50's style wiring of pots on tele isn't working

[harryjmic]

I rewired both my Les Paul and Strat following the guidelines on another post about 50's vs. modern style wiring but I am not able to make it work for my '52 reissue tele. Right now there is a white wire coming from the switch which goes to lug 1 on the tone control and lug 3 on the volume control. The capacitor is on lug 2 of the tone control and lug 1 of the volume control with this lead end going to ground. Lug 1 on the tone isopen and I believe lug 2 on the volume contol has the hot lead from the input jack going to it.

What would be the proper hook up of these wires and why is there a white wire tying everything together? Thanks for the help guys, I really like the sound difference and want to be able to do this with this guitar as well.

[RL in Fla]

Here's some Tele schemes Harry :

http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/schematics.shtml

The white wire is the output from the switch .

Note the way the switch is wired on a '53 vs the others . (66 and standard)

[harryjmic]

The '53 tele wiring from the Duncan page is how my tele is wired now. I thought I could incorporate the 50's wiring the Les Pauls used but maybe not although it seems like I should be able to. I tried switching the input jack lead and the capacitor but when I plugged everything up I didn't get any sound.

[Jim Collins]

There are a couple of different mods that people refer to as the 50s Les Paul wiring. Can you describe yours? (By the way, I've never actually seen any documentation that showed that 50s Les Pauls were wired with one of these so-called 50s wiring mods.)

[harryjmic]

Hello Jim,

The mod is described in the Guitars in general thread. It's called "More balanced and etc tips for Les Pauls" it was started by Roe I think. They desribe it within the thread. I was able to do it on my Strat but with this single wire running in series through both the tone and volume controls the wiring schematic no longer adds up.

[John E]

I remember Lew Collins posting a 50's mod diagram for Les Pauls (and any Humbuckers) on the Weber boards a ways back... it supposedly allowed you retain treble/clarity without having to add a treble bleed cap... I thought I had the copy of his diagram around somewhere, I'll see if I can find it... I've been wanting to try it on my Ibanez Artcore with GFS filtertron copies.

[Jim Collins]

If the guitar is wired according to the '53 diagram, you need only make one, very simple change.

First, let's get our lugs straight. Number the lugs from left to right, when the shaft is pointing down to the floor, and the lugs are pointing toward you. Lug #1 on the volume pot has the lead coming from the switch. There is also a lead from the volume pot #1 lug to the tone pot #3 lug. This lead, between volume #1 and tone #3, is the only wire you will change. Disconnect that wire from the volume #1 lug, and add it to #2 on the volume pot. It should now be between volume #2 and tone #3. There will already be a lead on volume #2, going to the output jack.