What do your EJ pickups measure?

[clothwiring]

So I took my EJ apart last night to use it as a wiring example for another guitar. Didn't touch it with a soldering iron at all and now the neck pickup is real weak. EXCEPT...the bridge reads 6.58, middle 6.25 and the neck ....0 but does give me about 25% of it's normal output. Everything looks good with the wiring as well so it's got me perplexed. What's gone wrong here?

[Jim Collins]

You may have broken a connection, or even a winding, when you put the guitar back together. Or, it may be that something is touching something else, causing a short.

[rickc007]

not sure how you are measuring it if you didn't take a soldering iron to it

if the pickups are still in the circuit, the pots will come into play

if you are doing it from a cord plugged in, switch the pickup selector
around to make sure the pots are'nt lowering you reading

the pots will lower it a little no matter, but if its selected and
you have the tone/volume down...it will screw you up

[clothwiring]

Originally Posted by rickc007

not sure how you are measuring it if you didn't take a soldering iron to it

Multimeter.

[Gordon]

Troubleshooting is a process of elimination. First I'd check for a bad contact at the switch. Then move on to checking the pickup itself at the volume pot and pickup switch. There's not that much in a guitar that you can't just proceed in an orderly fashion and arrive at the problem. It will just take a little patience.

[clothwiring]

Pretty sure it's the coil that broke. The other two measure at the poles, nothing from the neck. ugh!!!!! Now what to put in here!!! Should I just throw a whole set of Areas in here!

[clothwiring]

Ahh wait wait...I have an Area 58 sitting here...more in 20 minutes! lol

[DonM]

neck 6.12 /fomvar wire 42 / .197AlInCo-5
middle 6.55 /.187 a-5 / enamel wire
bridge 7.11 /.187 a-5 / enamel wire

[Gordon]

Did you actually remove the pickup from the guitar? Strat pups are prone to damage if mishandled since the coils is exposed and the cover can actually break winding. But i wouldn't panic yet. Even if that's the case, you can still repair the pickup quite easily and don't need to replace it.

[kimonostereo]

not sure if you can measure the pickup while its in the circuit with the multi-tester. unsolder the leads and retest.

[clothwiring]

Area 58 sounds good in here. Not quite as bell tone. Wonder if there's any interest in two good EJ pups and a dead neck?

[DonM]

you can measure from the cords end and add abut 0.25k and be in the ball game..

for dead accurate.. you need a room temp of 76*.. the pup must be unsoldered at one end in the control cavity -- it should also remain in that room at that temp about 3 hours,,, prior to measuring

[clothwiring]

Originally Posted by kimonostereo

not sure if you can measure the pickup while its in the circuit with the multi-tester. unsolder the leads and retest.

Yes you can. One: Test from the two points the coils are attached to (don't know name of the little points). Two: Test from a ground on the pot and the pole that the lead is attached to on the pickup switch. Three, insert a jack and from the other end of the cord you can put hot to tip and ground to base and test (yes I know you'll loose a little bit of the signal, but you can test if it's dead or not).

The pickup is dead as I suspected, I took it out and measured again just to be sure and yup, I pull the cover off and there's some wire sorta floating out there. I'll contact my dealer and see if I could get the pup fixed or replaced. Outside of that the Area 58 sounds good in there. A little less airy or bell in there, but still good. I like the pickups to match though.

[Gordon]

Good news, you've found the problem. Now here's the solution. Peel off that lose wire and find where you have good fresh wire that's still on the coil and solder it to the terminal. You can use a little bit of very fine sand paper to clean off the insulation and whatever you do, DON'T USE A SOLDERING GUN. You'll have things fixed up in just a few minutes. Good Luck.

[clothwiring]

Has anyone thrown a set of Custom Shop Fat 50s in their EJ? Thoughts on them?