Vintage Ibanez Pro Line Pickup Replacement

[PedalBob]

Hi Everyone ...

New to this forum ... I'm more of an Amp and Pedal builder so have a pretty basic (maybe silly !) question relative to pickups ... I have a mid 1980's Ibanez Pro Line strat looking guitar. It is the model with the standard 5 way knife switch and also 5 little push buttons that can over-ride the 5-way switch to also select pickups individually a combination. The Neck and Middle pickups are single coil with 3 wires red, white and a shield. I would like to replace them with something more start sounding ... looking at Seymour Duncan STK-S4 or similar but they have what look to be 4 wires white, red, black and a bare (shield ?). What is best way to go about figuring which should replace which on the Ibanez and what to do with the extra wire. Best wiring diagram I have found for my Ibanez is attached. The Gray wire in the diagram is the shield. The bottom blue rectangle is the PCB that the 5 push buttons are on .... above that is obviously the 5 way switch.
Thanks for any help or advice !

Bob

 

[Ashurbanipal]

Welcome to the forum, and congrats on the guitar. This switching system was installed on the bolt-on 1770 and neck through 2550 models. I have a gold 1770 and went through this process.

The oem singles are red = hot, white = cold, bare = ground. I never quite figured out what the bare wire was for as it doesn't seem to be connected to the innards of the pu, maybe as a general shield of the red and white in their casing *shrug*.

You can see in the diagram that the pups are actually wired to the pcb, and the right-most terminals of the 5 way are grounds. I think the red and white of the neck pu is reversed as it might be rwrp from the factory. I can't recall this sonically, was too long ago!

Transposing Ibanez to SD:

Ibz red = Duncan black
Ibz white = Duncan red/white
Ibz bare = Duncan green/bare

Pups like the STK have two coils, hence the four wires (plus ground), so to follow the Ibanez scheme, solder the blacks to the respective pcb terminals, red/white together and taped off, green/bare to ground.

What I don't know is whether there is a difference in polarity b/w the Duncans and stock, so you may have to reverse the hots and grounds somewhere unless you want out of phase sounds.

 

[Mincer]

BTW, these were very cool guitars, and I remember seeing the ads in the guitar mags. I always wanted one.

 

[Ashurbanipal]

^^ If you can get your hands on one (even just to try), Dave, you should give them a whirl. Basically they were Prestige equivalent guitars of the day. The neck is similar to the Ultra that was later used in the Radius.

I'm still hankering for a few in the range, just because, not that I necessarily need them . But I was stupid and didn't pull the trigger when nobody cared about them much and they were going for $500 or less.

 

[Mincer]

Man, the Radius was a fantastic guitar, too.

 

[PedalBob]

Thanks everybody for the feedback .!!.. long story but I bought this guitar from a guy I sat next to at work who actually was a phenomenal Chet Atkins type fingerstyle player and had a bunch of Gretsch guitars ... this was in like 1989 ... his brother in law had bought the Ibanez new thinking he would learn to play and gave up after a few months ... he also had an Ibanez pedalboard with about 6 Ibanez pedals of the day ... I was young and didn't have a lot of money but I bought the guitar for $300 which was a deal but a lot of money to me then (I still kick myself for not buying the pedals too !) ... I gigged with it for a few years until I got married and had kids ... I never liked how the neck or middle pickups sounded but they worked for what we were doing back then ... fast forward and now I am into tinkering with everything and I want to make it sound better. Thanks again for the help and I will let you know how it turns out and post some pictures. I have always loved the neck of this guitar ... it hase a rosewood fretboard and jumbo frets and no finish on the back of the neck ... plays like nothing else I have ever owned.

 

[Mincer]

Now you gotta post a pic of this thing!

 

[Masta' C]

Man, the Radius was a fantastic guitar, too.

Heck yeah! LOVE me some Ibanez Radius

 

[Ashurbanipal]

I've said it before, I'll say it again – Ibanez should do a Genesis reissue of a 540R. Not everybody likes the JS, and lots of people prefer pu options besides HH, the Ultra neck, and some of the colours they came in.

Thanks everybody for the feedback .!!.. long story but I bought this guitar from a guy I sat next to at work who actually was a phenomenal Chet Atkins type fingerstyle player and had a bunch of Gretsch guitars ... this was in like 1989 ... his brother in law had bought the Ibanez new thinking he would learn to play and gave up after a few months ... he also had an Ibanez pedalboard with about 6 Ibanez pedals of the day ... I was young and didn't have a lot of money but I bought the guitar for $300 which was a deal but a lot of money to me then (I still kick myself for not buying the pedals too !) ... I gigged with it for a few years until I got married and had kids ... I never liked how the neck or middle pickups sounded but they worked for what we were doing back then ... fast forward and now I am into tinkering with everything and I want to make it sound better. Thanks again for the help and I will let you know how it turns out and post some pictures. I have always loved the neck of this guitar ... it hase a rosewood fretboard and jumbo frets and no finish on the back of the neck ... plays like nothing else I have ever owned.

