Fender HB wiring & 3-way switch

[ack1961]

All,

Sorry, I've modified this post several times (because I've tried several things with varying results)

I'm trying to wire a pair of HB's to a 3-way switch - the bridge pup (Epi EB-0 type) only has 2 wires (white [hot] & bare [ground])

The issue I have is with the neck pickup, which is from a working Fender Telebass. It has 5 wires (Red, White, Black, Bare & Green)
The Red & White are soldered and taped together - they do nothing
The Black & Bare are soldered together - I'm assuming that these guys get grounded
The Green appears to be hot

I have a cheap Telecaster 3-way switch - it has 8 lugs (in a single row)
If you count the lugs from neck to bridge, lugs 2&3 and lugs 6&7 are bridge-soldered together
Lugs 1, 4 & 8 were open and unsoldered
Lug 5 has a white wire that goes to the hot lug of the Vol pot.

Here's what I did:
Neck pup (green) to lug8 (closest to bridge) of 3-way switch
Neck pup (Blk & bare) to Vol pot back
Bridge pup (white) to lug1 (closest to neck) of 3-way switch
Bridge pup (bare) to Vol pot back

Here's the results:
Switch to Neck position (fwd) - Neck pickup works
Switch to Bridge position (back) - Bridge pickup works
Switch to Blend position (middle) - neither pickup works

I'm just trying to figure out how to wire this thing in order to get the blend position to work.


Anyone here have any advice?
Thanks,
Steve

[Dave W]

Do you have a meter?

IIRC these came with a single conductor and braided shield like a Gibson so the leads may have been replaced.

The red and white are the leads from each coil connected in series. You don't connect these to anything.

Since the black and bare are soldered together, then either these are ground and green is hot (despite what Seymour says) or whoever soldered black and bare together didn't know what he was doing. Hard to say without hooking it up and seeing how it sounds. I'd go with Seymour, though.

[ack1961]

Do you have a meter?

IIRC these came with a single conductor and braided shield like a Gibson so the leads may have been replaced.

The red and white are the leads from each coil connected in series. You don't connect these to anything.

Since the black and bare are soldered together, then either these are ground and green is hot (despite what Seymour says) or whoever soldered black and bare together didn't know what he was doing. Hard to say without hooking it up and seeing how it sounds. I'd go with Seymour, though.

Thanks for the response.
Using the Green lead as hot and Slack/Bare as ground, I can get the neck pickup wired (and it sounds great).
As you can see from my modification of the original post, my problem is with the blend position of the switch.

[dadagoboi]

All,

Sorry, I've modified this post several times (because I've tried several things with varying results)

I'm trying to wire a pair of HB's to a 3-way switch - the bridge pup (Epi EB-0 type) only has 2 wires (white [hot] & bare [ground])

The issue I have is with the neck pickup, which is from a working Fender Telebass. It has 5 wires (Red, White, Black, Bare & Green)
The Red & White are soldered and taped together - they do nothing
The Black & Bare are soldered together - I'm assuming that these guys get grounded
The Green appears to be hot

I have a cheap Telecaster 3-way switch - it has 8 lugs (in a single row)
If you count the lugs from neck to bridge, lugs 2&3 and lugs 6&7 are bridge-soldered together
Lugs 1, 4 & 8 were open and unsoldered
Lug 5 has a white wire that goes to the hot lug of the Vol pot.

Here's what I did:
Neck pup (green) to lug8 (closest to bridge) of 3-way switch
Neck pup (Blk & bare) to Vol pot back
Bridge pup (white) to lug1 (closest to neck) of 3-way switch
Bridge pup (bare) to Vol pot back

Here's the results:
Switch to Neck position (fwd) - Neck pickup works
Switch to Bridge position (back) - Bridge pickup works
Switch to Blend position (middle) - neither pickup works

I'm just trying to figure out how to wire this thing in order to get the blend position to work.
Anyone here have any advice?
Thanks,
Steve

Switch the leads of the two wire pup, ground to hot and hot to ground.  The pups do not have the same polarity, it's fairly common but the first time it happens it will drive you nuts!   You can tell if polarity is reversed using an Ohm meter, you'll get a minus reading from one pup connecting the leads hot to hot ground to ground.

If the two pups do not have the same polarity the blend switch will not work, in the center position they will cancel each other out or drastically reduce the output of the stronger while eliminating the weaker.

A set of Jazz Antiquities from Seymour Duncan arrived with that problem a few years ago.  After wasting most of a day I called customer service and 15 seconds later problem solved.  Happened again yesterday when I replaced a pup in my Stratobaster.  I immediately knew what was wrong.

[ack1961]

Switch the leads of the two wire pup, ground to hot and hot to ground.  The pups do not have the same polarity, it's fairly common but the first time it happens it will drive you nuts!   You can tell if polarity is reversed using an Ohm meter, you'll get a minus reading from one pup connecting the leads hot to hot ground to ground.

If the two pups do not have the same polarity the blend switch will not work, in the center position they will cancel each other out or drastically reduce the output of the stronger while eliminating the weaker.

A set of Jazz Antiquities from Seymour Duncan arrived with that problem a few years ago.  After wasting most of a day I called customer service and 15 seconds later problem solved.  Happened again yesterday when I replaced a pup in my Stratobaster.  I immediately knew what was wrong.

Thanks.  I tried swapping leads and the bridge pup didn't work at all.

After some trial and tribulations, I figured out what I did wrong.
Neck pickup hot (green) goes to lug2, which is bridged to lug3
Bridge pickup hot (white) goes to lug7, which is bridged to lug6
Neck, Blend and Bridge all work.

Now that it works, it makes sense (isn't it always like that?)

Thanks.

[dadagoboi]

Glad you got it sorted out!