What the heck did I do wrong in my wiring?

[matt99camero]

I finally got around to installing my CTS 500k pots and wiring up my Ibanez GAX70. I'm still pretty new at this wiring stuff so I was releaved when I pluged it in and worked. I was sure I put all the wires back in there same spots but I guess not. The tone knobs work fine but when I turn the volume knobs down the volume stays the same and it sounds as if the tone knobs were turned halfway down also. Any idea what wires I could have crossed here?

 

[Cory_Dylan]

Re: What the heck did I do wrong in my wiring?

Man, I remember my first wiring job... it did the Jimmy Page mod :laugh2: It was so frustrating becuase I was sure I put all the wires in the right places... and I struggled without for about a week and I finally took it to a tech and he showed me I did everything right except I had the switch wired up wrong :smack: :smack: :smack: Those gibson switches are different and I didn't know how to wire them up.

Anyway, I had the same problem you had with the volume and tone knobs. It might be a ground problem. Do you have a link to the schematic you used?

 

[matt99camero]

Re: What the heck did I do wrong in my wiring?

Here is the story, when I first started out trying to solder I figured I'd practice on the Ibanez and would unsolder a wire and solder it right back on and so on, my first solders looked like s%@t but they worked. As I practiced my soldering got better and I installed a Duncan Designed in the bridge and everything was great. I then decided to step up to the real SD's, 59n/C-5b and I just used the schematic that came with the pups, just the regular configuration, nothing special. I wired it up and it worked great for a day and then just quit working. I rewired it several times and still got nothing. So I figured maybe all that heat from practicing on them burned up a pot or maybe the braided outside of the 59 touched something and shorted something out. So I ordered some new pots and caps and if it wasn't the pots it couldn't hurt to upgrade anyway. When I changed them the other night it was already completly wired up so I changed them one pot at a time, unsolder all the wires going to the stock pot, take it out put the new one in and wire it just as it had been on the old one. I tried to be careful and put them back exactly as they had been but I must have done something wrong.

 

[Artie]

Re: What the heck did I do wrong in my wiring?

Matt; I'm trying to think of what might cause that. Its easy to wire a tone control to work as a volume, but its a lot harder to wire a volume to work as a tone. :laugh2:

This is one of those cases where a meter would come in real handy. I would suspect the ground connection on the volume control first. Look for these types of problems:

1. simply not having it.
2. volume lug connected to pot case, but case not grounded.
3. volume and/or case ground doesn't have a path to the ground side of the output jack.
4. rough or not-shiny ground connections for the volume control.

If you didn't have the volume control grounded, it might cause this type of problem. As you turned the volume down, you'ld be adding resistance to the "hot" side, without routing it to ground.

Check that first, and let us know.

 

[matt99camero]

Re: What the heck did I do wrong in my wiring?

Will do Artie. And I just bought myself a meter now if I could figure out how to use the darn thing? Too bad I didn't wire the tone to work as the volume or I'd just leave it.

 

[TheArchitect]

Re: What the heck did I do wrong in my wiring?

It kind of sounds like he cooked the pot to me. I've seen 'similar' but not identical behavior from that.