Replacing pickups on my Tele - how would you go about this?

Fuengi

Managed to get my order in to Mojo Pickups today before the door slammed shut and the 'Go Away - We're Busy' sign went up for the month  .

I've gone with a humbucker sized Dyna for the neck and a Broadcaster for the bridge. The neck humbucker is currently coil split via the tone pot, obviously the Dyna is not splittable. 

Would you rewire the whole shebang and change out the tone pot? 

I should point out that it's a Burns Tele, not a Fender so everything is accessible under the pick guard. Thus;

Roland

If the switch on the tone pot is two gang then I’d be tempted to use it for series/parallel switching.

As for rewiring and replacing “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”. Personally I usually end up putting in new pots because existing ones crackle or are uneven. Since you’re changing pickup types you might find that you want different capacitor values and treble bleed networks. This might need a bit of experimentation. My first step would be to swap the pickups and play it for a while before deciding.

Fuengi

Roland said:

If the switch on the tone pot is two gang then I’d be tempted to use it for series/parallel switching.

As for rewiring and replacing “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”. Personally I usually end up putting in new pots because existing ones crackle or are uneven. Since you’re changing pickup types you might find that you want different capacitor values and treble bleed networks. This might need a bit of experimentation. My first step would be to swap the pickups and play it for a while before deciding.

Roland said:

If the switch on the tone pot is two gang then I’d be tempted to use it for series/parallel switching.

As for rewiring and replacing “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”. Personally I usually end up putting in new pots because existing ones crackle or are uneven. Since you’re changing pickup types you might find that you want different capacitor values and treble bleed networks. This might need a bit of experimentation. My first step would be to swap the pickups and play it for a while before deciding.

The tone pot, thinking about it, goes from no change to muddy at around midway. Other than that and splitting the humbucker it seems to do nothing.

Roland

New pots then. If you’re replacing one then might as well do both, and the caps

Funkfingers

Consider using a lower value capacitor for the tone control.

.1uF cuts more high frequencies than you might wish. .047, .033 and .022uF may prove more suitable.

The suddenness of the tone control would make sense if it were 1 Meg Ohm.

munckee

Will be interesting to see if better than those entwistle's they sound great.

Fuengi

munckee said:

Will be interesting to see if better than those entwistle's they sound great.

Yeah, it will. I prefer the neck on single coil but not particularly on humbucker mode. The bridge is pretty harsh, in a nice way. 

ICBM

Funkfingers said:

Consider using a lower value capacitor for the tone control.

.1uF cuts more high frequencies than you might wish. .047, .033 and .022uF may prove more suitable.

The suddenness of the tone control would make sense if it were 1 Meg Ohm.

Or if it's linear, which are often mistakenly fitted as tone controls - or sometimes even if it's just a cheap crap log taper, which are made from two sections of linear taper - cheap push-pulls seem to be commonly made like this.

Either way, switching it out for a good quality 250K Log pot should give a useful taper.

I prefer a fairly large tone cap like 0.47uF for a bright Tele-type guitar, but it does require a good pot.

Fuengi

ICBM said:

Funkfingers said:

Consider using a lower value capacitor for the tone control.

.1uF cuts more high frequencies than you might wish. .047, .033 and .022uF may prove more suitable.

The suddenness of the tone control would make sense if it were 1 Meg Ohm.

Or if it's linear, which are often mistakenly fitted as tone controls - or sometimes even if it's just a cheap crap log taper, which are made from two sections of linear taper - cheap push-pulls seem to be commonly made like this.

Either way, switching it out for a good quality 250K Log pot should give a useful taper.

I prefer a fairly large tone cap like 0.47uF for a bright Tele-type guitar, but it does require a good pot.

And where would one buy this stuff from? 

Fuengi

Allparts, to answer my own question   

Next... Which pots to go for? The Dyna would sway me towards 500k or 1meg but the single coil Broadcaster in the bridge will want 250k ? 

I'll have open up the Tele and see what's lurking below the scratch plate. 

Fuengi

Paging @ICBM @Roland @Funkfingers for advice on this birds nest! The cable from the humbucker appears to be a 5 core for some reason. 

What is that thing attached to the tone pot and why has it got two green things stuck to it? 

Funkfingers

Fuengi said:

What is that thing attached to the tone pot and why has it got two green things stuck to it? 

