Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by ChickenboneJohn on January 11, 2016 at 4:24am

Why are you trying to solder 6 (six!!!) wires to one lug? Have I taken the bait that this is a joke?

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Permalink Reply by JL on January 11, 2016 at 6:29am

maybe it only felt like 6, lets see, pup ground, volume pot signal ground, volume pot body ground, tone pot cap out to ground, tone pot body ground, jack ground, and bridge ground if using a mag-pup, that's 6 or 7 things to ground. 

I have seen diagrams to "daisy chain" them, solder the pup ground to the volume body pot, then another wire to the volume pup ground lug, then another to the tone body, then another to the tone pot cap out to ground, then another to the jack ground, but that means there are 5 solder connections between the pup ground and the jack ground, and I have seen a LOT of comments on CBNation about suspect cold solder joints being the cause of the problem.

so I instead run a ground lead out for everything, and twist them together and add solder for the 6 or 7 wires.  I find it easier to track against the wiring diagram, easier to actually hold wire/component/solder/iron when it's not several, and easier to troubleshoot and easier to replace a component if each solder point has only 1 wire.

just me trying to keep the torellian brain leaches happy

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Permalink Reply by JL on January 12, 2016 at 3:46am

oh, and forgot the 2 pup shielding wires that needed to be grounded, that makes 8-9 grounds to tie together.

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Permalink Reply by Diglydog on January 11, 2016 at 6:43am

I generally bend the ground tab back and solder it to the body - no wires.  Similarly, bridge the tone cap from the ground tab to the tone body.  That removes 2 of the 5 ground wires on your diagram.  On that diagram, I'd ground the pup and the tone body to the volume body and then ground that to the jack.  That means that you have 3 wires soldered to the vol pot body, which isn't a problem.

I think that, as long as you don't incorporate loops in the ground circuit, you're OK.  Your diagram shows a loop on the tone and vol pots.  I'm not sure why loops may cause problems but I've been advised against them.  Problems with soldered joints are more likely to be a result of poor soldering.  Good luck !

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Permalink Reply by JL on January 12, 2016 at 3:43am

you see a ground loop in the diagram?

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Permalink Reply by Thumper on January 11, 2016 at 7:23am

Please explain the grounding method, I've been running a wire from the jack to the metal tailstock.

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Permalink Reply by Thumper on January 11, 2016 at 7:44am

Wayfinder, if I ground the jack aren't I grounding the entire system? If not, how do I ground a piezo, it only has 2 wires????... t hrough the volume pot ground going to the jack ground?thanx for the input on the tailpiece method.

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Permalink Reply by ChickenboneJohn on January 11, 2016 at 7:49am

All pickups have a "hot" and a "ground" wire, whether they are piezo or magnetic.  Some magnetic pickups have multiple conductors, for example in humbuckers, each coil may have a hot  and ground wire allowing various configurations to be switched , such as full humbucking, single coil, out of phase etc.

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Permalink Reply by ChickenboneJohn on January 11, 2016 at 7:42am

Running multiple grounds is crazily over-complicated: there's even more stuff to go bad. Keep it simple, do it like the pros...just take look inside any decent electric guitar and copy that, and learn how to do a good solder joint. Here's a Seymour Duncan layout...not quite how I do it, but simple and effective.

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Permalink Reply by Thumper on January 11, 2016 at 12:19pm

Thank you all...I now feel my guesses are "grounded" with logic LOL.

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Permalink Reply by JL on January 12, 2016 at 4:41am

I know a lot of mass-produced instruments are wired like that, using the body of the volume pot as a common ground connection point, but have you ever tried to replace a failed volume pot that was wired like that?  pain in the output! 

they do that because every inch of copper wire they can shortcut saves $$$/day in profit when mass producing hundreds per day. 

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Permalink Reply by darryl kernaghan on January 12, 2016 at 5:34am

Many ways to skin this cat,but even if you DO need to attach 6 wires to the back of a pot,tin your pot with a healthy spot of solder,join and solder your earth wires together,then introduce the combined wires to your tinned pot with a bit of heat,just make it fluid and all done,everything clean and you should not need to inflict excess heat on the pot

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