Upgraded pickups now not working

JonathanAnon

Got the bridge and neck pickups upgraded on my Yamaha Pacifica about two weeks ago.. played two gigs and worked fine.. I was practising today, then all of a sudden it stops working.. the signal on the bridge pickup got really weak (as if the volume button had been turned down)....

At first I was thinking "am I after breaking another lead?"... but I quickly discovered that the signal was fine with other pickups.. The issue was just with the bridge pickup...

Obviously I'm gonna have to bring it back to the guy.. who is 40kms away, and a bit of hassle I could do without... I am gonna be looking for it to be fixed for free and absorb the travel cost myself... Has anybody else had something similar happen with pickups, is it possible I got a "dodgy" one?

Banjo

Volume loss usually means signal running to ground, so it's probably a wire come loose from it's solder point or a short circuit. Assuming the Pacifica is like a Strat, ie you need to remove the pickguard to get to the wiring, you could loosen the strings and have a look underneath - probably a wire loose on one of the pots or the switch. You could ask the guy for a wiring diagram if he hasn't already given you one so you can spot where the wires coming from the bridge pickup should be and compare that to what you see.

Obviously spin all the knobs to their extremes with the selector in each of it's 3 (5? is it the strat-copy or tele-copy?) and make sure you haven't just turned it down by accident first, maybe even call the guy and make sure he sense-checks it with you before you make the 80KM round trip. It's 5 minutes work, it probably won't tell you anything you don't already know but better to do it before you get to his house rather than find out you wasted the journey...

8k2q1gfcz9s5d4

prob a bad soulder as mentioned above. happened one of my strats a year ago, a cable at the input jack came loose

JonathanAnon

The pacifica is a strat copy.. there are five pickup positions.. I've replace only bridge and neck ends..

I would rather open it up myself tbh, cos it seems like a wire has come loose like what you are saying.. I am just worried that if I bring it back to the guy after "having a go" myself, he may claim that I actually broke the pickup by messing around with it...

I'll be talking to him tomorrow.. I might suggest to him that I open it myself and see if I can diagnose it, with the backup that if I cant find the issue he will still fix it.. (basically ensure with him that I dont void any warranty by opening it myself)..

hidinginthebush

Ah I wouldn't worry about him giving you grief over having a look. It's most likely a loose wire, which you should spot quite easily once you take the pickguard off (be careful not to pull it too far off, as you might pull the wires on the jack connection loose), or unscrew the lead jack and see if there's something loose there. Either way, it will probably take 5 minutes to resolder to fix it, so he shouldn't be too annoyed at you having already found the problem for him.

eoin5

Its most likely something obvious like a broken solder but if not one thing I've seen a few times is the pots positioned in a way that one of the connections contacts the shielding or the body of the guitar. Its worth checking if its not anything simple.

JonathanAnon

Okay rang the guy this morning.. says that he will cover the warranty even if I take a look myself... I'm gonna get her open now..

JonathanAnon

Success.... I opened up the back of the guitar and although the neck pickup wire was still connected fast to the pickup connector, it had broken free from it's grounding on the back of the volume pot... I solder it back in place and it seems to be fine now.. 80kms of petrol saved

thanks..