wire type and gauge

[bass dan]

I'm sure there are a bunch of threads about this , but for some reason I can't find any with the search function.

I have a p-bass pickup with short leads. Can I go to the hardware stor and get what I need? What gauge wire? What type of wire?

 

[K-Frog]

radio shack, hardware store, etc

insulated, stranded copper, 20 or 22 awg should be fine.

 

[96tbird]

Don't forget the heat-shrink!

 

[bass dan]

nice. thank you!

 

[tdub0199]

Make sure you get "stranded" wire....

 

[Jay2U]

Make sure you get "stranded" wire....

...and screened, like a center conductor and a braided screen. Otherwise hum and other electro-magnetic distortion may induce into the wiring.

 

[K-Frog]

...and screened, like a center conductor and a braided screen.

good point. For some reason i was thinking about hook-up wire, not shielded pick-up wire.

 

[bass dan]

so sheilded and screened. hopefully everything is labeled well.

 

[K-Frog]

Same thing, shielded or screened. It's a braid around the main pickup conductor that shields the conductor from interference/noise and serves as the ground for the pickup.

 

[colcifer]

Shielding aside, for that length, it doesn't matter much.

 

[doktorfeelgood]

I've installed prolly 25 after market pups in my playing career and have never seen shielded and/or screened wire leads on passive pickups. EMG used to use wire like that on their pickups 25 years ago but don't have any idea what they use now. Any stranded 22 or 20 AWG wire will do. To keep things straight, get white or red wire for the hot leads and black wire always for the ground leads. Heat shrink tubing is always a good idea when having to splice wire together. There are those in the Professional Audio world that swear that a wire that's been soldered together for extra length will not conduct current the same as one continuous length of wire and cause whatever's being hooked up to sound different, but I could never hear any difference.

 

[K-Frog]

I've installed prolly 25 after market pups in my playing career and have never seen shielded and/or screened wire leads on passive pickups.

ah yes, true. I remembered working with pickups in the past that have shielding, so I readily identified with and echoed that, but most passives I fix or swap are simple 2 or 4 conductor wiring.
Just duplicate whatever you already have when you extend the pickup leads.

 

[bass dan]

will do. I have Fralins in a '57 avri and want to put the original pickup back in. I had someone install the Fralin for me and forgot to ask them to leave the leads on the original pickup as long as possible. He cut one of them pretty short.

 

[96tbird]

P's you off when people do that. Just dumb. It's like slashing a guys stock tires when swapping them out for some performance tires. Anyway since the pickup wires in question are not coaxial, a shield isn't as necessary. One wire is hot and one is ground; where you gonna hook the shield?

 

[bass dan]

STEWMAC.COM : Shielded Push-back Wire - 16 inches. how bout this?

 

[walterw]

not for fender-type pickups.

get some straight-up single-conductor cloth wire from allparts, you can attach it to the ends of the old stuff, or (if you're careful and brave) you can remove the lead from the bobbin and attach a whole new length of wire.

the braided-shield stuff is for traditional gibson pickups.

 

[bass dan]

[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]. This?

 

[walterw]

bingo.

they have white, too.

 

[walterw]

you might find some at a music store with a good guitar tech; why buy a 25' roll when you need like 6"?

 

[bass dan]

good call. Glad I asked, I was just going to go to the hardware store and blindly buy some wire.