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pickup test


tom1946
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Morning folks,

I'm having some issues with a jazz pickup and need a definitive way to test it electrically.

I have a digital ohm meter and not much ability, so can anyone say what reading I should get across the pickup wires that would tell me whether there is continuity or not?

Also I've searched about earthing the bridge. I see that mine just has the wire stripped back and laid under the bridge where it meets the body and relies on the bridge being screwed down?

At the moment I don't know whether I have an earth issue or a fu.. broken pickup.

Any help would be very much appreciated as it's driving me potty!

Thanks, Tom.

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[quote name='tom1946' post='553516' date='Jul 28 2009, 08:04 AM']Morning folks,

I'm having some issues with a jazz pickup and need a definitive way to test it electrically.

I have a digital ohm meter and not much ability, so can anyone say what reading I should get across the pickup wires that would tell me whether there is continuity or not?

Also I've searched about earthing the bridge. I see that mine just has the wire stripped back and laid under the bridge where it meets the body and relies on the bridge being screwed down?

At the moment I don't know whether I have an earth issue or a fu.. broken pickup.

Any help would be very much appreciated as it's driving me potty!

Thanks, Tom.[/quote]

What are the issues?

Ohm-meter will read infinity if you have a broken wire or something.

Wire stripped back and sandwiched underneath the bridge is a standard practice, nothing to worry about.

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Hi, thanks for the reply, issue is no output basically but before I shell out for a new one I need to be sure this one's dead and it's not some spurious other fault.

The neck pickup shows 7.0 on the ohms and the bridge is bouncing about between 110 and 69 constantly. Sounds bust to me?

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There's not much you can do yourself with a faulty pickup. The only thing it is practical to repair is if the thin coil wire has come adrift from the points where the thicker coated wire joins the pickup.

Have a close look at where the coated wires join the pickup (there's usually a couple of big solder blobs there). Can you see the thin coil wire joining the solder ? Are the coated wires damaged where they join the pickup ? Sometimes resoldering these points will help.

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[quote name='BOD2' post='553675' date='Jul 28 2009, 11:01 AM']There's not much you can do yourself with a faulty pickup. The only thing it is practical to repair is if the thin coil wire has come adrift from the points where the thicker coated wire joins the pickup.

Have a close look at where the coated wires join the pickup (there's usually a couple of big solder blobs there). Can you see the thin coil wire joining the solder ? Are the coated wires damaged where they join the pickup ? Sometimes resoldering these points will help.[/quote]

yes check that first...how windings get broken is a mystery but the connections from the windings to the thicker wire is a possiblity and happens a lot where some strain is put on the wires

as for the bridge...yes...fan out the wire end and it gets clamped down by the bridge and so earths it

your meter reading jumping around may correspond to movement in those thicker wires wiggling away from the winding connection
try to test without any movement in the meter or pup....

i have found on jazz pups also shorts between the outer poles and the windings due to a slight breakdown in the wire coatings leading to noise when touching the poles
but the pup worked ok

best of luck

Edited by mrcrow
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Hi, thanks for the help, I've checked where suggested and it all LOOKS fine so I'm going to bite the bullet and buy some new ones.
Quite fancy the 60's custom shop ones, they're about £108 on fleabay, anyone else tried these? SD quarter pounders was the other option.

Cheers.

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