Changing pickups in a semi acoustic.

breakstuff

I know it's supposed to be a complete PITA to do but what is the easiest way to go about doing it.I've got a Shine semi acoustic which although a lovely guitar has got horrible sounding humbuckers in it.It's my birthday next month so was going to look at getting some new pickups but haven't the foggiest idea about how to go about fitting them.I've rewired solid bodies before so the soldering part isn't an issue.

Any advise for a semi acoustic newbie?

mart

If the pickups are bad enough to bin, then just pull them out, cut the wires off close to the pickup, and then solder the new pickup wires to these. That'd make it an easy job. 

 Otherwise, use strong thread or surgical tubing, and expect to spend hours cursing away, trying to get things out through the pickup cavity and then trying to get them back in, and into the right pot holes.

ICBM

"Proper" way - a pain. You have to get the whole wiring loom out, usually through either the f-hole or the bridge pickup hole. Getting it back in again is an art form.

"Guerilla" way - easy, pull as much of the wire up out of the pickup hole as you can, cut it there, and solder the new pickup wire to it, insulating the join using tape or heatshrink. This is not the "proper" way, no - but it's electrically identical and if you do it well there is no problem.

NB:

1 - Be absolutely sure not to let go of the wire, or it will disappear back into the guitar! Best to clamp it in some way. (A croc clip works well.)

2 - If you possibly can, don't cut the wire less than an inch from the old pickups, or it will be very difficult to reinstall them if you ever want to.

3 - don't cut the new pickup wires short, coil them up and hide them under the pickups - you might want to use the pickups in a different guitar one day.


I know a lot of people will tut at me for recommending this, and I would absolutely not consider it for a professional job, on a good quality guitar, using good quality pickups. But otherwise, I'm happy to - it's massively less work and doesn't carry the risk of messing something in the loom up and having to have the whole lot out again...


(mart beat me to it! )

breakstuff

@mart and @ICBM I'd never even thought of that.So simple it's brilliant.I'll be dumping the pickups so you could have just solved my problem.I'll just have to figure out which are the ground and hot wires which shouldn't be too difficult.

Cheers lads.

ICBM

Usually humbuckers have shielded wire, so the hot is the fine insulated wire in the middle and the shield is the bare wires which wrap around it. If you're connecting another pickup with the same type of wire, connect the two hots together and insulate that joint, and the two shields together - you don't need to insulate that, it doesn't matter if it touches anything.

If the new pickups have 4-conductor wire it becomes slightly more complicated, ask!

breakstuff

Thanks @ICBM.I may go for humbucker sized P90's so 4-conductor shouldn't be an issue.

fretfinder

I hope the simple method brilliantly described above works out for you. But if that doesn't improve the sound significantly then maybe the pots/loom are part of the problem with the sound, although changing them would undoubtedly make it a right royal PITA. Let's hope it doesn't come to that. Good luck.

Basher

On the same subject, I've seen pictures of people using some kind of wire with a jack plug on the end to plug to the socket. 

This passes into the body of the guitar and helps get the socket back into the right position so that the nut can be re-attached. 

Looking at my leads, there's a "rim" of metal that would stop a jack plug passing into the socket hole. 

So do people get rid of this rim and. if so, how? 

Presumably it's a hacksaw job, or are there some sockets out there without the rim that could be used for this purpose?

ICBM

I filed it down on mine.

Another couple of neat tricks relating to getting the jack back in are to use a knife blade jammed sideways into the threads to stop the jack falling back in while you put the nut on, and to use a taper reamer jammed into the jack to stop it turning when you tighten the nut.

I always use a drop of superglue to stop the nut ever working loose too - if you use a decent quality jack you're unlikely to have to change it in the foreseeable future, and if you really have to you can break the glue by heating the nut with a soldering iron (but mind the fumes!).

GuitarMonkey

On cheaper plugs the rim and shaft(?) are generally separate pieces held together by a rivet in the centre so they can be disassembled quite easily. 

You can then solder the shaft and tip together with a length of wire to make the socket removal/replacement tool.

Basher

Thanks for the advice @ICBM and @GuitarMonkey

Will look out for a cheap jackplug in case I ever decide to attempt this tricky job.