Problems with electric guitar wiring. Need urgent HELP!

Not sure if it will help, but make sure that you phase the pickups correctly. On old Strats, all three pickups are of the same polarity. On newer Strats (since the mid '80s) the middle pickup has reverse polarity from the other two. If both the 2 and 4 positions sound weak and thin, the polarity of the middle pickup is reversed. If only the 2 position (neck/middle) is weak and thin, the neck pickup is reversed. If only the 4 position is weak and thin, the bridge pickup is reversed.

Ok... let's say that the middle single coil has the a reverse polarity... What should I do in this case ?

Not sure if you removed all 3 pickups when you swapped, or if you are weak on 2 and 4 position. But easiest to try is do a 180 degree rotation of the middle pickup .... if you left everything alone there, you may have installed both hums backwards... but still just flipping around the middle should work. Think magnets facing the wrong way if that helps.

well I removed only the humbuckers and I placed them as they were place before on the epiphone guitar. The bad noise is in bothe 2 and 4 positions of the switch. I wonder if I weld correctly the wires on the switch.

Possibly weak solder joints, but sure sounds out of phase from your description. Should be easy enough to rotate the middle pup and see if the problem is solved.

Possibly weak solder joints, but sure sounds out of phase from your description. Should be easy enough to rotate the middle pup and see if the problem is solved.

I agree, cold soldering could cause the symptom but not likely. However, it is worth checking the joints for the middle pickup and make sure the joint is nice and shiny. For that matter all connections should be checked.

If these are Epi humbuckers with adjustable poles they should be placed with the adjustable poles facing the neck and bridge respectively. Then it is just a matter of getting the correct orientation of the middle pickup which is just a 50/50 shot.

Guys... I cant rotate the single coil becose it has a triangle shape and the hole in the guitar body has the exact shape.

"If these are Epi humbuckers with adjustable poles they should be placed with the adjustable poles facing the neck and bridge respectively"

This is how they were when I started this thread.

Right now I've rotated the two humbuckers and the're is still no change. I have a felling that I haven't weld the wires correctly on the switch. That's why I posted 2 pictures, hoping that somebody will figure out how i should wire correctly this humbuckers and still use all the 5 positions on the switch like before.

I am thinking out loud here so bare with me.

The ground wire from each pup should obviously go to ground.

Since the original pups were either split coil or phase switching (not sure which) you may need to switch the new white wires to where the original red wires were.

Another possibility is that the white wire from the 2 epi pups need to go where the white from the old were with a jumper to where the reds were. I am a little afraid of what this could do to the pups since I don't know the inner workings of the switch and what feedback it may cause.

The Yamaha switch is very complex and may be worth replacing with a strat 5 way or something like that to simplify the wiring.

Maybe reading this on the Yamaha switch may help:

http://www.stewmac.com/wiring101/yamaha_switch.html

I already tried the jumper thing... but in this situation there's no sound at all. I owned a few years ago a stratocaster copy and this is how I connected a bridge humbucker to the switch so i know what you're talking about.

Here you can see how the original humbuckers looked like:

I don't know if they were split coil or phase but i'm sure that in the 1st and 5th positions of the switch there was no buzz. (so they acted like humbuckers).

Tomorrow morning I'll try to put the actual white wires to where the original wires were and I'll let you know if it will be some change. I have a concert on the 19th this month and this is my back-up guitar and I have to make it work till then.

Thanx

My first thought was that those pickups you installed may look like Humbuckers, when they could be single coil with another magnet to work in the same manner. A Humbucker should have five wires. North Start, North Finish, South Start, South Finish, and Ground. If you do some searching you'll see that single coil pickups only have two wires. a hot Lead (white in color) and a Ground.

What I might try would be to run a wire from where the white wire is soldered over to where the other lead wires where. Take a look at this image you'll see that I drew jumpers across the switch. If it doesn't help you could always remove the jumpers.

Just an Idea Click for Image

Joe

What I might try would be to run a wire from where the white wire is soldered over to where the other lead wires where. Take a look at this image you'll see that I drew jumpers across the switch. If it doesn't help you could always remove the jumpers.

Joe
That was also what I suggested but I was concerned about cross feeding the coil but I guess it can't really hurt anything.

forrok_star, thank you for joining the disscution... unfortunatelly I already tried that and in the 2nd & 4th positions I get no sound at all.

The humbuckers with 3 wires have no splitting capability - you are permanently in humbucking mode.

There a remore and more guitars being delivered with non-splittable humbuckers - even the Gibsons apparently come from the factory without splittable HBs, you have to buy after market replacements for that.

Ok guys... I FIXED IT :))... i switch the wires that were coming from the single coil and it works fine. Thank you for you support.

I still have a question:

The adjustable poles of the humbuckers should be facing the neck and respectively the brigde or it's ok if they are facing the single coil ?