Mm, $300 is a good chunk of change back then when you're a kid! I think brand new, the rrp of this model was like $700. Yes, I'd agree that the single coils are a bit meh; they're are quite underpowered, and only about 4k dcr. If you're used to the brilliance and robustness of a classic Strat pu, they're kinda underwhelming.

The fingerboards on these were actually ebony . Only the PL650, a Japan only model, got rosewood.

 

[PedalBob]

Hi Everyone-

Thanks for the help so far. My new pickups arrived this week (STK-S4 neck and middle).
I just installed the neck one as described above (black to PCB, Bare shield 5 way switch where the Ibanez bare and white were, and white/red soldered together and taped).
I'm only getting less than 20% of the volume out of the new pickup compared to the middel and bridge stock ones which are still installed. Height to strings is fine so it isn't than.
Ashurbanipal was correct the neck pickup was reversed from the picture I posted (red went to pcb and white to 5 way switch) when I actually opened mine up but I know it is the way it was done from factory because the PCB is actually labelled "R" for the neck pu and "W" for the middle pu.

Any thoughts on what to try ?

Thanks

 

[larryguitar]

Hi Everyone-

Thanks for the help so far. My new pickups arrived this week (STK-S4 neck and middle).
I just installed the neck one as described above (black to PCB, Bare shield 5 way switch where the Ibanez bare and white were, and white/red soldered together and taped).
I'm only getting less than 20% of the volume out of the new pickup compared to the middel and bridge stock ones which are still installed. Height to strings is fine so it isn't than.
Ashurbanipal was correct the neck pickup was reversed from the picture I posted (red went to pcb and white to 5 way switch) when I actually opened mine up but I know it is the way it was done from factory because the PCB is actually labelled "R" for the neck pu and "W" for the middle pu.

Any thoughts on what to try ?

Thanks

First thought is you're only getting one coil. I'd get a DCR reading on the black and ground, and compare it to the specs. If that looks OK, my favorite trick is to get a spare output jack and wire the PU directly to that and check it's tone/output; if it's OK there, you know the problem is between the pickup and the output jack in the guitar's circuit.

Larry

 

[PedalBob]

Thanks. Got them working by swapping some of the wires. Went with black and shield to the 5 way switch, white to the PC board and red taped off. They sound very good ... beter than my originals (more strat like which is what I wanted). Getting a little bit of noise though so guessing the way I wired them I'm not getting the hum cancelling benefit of the two coils. I'll post some picture when I get some time (spent way too much time on this yesterday and my wife annoyed now )

 

[Ashurbanipal]

Good to hear it worked out. I do also have the following diagram (found it in my labyrinthine virtual storage), which is mostly the same (red and white of the respective single coils are reversed, on mine the factory wiring was like this) as in the op. I can't remember where I got this, maybe from the IC forum years ago. I don't know if it's factory diagram since the pu grounds here are soldered to the volume, while actual examples I've seen all go to the 5 way terminals.

 

[PedalBob]

Thanks Again Everybody. And here is a picture ... Funny the black finish on the knobs "crazed" initially years ago (my sweaty hands I guess) and then started to come off so I lightly hit it with some fine steel wool a few years ago when I was cleaning frets ... knobs are actually solid brass so it has a bit of a grunge look now

I'm really loving these new pickups. The bridge pickup was never as dull as the others but mght need to go for the full monty and replace that one too. Any suggestions from you experts ?

 

[Demanic]

Thanks Again Everybody. And here is a picture ... Funny the black finish on the knobs "crazed" initially years ago (my sweaty hands I guess) and then started to come off so I lightly hit it with some fine steel wool a few years ago when I was cleaning frets ... knobs are actually solid brass so it has a bit of a grunge look now

I'm really loving these new pickups. The bridge pickup was never as dull as the others but mght need to go for the full monty and replace that one too. Any suggestions from you experts ?

Black Winter.

Sent from my SM-A115A using Tapatalk

 

[Mincer]

I'd go with a Pegasus or Custom.

 

[Ashurbanipal]

Nice, they look good in none more black, don't they? Yes, the original brass knobs don't have the best plating from the factory, see them like that often, while the rest of the guitar looks new.

Regarding the bridge pu, depends on what you're after, also presumably something that will match the stacks in terms of output.

Mine has seen a bit of action before me, but also not trashed about. All the electricals and the scratchplate have been changed, except for the preset switching (which work well still *touches wood*). I have a pair of SSL2s and a 59/C in it. If I were doing it again, I'd try some other PAFish hbs like the Demon, SNS, WLH or just a regular 59. This guitar has a warmer, rounder kind of tone, so a brighter pu works well and I prefer lower to mid output hbs. The 59/C is cool, and isolating the Custom coil also gives a useable bridge single coil tone.

 

[Mincer]

^ That's not a color I would think I would like, but it looks fantastic here.

 

[Ashurbanipal]

Yeah, I had similar thoughts. But, you can't be too choosy with these guitars - if one comes up for a decent price, you hit BIN . Apart from gold and black, this model came in silver and copper for the US/EU markets.

The overall colour has softened over the years due to clear coat ageing (under the scratchplate it's more yellow); many of the silver ones have turned snot green, for instance.