help needed (i think something's messed up!)

[edof]

i just swapped pickups on 2 historic les pauls (formerly one had sd aph1 and one had gibson bb 1&2), now the one where i installed bb's sounds right, the one where i installed sd's is acting strange: it adds some sort of "artificial" clipping (the one you'd hear if you were distorting a digital preamp) and the neck pickup sounds like it has a built in compressor (where if i play one string or muted strum it sounds louder than if i play a full chord) - we're talking clean tone here, it's definitely not a pleasant crunch like the one that comes from a tube amp when you dig in. Yes, the pick up are almost as low as they can, yes, the amp is on clean channel, yes, if i plug another lp (with same pickups) on this very setup it sounds right, this r7 does not.
I should mention that i took out the covers from the bb's and installed on the sd's (as i like the look of goldtop better with nickel covers), so i unscrewed a bit the pole screws (just to make them come out of the cover)... and i followed the original 50's wiring it already had, so black wire to pot lug, green+bare to pot, white + red isolated together.

Anyone got a clue of what's going on here?

thanks in advance

[acuralytic]

Re: help needed (i think something's messed up!)

i just swapped pickups on 2 historic les pauls (formerly one had sd aph1 and one had gibson bb 1&2), now the one where i installed bb's sounds right, the one where i installed sd's is acting strange: it adds some sort of "artificial" clipping (the one you'd hear if you were distorting a digital preamp) and the neck pickup sounds like it has a built in compressor (where if i play one string or muted strum it sounds louder than if i play a full chord) - we're talking clean tone here, it's definitely not a pleasant crunch like the one that comes from a tube amp when you dig in. Yes, the pick up are almost as low as they can, yes, the amp is on clean channel, yes, if i plug another lp (with same pickups) on this very setup it sounds right, this r7 does not.
I should mention that i took out the covers from the bb's and installed on the sd's (as i like the look of goldtop better with nickel covers), so i unscrewed a bit the pole screws (just to make them come out of the cover)... and i followed the original 50's wiring it already had, so black wire to pot lug, green+bare to pot, white + red isolated together.

Anyone got a clue of what's going on here?

thanks in advance

make sure red and white are soldered together and then taped with electrical tape and are not shorting anywhere! That should do it, also do u have caps installed on ur tone knobs? or anything like that? did you overheat the pots a bit? it sounds like a bad solder TBH but show a pic and i'll have a better idea. Just resolder it back in and see how it goes. Test the output with a multimeter when it's unsoldered to be sure.

[edof]

Re: help needed (i think something's messed up!)

it's a r7 lp with bumblebee caps 50's wiring... i actually think i've accidentally hit the neck cap, but the same problem shows on bridge pick up too....i'll try and post a pic later. However red and white are already isolated per factory inside a short plastic cord..

[edof]

Re: help needed (i think something's messed up!)

[hermetico]

Re: help needed (i think something's messed up!)

Probably wrong but, to me that cap (first pic) seems to had been in touch with the iron and, maybe it's fried an working bad.

[edof]

Re: help needed (i think something's messed up!)

Probably wrong but, to me that cap (first pic) seems to had been in touch with the iron and, maybe it's fried an working bad.

That is right, i did hit it with the iron... any ways to figure out if i broke it or it's just surface damage? Also, that's the bridge tone cap, but most weirdness happens on neck pickup.. are they connected? i thought they were indipendent.