbucker, stop looking at the color of the wire and think “north start/finish and south start/finish” and try a few things with my multi-meter. After tying the north finish together with the south start, I poked the north start and south finish with the multi-meter and got a reading of 11.55 OHMS (and my P set read 15.22).

If anyone thinks these wouldn’t go together in my PH balance idea please voice your opinion with explanation, this is a chance to increase my knowledge of instrument electronics. One of the reasons I chose to do this goofy project, and I plan to build a whole “RECICLED” bass around these pups.

At this point I’m only questioning the ground. (oh… just popped the cover off, that sun did the trick). Will the pup be grounded in the circuit or is the brass plate with white wire necessary for ground? (Equivalent to bare wire) Or is just shielding?

 

[Lo-E]

Measure the coils in the soap bar individually first. The separate coils should measure about half of what the two coils measure together in series.

Series is most probably the way you'd want to go with that soap bar because you'll get a better balance when the bridge p'up is hotter than the neck p'up.

15K is pretty hot for a neck p'up. It's not a deal-breaker, but you'll probably need to sink the P p'up way down into the body and get the humbucker really close to the strings to get a decent balance.

 

[testing1two]

Don't get too caught up in DC resistance numbers as a measure of output. Without knowing the type & strength of the magnets and the diameter & number of turns of wire the DC resistance number has no context. In terms of series/parallel I would wire it to a switch at least temporarily so I could see which mode sounded better or if both sounds were usable and the switch should be mounted permanently.

As far as the two pickups blending together, that's what 2 volume controls are for. If it were me, I would wire up two volumes and a master tone control, a 3 way pickup switch and a series/parallel/single coil switch for the bridge pickup.

 

[testing1two]

Oh, and that baseplate is a shield but it also increases the strength of the magnets slightly (baseplates are pretty common on Strat & Tele bridge pickups). You definitely want to put it back on. It's held against the bottom magnets with wax. Then solder the wire to ground.

 

[bassbenj]

O.K. here’s what I’ve come up with, tell me what-ch think.

First, The P. pup is pretty straight forward as mentioned (I was just thinking about putting new “lead” wire on it to go with the fancy new covers I’ll be building to make it all nice and clean looking. If someone can tell me how to do that without making a mess of things, I still might) with a volume and tone pot, unless someone knows something cool to do with it that I don’t.

The P pickup set ought to be pretty straight forward. It's probably already wired correctly with the nasty old wires.

You'll want to replace those wires if you can. And that depends on the basic arrangement in the pickup. If the wires are soldered into little eyelets or pegs on the bottom of the pickups then just heat the wires there (try to be fast and use only the minimum heat necessary to pull the lead out of the eyelet if it's poked in there because there is a VERY thin wire soldered on the other side of the eyelet and if it comes loose putting it back can be a major nightmare.) Strip the end of the new wire and just tack it onto the eyelet or peg with solder. I wouldn't even try to poke it back down the eyelet or peg where the old one was.

That is if things go well. Otherwise you will see the leads simply disappearing into the potting. This is bad. In that case I wouldn't try to put new wires on but rather just strip the old ratty insulation off the wires and slip "spaghetti" as it's called over them or small diameter shrink tube and shrink it down with a hair dryer to replace the old insulation. The looped wire between the pickups will have to be cut and spliced back together in this case.

For my P-bass I added a push-pull volume control that switches the two halves of the P pickup from series to parallel. Parallel is normal and gives the best sound, but sometimes the brighter, thinner parallel sound is an interesting variation in tone. Just an idea.

 

[bassbenj]

O.K. here’s what I’ve come up with, tell me what-ch think.

Second, the soapbar that’s been driving me mad for a while now, (even before I sought out help). I’m almost positive it’s wax; it compressed and flaked when scratched with my awl, just like a candle would. So now it’s back to the wires. (Again I ask, who uses blue wire?) Not sure how to test this short of wiring the whole thing up, but, assuming red = white and BLUE = black I figure I’ll wire the one Soapbar like Two J bass pups with a series/parallel switch ([Invalid or Expired Link Removed]) or try to think of it as a humbucker and decipher the code,( not sure how to do that). I’m thinking something like this ([Invalid or Expired Link Removed]) with a series/split/parallel switch. Am I at least on the right track?

This should be pretty straight forward. There are two coils and each has a "hot" and a "return" wire. I presume the red wires are "hot" for each coil.

If you look at your Seymour Duncan diagram you have the following: Green is "return" on one coil and Red is "hot" on that same coil. Also white is "return" on the other coil and black is "hot" on that other coil. This is completely like yours only you have only two colors of wire. On yours I'd guess red is hot for a given coil and the dark wire is "return" for that same coil. And that switch can be separate or push-pull on a volume pot (Stew-Mac)

That is pretty much it except for one catch. You need to be sure of polarity. Basically it's simple. If the pickup hums like mad then ONE of the coil wire pairs needs to be reversed. (put Red where the dark was and dark where the red was) I doubt this will be necessary, but you never know.

Good Luck!

 

[MrArose13]

Thanks guys. You are being very helpfull and I really appreciate it.

testing1two - I hadn't thought of a 3 way pickup switch. I like the idea. I feel you see where I'm going with this. Although, I like a volume and tone pot on each pickup.

Lo-E - I did, and they were. good lookn out.

I plan on putting wood covers on these, So... with the Ps being so hot would it be a bad idea to cover the poles to try to balance it out?
Isn't the bridge usually the hotter pick up?

I'm sure I'll have another question be for the day's over.

Agian, Thanks you guys For being so helpful.

 

[MrArose13]

bassbenj - you are correct. The Ps are good just the way thay are (even the wire color... Ha,Ha,Ha ) thay just look bad. Although they're not brittle now, they look as though they will be in a few more years and I would love to replace/repair them.

Oddly enough, there's no eyelets or pegs. The wire comes right out from under the coil tape (which looks good so I didn't go digging) and through the bobbin. Easy fix, yes? Just so I can do it right/learn. How do I do it?

 

[Lo-E]

Oh, and that baseplate is a shield but it also increases the strength of the magnets slightly. You definitely want to put it back on. It's held against the bottom magnets with wax. Then solder the wire to ground.

It is, in fact, a shield and it should be put back on and wired to ground as testing1two pointed out, but if it's brass, which it appears to be, it will have no effect whatsoever on the magnetic field or the strength of the magnet.

@OP - covering the pole pieces with a non-magnetic material such as wood will not effect the performance of the pickup at all. Go for it!

 

[MrArose13]

It is, in fact, a shield and it should be put back on and wired to ground as testing1two pointed out, but if it's brass, which it appears to be, it will have no effect whatsoever on the magnetic field or the strength of the magnet.

@OP - covering the pole pieces with a non-magnetic material such as wood will not effect the performance of the pickup at all. Go for it!

Thanks Lo-E. these will be my first wooden covers, so that would make things easier for my first attempt. I like that look you get too, after the first ones are done, i'll make some with the poles showing. I now over in the LC. there's some tone controversy with covering the poles.

Any words on replaceing the wire on the Ps?

Would a Pic help?

What if I replace the brass plate with something else, would that increases the strength of the magnets? If not for this project, then for future knowledge.