Sounds drops when i select both pick-ups

[adsy]

I have just installed a Tv Jones humbucker in my Tele along woth the original neck pick-up from a thinline, now each pickup on its own sound fine but when i select both of them the sounds dramatically drops. Any ideas anyone??

[Robert M. Martinelli]

Hi,
seems to me you have a phase problem,
Do you also experience a dramatic loss of low frequencies? This usually is a good indicator of "out of phase" pickups.

Try to reverse the wiring on only one of the two pickups ( by swapping its "hot" and "GND" connections ).

Hope this helps

Best regards

Bob

[adsy]

Thankyou for your reply. You are correct when you said I am experiencing loss of low frequencies, so to rectify this can you explian exactly what i have to do, i'm sorry i am kind of a novice at electronics!

[Robert M. Martinelli]

Don't be sorry, we have all been a novice at some point in our lives, you' ll find this forum's a great place for learning/getting help, and I wish you to learn fast and be able to help others one day with the knowledge you gained.

As I stated in my previous post, simply choose one of the two pickups, take the ( currently ) "hot" wire ( the one going to the selector/switch ) and connect it to GND, then take the GND wire and use it as the new "hot" - If the pickup's cable has a screen, keep it tied to GND.

This should fix your phase problem.

Oh, and don't forget to let us know if you managed to fix the problem!

Cheers

Bob

[adsy]

Well i appreciate it Bob, i'm off home now but will try to rectify the problem in the morning.
Time for a beer and a relax!
Thanks again, i have wired several guitars in the past but never came up with this problem before.

[Robert M. Martinelli]

Thanks again, i have wired several guitars in the past but never came up with this problem before.

Then, either all the pickups you wired were from the same manufacturer and had the same "color code" or you're a terribly lucky guy!

Wiring the pickups out of phase is more likely to happen when mixing different manufacturers' pickups ( just like in your case ), but, as you've just learned, it's a very simple issue to fix.

Cheers

Bob

[Dave Kerr]

You might wish to make the switch that Robert suggested on the new TV Jones pickup. Tele neck pickup covers are often wired to that same ground wire that you'd be switching to hot. You could always run a separate ground from cover to ground, but why make more work?