Pot and switch soldering question...

[StratStringSlinger]

When soldering a wire onto the lug of a pot or 5 way switch, do you just lay the wire on top of the lug, hook the wire physically to the lug or something else? I'm thinking of installing new pickups myself and never done his before. I was thinking that physically hooking the wire onto the lug before soldering would make the best connection but I heard it makes it hard to take apart later. If just laying the wire on top is good enough then it would be easier. Thanks!

[flyingvees]

put the exposed wire through the lug bend it slightly then solder. Thats always been my m.o.

[mark norwine]

solder is not glue.

always establish a good mechanical connection before soldering.

[StratStringSlinger]

solder is not glue.

always establish a good mechanical connection before soldering.

So you mean hook the wire onto the lug?

[mark norwine]

yep

[StratStringSlinger]

I'm thinking this is what I'll do. I saw on a YouTube video that the person demonstrating it just laid the wire on top before soldering (and the person teaching is a very knowledgeable person).

[RBfan]

solder is not glue.

always establish a good mechanical connection before soldering.

This, definitely. De-soldering a wire from a lug is a relatively easy process.

When working with the new pickup, don't expose more wire than you need to, push through the lug opening, then maybe tighten the wire back on itself with some needlenose pliers. Check the BYOC forum - someone did a pretty cool tutorial with pics.

T

[losergeek]

I just wired a set of pots that had been previously soldered and snipped by the last owner leaving lots of little wire tails and solder blobs all over them - they had been well twisted into the loops and I didn't really have much trouble getting them all off with my iron and a pair of tweesers....so I say go with a nice twist and then solder.

[MSS]

What a lot of people forget to do is to tin the soldering iron and the wire..........I tend to loop some wire through the lug to keep it in place.

[RBfan]

Good point - always tin the wire (& the iron).

T

[mannish]

another tip the soldering iron is HOT a couple weeks ago about 2 hours before gig I grabbed the wrong end. Do not do that

[StratStringSlinger]

Picked up a Hakko FX-888 and supplies, will be going in tonight to give it a shot!

[EADGBE]

It will work just laying it on top and soldering it. But it will stand more abuse if it's through the lug opening and soldered.

[direwolf]

Tin the wire. Place said wire through the lug. You can use a device called helping hands to hold the wire. Solder. Don't disturb the joint for 10 seconds. You will not be able to pull it apart. You will break the wire or lug first.

[VaughnC]

Tin the wire first.

While inserting the wire into the hole, bending & crimping it to the terminal (with needle nose pliers), then soldering, is the best way to do it, it doesn't make for easy changes if you expect to try different pickups in the future.

The next best thing is to insert the wire into the hole, heat both the wire and terminal simultaneously and flow just enough solder to fill the hole and create a small mound around the wire. This way, if you ever need to desloder, just reheating the connection will easily free the wire...but you should have some solder wick or a vacuum tool on hand to clean out the hole prior to resoldering.

But NEVER just LAY the wire on the terminal and solder....that's asking for trouble down the road.

However, soldering to the shell of a pot you're forced to lay the wire(s) on the shell and solder a small puddle around them. This is tricky because you need a lot of heat to do it quickly and some way to stabilize the wire(s) until the connection cools. I use a pair of surgical clamping forceps to stabilize the wire(s) while soldering to a pot shell.

I use about 625 degrees for terminal connections and about 700 degrees for pot shells.

[StratStringSlinger]

Thanks for the tips guys. If I'm not mistaken, aren't the wires used for pickup leads usually tinned already? See post 362 in the 'Ron Ellis Pickups Rule' thread for a picture of my pickups.

Should be exciting tonight working on my the only guitar I got, an almost irreplaceable Wildwood 10, pickups I've waiting a good time for and I need the guitar Tuesday and Thursday for band practice. Wish me luck!

[Stringrazor]

My dad soldered for a living in the days before everything was machine-made and wave soldered. He would always say "heat the WORK not the solder". So,

1) strip wires, twist, and tin
2) hook tinned wires in lugs
3) heat the LUG with iron
4) touch solder to lug until it flows evenly (solder flows toward hottest point)
5) snip excess wire

[VaughnC]

Thanks for the tips guys. If I'm not mistaken, aren't the wires used for pickup leads usually tinned already? See post 362 in the 'Ron Ellis Pickups Rule' thread for a picture of my pickups.

