Hey guys I just joined last week but I figured I'd offer help if anyone needs. I repair/build/wire guitars as a hobby so feel free to ask away if anyone has electrical/electronic issues! 
Electrical/Wiring help if anyone needs
- Thread starter tamagotchigraveyard
- Start date
I got a question for you, I'm contemplating adding a kill switch(with an LED light) to my Synyster Gates Custom-S w/Sustainiac. I added one on an old Ltd. guitar I have... It had active pickups and a stereo output jack. It all went well and everything works perfectly.
My question is, do I have to do anything differently or be cautious about anything involving the Sustainiac? I'm not sure if that will complicate the installation process or not. Because I want the kill switch to ground the signal and mute the guitar... But I do not want the kill switch to cut power to the Sustainiac preventing it from doing it's job(sustaining and squealing lol).
My question is, do I have to do anything differently or be cautious about anything involving the Sustainiac? I'm not sure if that will complicate the installation process or not. Because I want the kill switch to ground the signal and mute the guitar... But I do not want the kill switch to cut power to the Sustainiac preventing it from doing it's job(sustaining and squealing lol).
Okay, I'll bite. I put a set of Syn pickups in an Ibanez I have. I'm not great at soldering, but all the connections appear solid. However, both pickups sound weak and "flubbery," like they're definitely not operating at full power. Since it's both, I don't think it's the pickups (and I know what they SHOULD sound like based on specs and hearing them in other guitars). My feeling is that maybe I wonked the volume pot by overheating it or something (or possibly the tone pot?). Is there a way to check if an installed pot is good with just the multimeter? If so, how?
Thanks!
Thanks!
im completely unfamiliar with the sustainiac wiring ! But I don’t seewhy it would be any dif, just same thing as your other guitar with a dpdt
Not a sustainiac - the syn gates passive pickup set. They're normal 4-wire humbuckers
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Standard 500k pots. What reading should I be looking for, and should I just jump the two outside lugs on the pot, or something more specific?
(huh, I didn't even see the question about the killswitch and sustainiac - sorry for interfering there!)
(huh, I didn't even see the question about the killswitch and sustainiac - sorry for interfering there!)
To check the potentiometers value (its resistance-potentiometers are essentially dialing up and down resistance) youd set your multimeter to ohms (horseshoe things) and set to 2 M and then yeah touch each node to an outside lug, DM me if ya wanna text a pic of the wiring. could possibly be an issue with the capacitor too.
The sustainiac is pretty sophisticated, it has it's own circuit board. Basically a small calculator runs that thing lol. I haven't had the guts to pull the trigger on it quite yet. But I'm pretty sure if I make sure that the sustainiac always has power when the guitar jack is plugged in, it will work great.
not necessarily, if it’s wired up then the reading will be from the pickups and everything attached to the pot,for volume pots you’d have to isolate it to check for sure. I’d double check the pickup->switch connections first, make sure those connections are super solid before isolating volume pot.Solder joints can sometimes look fine when they aren’t, especially if you used a dif type of solder on top of the factory solder (using flux can help them mix better)
You could just bypass all the pots by clipping a wire from the pickup output (where it connects to the pot, or switch. Whichever is first) to the output jack and see if it sounds right. If it does, you know it's not the pickups. Leave the connection on the output jack, and move the other end of the jumper to the next component till you find the culprit. You don't have to disconnect anything to do it. Also, try a different guitar cable if you haven't already.
That's an interesting idea. I may tray that before I just bring it in.
It's definitely not the cable, I have a dozen other guitars that are fine.
I was wondering if when I solder the wires for my speaker do I need to make sure to get all the copper wires? I tried using a razor to expose the wires and the first time I did a pretty good job, there was some static but it was working. I remembered I cut like 2-3 of the wires by accident and still soldered them together. I tried it a second time, I think I cut more wires than before and it didn't work at all. I gave up for then but I'm going to try it again soon. Should I get a tool to properly expose the wires? Is that the problem? The first time around the sound was occasionally good but I wanted to get it right.
Thanks in advance!
Thanks in advance!
Wire strippers would help, but I use razor blades or my teeth when I’m in a pinch. Cutting off a few strands won’t really effect anything. but maybe you cut more than you realized. You could always completely chop off that end and try again.
Also try resoldering the ends, maybe you got a cold solder joint without realizing it.
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Okay I'll just try it again. I probably exposed too much of the wire the second time
Thanks!
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