Dead pickup?

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Orangesoda
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Dead pickup?

Post by Orangesoda » Tue Aug 27, 2013 7:25 pm

Just wanted some quick advice cuz I'm a noob. Lemme see if I can make this short lol. Bought a new pickup. It was in USPS box for 2 days(about 100 degrees here). I installed it and it don't work. Could have been my soldering. Checked with the guy that sent me the electronics kit and he said it looks like I did it correctly.

I'm supposed to test the pup with a multimeter by leaving the red and white wires alone (Seymour Duncan) and testing it with the green and black wires.

What settings on the multimeter should I use? What reading should I get?

Idk if this is necessary but the pup is an Alnico 2 Pro, neck pup.

I'll be getting a multimeter from Radio Shack in a bit and I'm gonna test out the pup after work when I get home.

Dave666
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by Dave666 » Tue Aug 27, 2013 8:52 pm

I think the red & white should be tied together if you want to read the pup with your multimeter. (according to the seymour duncan website)
You should read somewhere around 8K (according to the SD website 7.92K)

hope this helps
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Orangesoda
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by Orangesoda » Tue Aug 27, 2013 10:10 pm

Dave666 wrote:I think the red & white should be tied together if you want to read the pup with your multimeter. (according to the seymour duncan website)
You should read somewhere around 8K (according to the SD website 7.92K)

hope this helps
Yes they r tied together. Just got home. About to check it out. Oh boy lol

Orangesoda
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by Orangesoda » Tue Aug 27, 2013 10:45 pm

Dave666 wrote:I think the red & white should be tied together if you want to read the pup with your multimeter. (according to the seymour duncan website)
You should read somewhere around 8K (according to the SD website 7.92K)

hope this helps
So the pup reads 7.4. Maybe my soldering sucks lol

Dave666
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by Dave666 » Wed Aug 28, 2013 3:09 am

In what typre of guitar did you solder this pup?
Is it a 2 vol, 2 tone guitar? Then maybe your volumepot can be broken, happened to me one time (I warmed one of the legs to much and the internal connection came loose)
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Orangesoda
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by Orangesoda » Wed Aug 28, 2013 4:29 am

Dave666 wrote:In what typre of guitar did you solder this pup?
Is it a 2 vol, 2 tone guitar? Then maybe your volumepot can be broken, happened to me one time (I warmed one of the legs to much and the internal connection came loose)
LP copy, 2 vol, 2 tone. I'm a noob at this stuff. I undid the soldering to every wire that has to do with the neck pup and re-soldered and nothing still. I checked the neck pup pots and they look good, nothing is loose, I checked the pup too. Nothing. I tried to go through every minor detail and I can't find the problem.

I contacted the guy that built this harness. He'll prolly reply tomorrow since I emailed him so late. But several opinions can help! :P

irish_admiral
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by irish_admiral » Wed Aug 28, 2013 8:35 am

Take the pickup cables and - if they reach - hold them directly to the hot & ground terminals on the output jack. Plug in a cable and hit the strings.

That'll tell you if it's the pickup or your soldering / volume pot.
Joe

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Orangesoda
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by Orangesoda » Wed Aug 28, 2013 1:58 pm

irish_admiral wrote:Take the pickup cables and - if they reach - hold them directly to the hot & ground terminals on the output jack. Plug in a cable and hit the strings.

That'll tell you if it's the pickup or your soldering / volume pot.
They don't reach actually lol. For some reason they were really short :/.

I emailed the guy and gave him all the details. He says there must be a short somewhere. How do I go about finding a short?

irish_admiral
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by irish_admiral » Wed Aug 28, 2013 2:57 pm

If the cables are too short, get some other lengths of wire or cabling and just touch them together using crocodile clips, electrical tape or whatever so you can extend the pickup wires.

You can trace a short if you know what you're doing, but as you're asking, i'm guessing the answer is no! You basically need to trace the signal path for each pickup and make sure your wiring and soldering is sound.

Just rule things out one at a time - pickup is easiest to do first.


To ask another question, is the pickup which you haven't replaced not working also, or does that work ok in both its normal switch position, and in-between switch position?

Also bear in mind that depending on the brand of pickup you've got, the cables running from it carrying out the different functions sometimes have different colour coding. The supplier should have let you know what each was, or already tied off the ones that needed to be tied off.
Joe

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ironlung40
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by ironlung40 » Wed Aug 28, 2013 4:30 pm

If it is reading that on the meter, then it is not the p'up

Sounds like you have a short in the wiring.