Should be exciting tonight working on my the only guitar I got, an almost irreplaceable Wildwood 10, pickups I've waiting a good time for and I need the guitar Tuesday and Thursday for band practice. Wish me luck!

Pickup wires are usually tinned but not always. You can tell...if the individual strands separate easily, they aren't...but it doesn't hurt to tin just to make sure. Just don't use too much solder as it will make the wire more difficult to work with. Just enough solder to wet the wire to keep the strands from separating is sufficient. And make sure you're using rosin core electronic solder.

Soldering is an art form that takes some practice to get right. Perhaps it might be better to practice on something else before digging into a good guitar. It's especially challenging when it comes to desoldering & soldering the pickups ground wires to the volume pot shell. Its best to have an iron with adjustable temperature as it requires a lot more heat to do that than common soldering irons can deliver. Something like a 25 watt iron will be fine for terminals but will unlikely generate enough heat fast enough to adequately solder wires to a pot shell.

[StratStringSlinger]

Ok 2:30am and I got the pickups in and tested! It was definitely a learning experience. I choose not to change the capicitor because it looked too delicate for a beginner like me to tackle. VaughnC predicated my situation, I had to turn up the heat to get the three ground wires on and off. Luckily I sprang for a pretty good soldering station so I was able to do it. I'll probably practice some more before taking on the capicitor. I'll post pics tomorrow. Going to sleep now.

[StratStringSlinger]

I posted some pics in another thread: http://www.thegearpage.net/board/showthread.php?t=883400&page=25&highlight=ellis

Thanks everyone for all the advice. I'm really happy I was able to get the pickups installed myself. I've been slowly learning to do all guitar setup/work myself over the years and this is the first time I've soldered anything/changed pickups myself. I figured it cost about $75 to have someone else do it and my soldering station cost about $80. Once I go back in to change capacitors or volume/tone pots then it will more than pay for itself.

Though I got them installed, I learned a couple things were more difficult than expected or not even anticipated.

1) The store didn't have a solder removal tool in stock so I bought the braid instead. What a bad idea, it was so hard and I ended up not removing all the old solder and just used alot of the old solder. QUESTION: is this bad to use the old solder/keep the old solder when installing new pickups?

2) It was very hard to remove the three pickup ground wires from the volume. I think part of the problem was the tip of the soldering iron was too small, I should have gotten a large size one for this part of the job. Once again not having the solder removal tool (the air suction thing) contributed to the problem. The only thing that saved me and allowed me to complete the job was to turn up the heat on the soldering station. QUESTION: How do you guys remove all the solder or do you even try to?

3) Cloth wire is a pain to work with! It was easy enough to push back and attach to the lugs on the 5 way switch but it was very hard to get enough wire exposed to ground the three wires to the volume pot. I tried stripping the cloth with scissors like you would teflon/plastic type wires but it just didn't work. QUESTION: What do you guys do to strip cloth wire? Any other tips working with cloth covered wire?

4) My last question is whether how well something is soldered effect tone? B/c I couldn't remove all the old solder, I wasn't able to hook the wire onto the lug or ensure the ground wire was really right up against the pot when I put on the new pickups. The guitar works and sounds good, I'm just wondering if it could sound better if I go back in and remove all the old solder, hook on the connections real good and re-solder???

Thanks!

[MSS]

When soldering pots, I first rough-up the surface with some sand-paper, pool some solder on it, then attach the wires. Always works well and you can do it very fast with this method.

[StratStringSlinger]

When soldering pots, I first rough-up the surface with some sand-paper, pool some solder on it, then attach the wires. Always works well and you can do it very fast with this method.

Since I was installing new pickups, is it ok to reuse the pool of old solder that was on the pot? Should the ground wire physically contact the surface of the pot or just as long as it's in the pool of solder?

[RBfan]

Since I was installing new pickups, is it ok to reuse the pool of old solder that was on the pot? Should the ground wire physically contact the surface of the pot or just as long as it's in the pool of solder?


I'm certainly no authority, but I've done this (reuse the existing solder since I couldn't remove it). A number of times. No issues. I don't believe the ground has to physically contact the pot surface - again, I've done this without a problem.

One bit of advice on this: I do make sure the new solder joint is nice & shiny, which generally indicates a good connection. You may need to re-flow (hold the iron against it & remove as if a new connection) if it looks cloudy or too grey.

T