curious problem, perhaps warranty issue?

[jsullysix]

hey all, i'd like to pick your brains for a minute.

a friend gave me a duncan custom, and he said that there's something wrong with it. it would seem as if only one of the coils is on, and to get the pickup to funtion correctly, he'd have to squeee the bobbins together.

i'm assuming there's just a bad connection in there somewhere, but have any of you experienced this? and better yet, any idea where to start fixing it?

since i'm not the pickup's original owner, i'm not sure if a warranty would apply to me, either. it looks new, and has the newer styled sticker on the back, so who knows...?

thanks; i'm determined to make this work!

sully

 

[jsullysix]

Re: curious problem, perhaps warranty issue?

a bit more info, if this helps any, is that the reading i get with my multimeter on the grond and black wire is about 7.5, (which should be about 1/2 of what customs normally read at) but with the multimeter on the red and white wire's solder connection, i get a reading of 69.3! that's one hot pickup!

anyway, not sure if that provides any more clues, but i'm hoping i can get to the bottom of this mystery....

sully

 

[tone4days]

Re: curious problem, perhaps warranty issue?

try this

solder the red and white together, then put some electrical tape over the connection in order to protect it from 'shorting out' against anything .. then measure the resistance between green and black wires

dont worry about the '69.3' reading, it was an 'artifact' of the setting on the ohmmeter

also, dont do any more 'squeezing', that is not going to be a good, long term solution to anything, and oculd make things long term worse

cheers
t4d

let us know

 

[jsullysix]

Re: curious problem, perhaps warranty issue?

try this

solder the red and white together, then put some electrical tape over the connection in order to protect it from 'shorting out' against anything .. then measure the resistance between green and black wires

when i got the pickup, the red and white was already soldered together and had shrink tubing on there. that's when i got the first reading on the black wire of 7.5 or so. i'm about to resolder the red and white wires in a second and perhaps that will fix it.

dont worry about the '69.3' reading, it was an 'artifact' of the setting on the ohmmeter

also, dont do any more 'squeezing', that is not going to be a good, long term solution to anything, and oculd make things long term worse

thanks for the tip on the 69.3 rating. i thought it was a little odd, but that's what it kept reading as! i'm not gonna do any more of the proverbial squeezing, but i thought that was an odd way to get it to work.

if i get the same reading again after re-soldering the red and white wires, any thoughts on what could be causing this problem?

 

[jsullysix]

Re: curious problem, perhaps warranty issue?

yep. after resoldering the red and white wires, and taping them out of the way, i still get a reading on the black wire of about 7.5. rats.

 

[tone4days]

Re: curious problem, perhaps warranty issue?

you can either send it back for a repair, or try it yourself ... call them and see what they think and what they'd charge ... if their answer is too $$$$, then you can risk trying it yourself ... now that i've assembled a pickup at UGD, i feel more comfortable about attempting a repair on my own (although the wax potting is daunting a bit) ... it could just be that one of the little wires that connect the coils to the lead came undone .. simple fix if you have a steady hand and good eyes / good light

good luck
t4d