Help fixing bass please..

phantom_lord · 26-09-2005 9:31am #1

I managed to snap a wire in the inside of my aria pro II bass, it goes between the input and one of the pots(volume knobs) inside, but the thing is I can't work out which one. Does anyone know where i can get it looked at....cheaply... any help appreciated

Doctor J · 26-09-2005 9:33am

Bring it into any instrument shop in Dublin... it should just be a quick solder job.

phantom_lord · 26-09-2005 9:47am

How much would that be?

I've morphed into a stingy student...

ferdi · 26-09-2005 9:49am

alot of places have a waiting list for repairs and musician inc wont even consider doing it.

its ireland so you have to be prepared to pay stupid amounts of money for the most basic task/

phantom_lord · 26-09-2005 9:53am

My local shop is twenty yoyos just to bother looking at it, i'l do the soldering myself if someone could tell me which wire it is. Pity I don't have a dig camera.

Doctor J · 26-09-2005 10:07am

Is it a wire with a core and a shield which connects directly to the jack socket? If so, the core connects to the part which clips onto the tip of the jack and the shild connects on the part which is in contact with the main shaft of the jack.

phantom_lord · 26-09-2005 10:23am

It's just a single wire with a bit of solder on the end. I'l have to have another look at it to describe it properly.It's attached to one of the pots, i tried soldering it to the output jack but it didn't work so i'm guessing it goes to one of the other pots but i can't work out which one or which input.

feylya · 26-09-2005 10:50am

Any chance you could sketch out what's connected to what?

phantom_lord · 27-09-2005 4:41pm

Yep i will, but can't do it til the weekend (havn't got the bass with me)

phantom_lord · 09-10-2005 2:19pm

Not the best but it's all i could do at the moment

phantom_lord · 09-10-2005 2:21pm

I had to resize it down so i could upload it, the redthing in the top right corner is a capacitor

kazaam · 09-10-2005 2:28pm

bring it into instrumental, if its a quick solder job theyll do it free

feylya · 09-10-2005 2:47pm

phantom_lord wrote:

I had to resize it down so i could upload it, the redthing in the top right corner is a capacitor

Change the format of the picture to jpg and you'll be able to upload the full size picture. As it is, it's too hard to read to understand.

phantom_lord · 09-10-2005 5:31pm

there.....

Doctor J · 09-10-2005 5:49pm

There should be two wires coming from the input jack. One connects to the tip of the jack, the other connects to the ring which touches off the shaft of the jack. Going on your diagram, it looks like there's only one wire connected to your jack, so I'm guessing that's where the wire came from.

Edit -> here's a standard input jack (the one on the left, the right one is for stereo, ignore it), as you can see there are two solder points on it, one which is connected to the part which clips onto the tip of the jack, the other to the ring which touches the shaft of the jack.

Eoin Madsen · 09-10-2005 5:54pm

That diagram makes very little sense tbh. What are "inputs"? Pickups? I presume the circles with the boxes on top are the pots, but is the circle the back of the pot or something else? I would strongly recommend you take a picture of this instead.

Eoin Madsen · 09-10-2005 5:56pm

Doctor J wrote:

Going on your diagram, it looks like there's only one wire connected to your jack, so I'm guessing that's where the wire came from.

Yeah, but going on the diagram the unattached wire is already indirectly connected to the other jack terminal!

Eoin Madsen · 09-10-2005 6:08pm

Incidently, is this an Aria Pro II in the style of a Jazz Bass? - ie (more importantly) is the panel that the pots are mounted to made of metal?

Doctor J · 09-10-2005 6:14pm

Eoin Madsen wrote:

Yeah, but going on the diagram the unattached wire is already indirectly connected to the other jack terminal!

True, but sometimes you've got to follow your heart

I'm guessing the inputs are pickup1, pickup2 and earth.

A clearer diagram (can you do one by hand?) would be fantastic here.

Eoin Madsen · 09-10-2005 6:31pm

Doctor J wrote:

True, but sometimes you've got to follow your heart

My heart tells me that this guitar probably grounds through a top plate so the earth connection on the jack doesn't need to be connected with a wire.

Maybe the third "input" is the bridge earth...?

Doctor J · 09-10-2005 6:35pm

Eoin Madsen wrote:

Maybe the third "input" is the bridge earth...?

Aye, that's what I meant...

Eoin Madsen · 09-10-2005 6:46pm

Yeah, now that I think of it, it's the only thing you could have meant. Sorry!

phantom_lord · 10-10-2005 9:39am

ok....i know it's pretty bad....the three wires coming from the top are wires from the inputs. I tried soldering the wire to the input but it had no effect. The panel thing that covers the inside of the bass is metal on the inside and there's a piece of foil connecting the top pot on the right of the diagram to the inside of the panel if that makes any difference. Anyway i'l try and borrow a camera off someone....thanks for trying....

phantom_lord · 10-10-2005 10:00am

Basically the three big circles are the pots, the square divided in the three beside the them is the three connectors of the pots. The wires are the same colour as on the bass.

phantom_lord · 10-10-2005 10:08am

here's what i mean....the things sticking out at the side of this pot are represented in the diagram by the square divided in three....and the small circle within the bigger circle on the pot in the diagram is the underside of the pot in the picture.

Eoin Madsen · 10-10-2005 11:26am

phantom_lord wrote:

ok....i know it's pretty bad....the three wires coming from the top are wires from the inputs. I tried soldering the wire to the input but it had no effect.

Yes, that's what you said in the diagram... but guitar wiring doesn't have anything commonly called an "input".

In this instance you have two transducers (pickups), each with one signal wire and one earth wire. You have a volume pot for each pickup, you have a common tone pot, and you have a jack (the output). There is also a wire which comes from the bridge to be wired somewhere into the ground circuit, ideally the jack earth.

Wires can be any colour unfortunately so that doesn't really indicate a lot.

Eoin Madsen · 10-10-2005 12:50pm

[IMG]http://homepage.eircom.net/~edsire03/images/wiring diagram.gif[/IMG]

Going on your description of the bass anyway, that's how it should be wired. Any of the pots or the jack that are mounted in metal will have the casing part earthed automatically - in the case (hehe) of the jack, that means a wire to the earth pin isn't needed, as such. Thus, often wires (like the pickup earths, the earth pin on the pot itself, and the tone cap) are soldered to the backs of the pots to be grouned.

phantom_lord · 10-10-2005 5:05pm

sorry i meant the wires were coming from the pick ups not the 'inputs'. Thanks for the help i'l go try that. Sorry about the diagram i should have done something more like a circuit diagram rather a very bad pictorial view.

Help fixing bass please..

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