Help and advice appreciated, Hot rails in wrong place and pots wired wrong ?

[yamaha1962]

Please look at the photographs ! Hi, I have a Squire Strat with Hot Rails, when I select bridge+ middle or neck+middle, the resistance measured at the jack drops to 7.5 ohm. The individual pups measured at the switch and the Jack read, Bridge(11.74) Middle(22.94).....labeled as "Bridge" on the pup !!!! Neck(11.82).
I have measured my Affinity Squire Strat and the resistance doubles as you would expect, when combining two pups, eg Middle(7.5ohms)middle and bride (15ohms).
Why doesn`t my hot Rails double when combining two pups ?. I have heard that they are wired wrong from factory so have included photos of the the pups, pots and switch. Can anyone help me ?

John.

 

[AlexR]

Re: Help and advice appreciated, Hot rails in wrong place and pots wired wrong ?

Does it sound ok??....is it very thin and weak in 2 and 4. The only thing that could be 'wrong' is the pickups are out of phase, but that wouldn't necessarily change the resistance.

I mean if the neck and middle are untouched yet you've still got the resistance drop then perhaps thats the way this guitar is.

Also, there should be the pot (250k) in that reading too.

 

[yamaha1962]

Re: Help and advice appreciated, Hot rails in wrong place and pots wired wrong ?

The bridge pickup has been put in the middle by the factory !, I will put it in the bride now. I have to resolder the green wires in the correct place. Where do they swap to ? and does the wiring to the pots look okay ?. The sound was quite muddy. I noticed that it is wired differently to my other strat.

 

[AlexR]

Re: Help and advice appreciated, Hot rails in wrong place and pots wired wrong ?

Who wired the pickups in??

I don't know of any fender that comes stock with 3x hotrails as stock, let alone a squire. Who knows, maybe this is a special model.
You just need to swap the green wires from the middle and bridge pickups on the switch.

Another funny issue - usually SD's are wired with black to the switch and green to ground. It won't make any difference unless you want to split the pickups, where it will go to the opposite coil to normal.

 

[Artie]

Re: Help and advice appreciated, Hot rails in wrong place and pots wired wrong ?

Two resistors wired in parallel, assuming they're the same, will read half of the total resistance. So, two 10k resistors would read as 5k. Your readings sound normal to me. I also assume those readings are in "k". (thousands)

 

[robrob2]

Re: Help and advice appreciated, Hot rails in wrong place and pots wired wrong ?

Your pickups when combined are in parallel so your resistance measurement is just what's expected (11.7k + 22.9k in parallel = 7.8k). Unless your guitar sounds bad in bridge + mid or mid + neck your guitar is perfectly normal. If your guitar sounds good I would not recommend moving the pickups around because you'll probably mess up your magnetic phase.

 

[Funkfingers]

Re: Help and advice appreciated, Hot rails in wrong place and pots wired wrong ?

The good news is that Korean or Indonesian Squier guitars have generous lengths of cable left on the pickups. Changing the positions of two pickups should be simple.

The statistics given by robrob tell part of the story. When dual coil pickups are combined in parallel, the volume drop often seems greater than would be expected from two single coils in an otherwise identical circuit. Also, two coils produce frequency cancellation effects in a way that four coils do not.

Two other possible explanations for the unexpected volume drop in selector switch positions 2 and 4;
1) A defect inside the switch.
2) The centre pickup has been adjusted very low to compensate for being much more powerful than the other two.

 

[robrob2]

Re: Help and advice appreciated, Hot rails in wrong place and pots wired wrong ?

Funkfingers, the OP said nothing of a volume drop, just some muddiness.

Yamaha1962, your 3 humbuckers are wired in series (red and white soldered together) which is the norm. There is no provision for auto-splitting the coils in the 2 & 4 position so you don't have to worry about magnetic phase. Whoever installed the pickups did reverse the green and black wires but since all 3 pickups are wired that way there is no problem. Be sure and swap the two green wires when you move the pickups so the selector switch functions correctly. Also reset your pickup heights after you move the pickups--the height can affect perceived "muddiness."