In this photograph, the thing attached to the tone pot that resembles a DPDT on/on switch, is a DPDT on/on switch. You have a push-pull pot. On your circuit, it could coil split the humbucker, reconfigure it between series and parallel modes or reverse the phase relationship between the two pickups.

The green thing on the right, soldered between the outer terminal of the pot and the chassis of the tone pot is the capacitor that determines the roll off frequency of the tone control. There should be legend printed on the other side. The figures represent the value of the capacitor in either pico- or micro-Faradays.

The green thing on the left, bearing the legend 2A104J is another capacitor. The value of 104 pF makes it suitable as a treble bypass capacitor - either on its own or as part of a network involving a resistor.

In this instance, the 104pF has been connected in a highly unusual location. What it does in your circuit depends on where the black insulated wire on the third terminal of the tone pot finishes up.

It is conventional for the input on a passive treble roll off control to arrive at the central terminal. In your circuit, that location is occupied by one leg of the treble bypass capacitor.

As things stand, your tone control appears to be attempting to serve as a simultaneous treble roll off and treble bypass. 




The output cable on the humbucker will involve five wires in the sense of start and end of each coil plus a permanent ground for the metal parts. (The baseplate and a metal cover, if present.)

Funkfingers

Fuengi said:

Would you rewire the whole shebang and change out the tone pot? 

Yes. Your expensive new pickups deserve to be heard. Two new pots. One new selector switch. Probably, one new output jack socket.

ICBM

Funkfingers said:

The green thing on the left, bearing the legend 2A104J is another capacitor. The value of 104 pF makes it suitable as a treble bypass capacitor - either on its own or as part of a network involving a resistor.

In this instance, the 104pF has been connected in a highly unusual location. What it does in your circuit depends on where the black insulated wire on the third terminal of the tone pot finishes up.

It is conventional for the input on a passive treble roll off control to arrive at the central terminal. In your circuit, that location is occupied by one leg of the treble bypass capacitor.

As things stand, your tone control appears to be attempting to serve as a simultaneous treble roll off and treble bypass.

104 is actually a .1uF cap - 10 followed by four zeros, in pF.

It looks like an approximation of the Fender 'Greasebucket' tone circuit, where as the tone control is turned down the second cap is added in series with the first, progressively reducing the effective value. I'm guessing the other cap is also this value, as it looks the same physical size, so the result is .05uF when the control is fully down.

I have really no idea of the purpose of this, since the cap value is almost completely irrelevant when the control is up full, so why not just use the smaller value in the first place in a standard tone circuit, and save the cost of a cap and the labour of wiring it up?! Needless complexity for the sake of it...

andy_k

there are a few guys on e-bay that make pre-wired plates for these things, it can get expensive, but it is worth it to just be able to drop in something that works.
I built a Mcawber / Bonamassa style broadcaster, with a Gibson Paf in the neck and a Mojo broadcaster bridge, and also got a pre wired plate for an Esquire, 3 way for the Broadcaster, and 5 way for the Esquire. I play the Esquire the most.
Best to use good quality pots and switches for these kind of things IMHO.

ICBM

I also forgot to say... having now seen the electrics, the switch and pots - and very likely also the jack - are all complete garbage and best replaced all at the same time with proper quality stuff. The cable from the jack to the volume pot should also be shielded, not two plain wires, otherwise it will be noisier than it could be.

Fuengi

Thanks chaps. I'll order some CTS pots. Never had an issue with the switch or the output jack so may leave them in place for now. 

I'd like to keep things as simple as possible with the wiring for now so will strip this lot out and go again. 

Fuengi

ICBM said:

I also forgot to say... having now seen the electrics, the switch and pots - and very likely also the jack - are all complete garbage and best replaced all at the same time with proper quality stuff. The cable from the jack to the volume pot should also be shielded, not two plain wires, otherwise it will be noisier than it could be.

Posted at the same time so I missed this.

I'll order a new switch and output jack too, plus some cable. Where best to order from? 

ICBM

Any of the usual online vendors should have CTS pots, a CRL switch and a Switchcraft jack. I wouldn’t use anything else normally. I would also get a .047uF (or .05uF) cap and a small amount of shielded cable if you don’t have any.

andy_k

Sorry--missed the fact that it isn't a standard Tele plate, my bad.

prowla

That wiring ain't a pro job, that's for sure!