If you are not up for this a tech could do that job for probably no more than $35....provided pots and all are still good. Sometimes it is best to pay for experience, especially if begin to get frustrated with it.

and as Dave said make sure you have the p'up wired right before you install into the guitar.
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Orangesoda
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by Orangesoda » Wed Aug 28, 2013 4:42 pm

irish_admiral wrote:If the cables are too short, get some other lengths of wire or cabling and just touch them together using crocodile clips, electrical tape or whatever so you can extend the pickup wires.

You can trace a short if you know what you're doing, but as you're asking, i'm guessing the answer is no! You basically need to trace the signal path for each pickup and make sure your wiring and soldering is sound.

Just rule things out one at a time - pickup is easiest to do first.


To ask another question, is the pickup which you haven't replaced not working also, or does that work ok in both its normal switch position, and in-between switch position?

Also bear in mind that depending on the brand of pickup you've got, the cables running from it carrying out the different functions sometimes have different colour coding. The supplier should have let you know what each was, or already tied off the ones that needed to be tied off.
Yea I don't exactly know what to do to find a short. I was able to un-solder the pup to find out if it's working and it is. It read 7.4.

The other pup(bridge) I had already bought and had it for a couple of weeks. It's brand new. I installed both of these at the same time. In the bridge position and in the middle position (LP copy) the bridge pup works fine.

For the color coding his instructions were simple and the color coding for his harness was intended to match up with SD pups(my neck pup) so that was a no-brainer.

Orangesoda
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by Orangesoda » Wed Aug 28, 2013 4:45 pm

ironlung40 wrote:If it is reading that on the meter, then it is not the p'up

Sounds like you have a short in the wiring.

If you are not up for this a tech could do that job for probably no more than $35....provided pots and all are still good. Sometimes it is best to pay for experience, especially if begin to get frustrated with it.

and as Dave said make sure you have the p'up wired right before you install into the guitar.
Yea I'm not too sure I could find a short in the wires. I would like to find it myself but might have to take it to a tech. Our bass guy built his own bass and has changed out pups quite a bit and with a couple of guitars. Plus he knows electronics. Might get him to help me out with it. But the putz is lazy. So we'll see lol.

Jondog
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by Jondog » Wed Aug 28, 2013 9:05 pm

Your wiring should look like this, if you haven't checked out already:
http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/wi ... h_2v_2t_3w
You can check your pots by putting your multimeter on the middle and 1 outside lug, the ohm reading should go up and down as you turn the pot, and read the full value of the pot if you put the meter on each outside lug. Double check the switch is wired properly and the lead for the neck pickup isn't touching ground.
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Orangesoda
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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by Orangesoda » Wed Aug 28, 2013 9:36 pm

Jondog wrote:Your wiring should look like this, if you haven't checked out already:
http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/wi ... h_2v_2t_3w
You can check your pots by putting your multimeter on the middle and 1 outside lug, the ohm reading should go up and down as you turn the pot, and read the full value of the pot if you put the meter on each outside lug. Double check the switch is wired properly and the lead for the neck pickup isn't touching ground.
Yea I made sure the wires weren't touching each other.

Thing is my wiring won't look like that lol. The way this harness comes I don't have to hook anything up to the pots. It's only wire to wire soldering. It's made that way.

This might help http://www.jimmypagewiring.com/Installation_Tips.html

But it's simple. The color codes are meant for Seymour Duncan pickups:

Red and white wire from pup are linked together and attach to red wire from harness
Green wire from pup attach to green wire on harness
Black wire from pup to black wire on harness
Bare wire to a green wire labeled Earth that comes from the neck volume

I undid all of these and redid em all. And there's a wire that comes from the switch that is labeled neck volume that goes to a separate wire labeled neck volume that comes from the harness.

I really appreciate the help guys. If I can save a few bucks and gain some experience in the process it's all good!

Edit: The instructions on the website for the switch are wrong. With the harness come new instructions and you no longer have to solder anything to the pots. The wires are all there now. Even the video instructions are outdated. The instructions that come with the harness say *NEW FOR 2013* for the switch instructions.

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Re: Dead pickup?

Post by OrangePaul » Wed Aug 28, 2013 9:59 pm

A few questions spring to mind...

is this a Seymour Duncan pickup we are talking about? Gibson use a different colour code I think..

have you just changed the pickup or pots/harness also?

is the bridge pickup working still?

can you fit the original pup back in there? if so does that still work??
Paul.

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