As I recall the pickup wires have nothing to do with the molex

[357mag]

Many years ago when I traced the wires in one of my Epiphone Les Pauls I thought I discovered that you do not need to remove the molex. Because the wires going to the molex come from the toggle switch, not the pickups. So in order to change pickups in an Epiphone Les Paul you merely need to desolder the ground wire on top of the pot and the hot wire from the lug and install the new pickups and resolder the wires in the same places.

Has anyone else determined this to be so?

 

[Mincer]

I would need to see pics of the wiring in question- it has been awhile since I've seen an Epi's guts.

 

[Jack_TriPpEr]

Many years ago when I traced the wires in one of my Epiphone Les Pauls I thought I discovered that you do not need to remove the molex. Because the wires going to the molex come from the toggle switch, not the pickups. So in order to change pickups in an Epiphone Les Paul you merely need to desolder the ground wire on top of the pot and the hot wire from the lug and install the new pickups and resolder the wires in the same places.

Has anyone else determined this to be so?

When i owned a Year 2004 Epiphone Les Paul Classic Quilt Top a few years back, i also made a sketch of the original wiring. Dug it up in my folder of paper diagrams and took a look for you.

Yes, the Hot and Cold wires from each pup only get attached to the Hot Input and Back Of Pot of their respective volume pots. None of the other wiring like the molex connections needs to be changed.