Had to replace wire "harness", what went wrong?

[Hardtailed]

The pickup is a TB-5 (Custom trembucker), the black wire (the hot wire technically) wasn't working at all (only the red to green coil worked). I tried cutting it and do a new connection, still didn't work, so I decided to simply replace the wire. And I only had a 3-wire spare, but I don't use coil-splitting so what I did, in the pickup itself I soldered together the small wire that used to be connected to the red one with the one that used to be connected to the white one (what you have to do for normal serie operation). And I kept what used to be the black one as the "hot" lead, and what used to be the green one as the ground (inside the pickup itself, the red one is actually black, and the green one is white). The 3rd connector was used to ground the backplate. Every exposed connection was properly covered and secured, just like stock. The back plate with the magnet was put back in the same direction.

Before putting everything back into place, I tested the pickup and both coils were working, so it went back into the guitar for final testing. And then: ultra-weak nasal sound and the low E string is twice as loud as the other ones. Sounds like an out-of-phase kind of problem, but I can't figure out what I did wrong, plus the imbalance between the E string and the other ones doesn't make sense.

Can somebody help me here?

 

[Hardtailed]

Re: Had to replace wire "harness", what went wrong?

I supposed I have to connect it differently, but the whole process of removing the pickup and opening it and putting it back in to test it is a pita, so I'd like to get it right the first time. I did make sure both coils were working before putting it back, but it's hard to test the sound without it being the guitar.

Ok, I'll try to be more precise in my explanation:
When you open the pickup and remove the factory wire harness, each coil has 1 black and 1 white wire. On the north coil (assuming north is the nut, and south is the bridge), those wires were assigned to the black and with on the factory harness, and the south coil was assigned to red and green (respectively).

Since the new harness I was using came from a non-splittable pickup, I had to wire it in serie "from the inside". Looking at the wiring diagrams, they said to solder red and white together and send the green to the ground. So I soldered the white from the first coil with the black from the second coil together, and used the black from the first coil as the "hot" lead, and the white from the second coil was grounded.

One thing that bugged me was that, in order to respect the original color codes, the two wires that had to be soldered together were the ones on each opposite ends (on the outer side of each coil).

Can anyone explain to me what I did wrong, or at least suggest me what I should try next? Thank god, with the tremolo on that specific guitar, removing the pickup can be done fairly easily. I'm just mad because I wanted to use that guitar for tonight's gig, I've worked on it all week long and the bridge p/u is all that's missing now, the neck one (Jazz) works perfectly.

 

[3 cent hero]

Re: Had to replace wire "harness", what went wrong?

solder red and white together and send the green to the ground. So I soldered the white from the first coil with the black from the second coil together, and used the black from the first coil as the "hot" lead, and the white from the second coil was grounded.

this is correct. did you remember to re-attatch the bare wire from the baseplate to ground?

 

[Hardtailed]

Re: Had to replace wire "harness", what went wrong?

this is correct. did you remember to re-attatch the bare wire from the baseplate to ground?

Yes, so basically the baseplate is grounded, the white wire from the north coil (the one with adjustable screws) is grounded, and the black wire from the south coil (fixed pole) is the "hot" lead, connected to the switch.

Note that, to isolate the problem, I disconnected the neck pickup and the tone control, I've also tried bypassing the switch and the volume pot. So if the pickup is out of phase, it's with itself, not with the neck pickup.

So what should I try? Soldering two black leads together and using one white as the hot the other as the ground, or vice versa (soldering both white leads together).

 

[3 cent hero]

Re: Had to replace wire "harness", what went wrong?

sounds to me like you got a faulty pickup. maybe send it to Duncan to see whats up with it?

 

[Hardtailed]

Re: Had to replace wire "harness", what went wrong?

No, it worked fine in the guitar from which I took it (had the thing for 3-4 years, if it was new I would've returned it)

 

[Hardtailed]

Re: Had to replace wire "harness", what went wrong?

Okay, it might not be a wiring problem after all, the pickup was angled too much so I put it in a mounting ring and adjusted the pole pieces better. I've got the full sound back, but now I have a crazy background buzz that's so loud you hear it even while playing?!?! Why oh why!

The backplate is grounded, so is the bridge and the control cavity is covered in conductive paint.... Please help me