Jazzer2020

Thanks bp. I was going to try your suggestion of going direct from the pickup to the output jack, but I wanted to try the caps first (it's also easier). I have a bunch of caps lying around from old electronics projects I once did. I couldn't find any .022 mF. The closest I had was .050 mF so I gave that a shot. I wired it in parallel with the existing neck cap (I didn't want to cut the existing one straight away). Bammm!!!! I immediately got a tone in the ballpark of what I was looking for. Gone was the out-of-phase sound. There was however too much muffled sound going on. I like a bit (rolling down my tone knob for jazz), but this was too much. So it seems that my cap was going/has gone. What do you suggest I do next. Buy a new .022 mF? I have this .050 mF ceramic as I mentioned. I also have a .47 mF metal poly axial cap. These are the closest I have to the .022 mF. ...

Thanks 1001 for helping out. I had my hopes up for that one. Unfortunately it didn't help. I tried bringing the bridge vol. gradually all the way down (also its tone). Then when I put the pickup selector in the middle position (with the bridge vol. off) and didn't hear anything I thought maybe something was wrong with the pickup selector. But I took out another guitar with two pickups, did the same, and it also cut out the neck pickup. I'm losing options. I may try different caps later.

It could be. I'll leave it for now. I spent the day trying to clean off the vol. pot top and resoldering, but I don't have a desoldering bulb so didn't have much success. Put everything back together and it was the same sound. When I have the time I may take it into a pro shop to see what they say about it. Maybe change the caps. That's the only thing I can think of that might make a difference at this point. Oh and I managed to burn the side of my left index finger while not looking at my soldering iron. Ouch!! It's be a few days until I can play chords again.

Yes I checked the screws (mentioned above). They are as you described. I just did some multi-meter testing. Everything is as should be, except for one small deviance. For some reason there is some bleeding between two tabs on the bridge vol. pot. It's just .003K. I don't know what's causing it or if is making a difference? I don't think I mentioned it explicitly yet, but the only soldering I did was at the neck pot, all the rest including the caps are all original.

Thanks BP! I looked closely at the wiring (I only did changes to the neck volume), the one with the ugly soldering. I am attaching some new photos from a better/closer angle. I think you will see clearly that the IN/OUT of the pot is NOT wired together. There is an 'extra' piece of a wire that I left attached (short black). I recall leaving it (many years ago when I did the pickup swaps). If you don't have any other suggestions, I think I am going to remove all the Vol wiring, clean it up as best as I can do and resolder. But do you see any obvious mis-wiring now that would cause the 'out of phase' sound?

My soldering technique is very amateurish. I also lack the proper tools to do a good job.

Thanks Mikeo. As I stated in a post above, my wiring (original) is different than the one in the video. The cap leads go from Tone to Vol SIDE tab.

Thanks daddy for your help! I see from my few posts here that I need to be extremely explicit in my wording lest I be misunderstood. By "open up the pickups " I meant unscrew the pickups (release them) to look at the wiring. I would never dare to get at the actual coil windings inside a pickup!!! I am not Eddie Van Halen! I have 'opened up' the neck pickup (see photos) and can't see if there are 3/4/5 leads. Should I investigate further? I don't remember how I installed the other pickups that I tried. Whether I installed them at the pickup location or at the cavity location. Just checked the toggle switch contacts. They are working OK. Are the bleed caps the caps between each of the tone/vol pot controls? Here are some photos of the pickup cavity and the neck pickup.

Let me first address my aural memory. I'm not saying I remember the exact sounds that I heard years ago. What I am saying is this. Years ago when I first noticed the problem, I had the exact same impression, 'thin out of phase sound'. Now several years later I am hearing the exact same problem; 'thin out of phase sound'. I just checked your diagrams and Mikeo's and what I have for my wiring. I have the 'Modern' wiring. That is, the outer tab lead from the Tone goes to the OUTER tab of the Volume (not the middle tab). This is the same for both pickups. I am assuming it is wired correctly? Have you changed amps? No. String brands? No. String gauges? No. How about cables or effects? None. Assuming everything is the same, and your hearing hasn't changed in the few years since playing it, (Which is normal for hearing to change over time.) then try adjusting the pickup heights and the pole piece heights. That in itself can have a dramatic change in the pickup tones. I will mess around a bit with the pickup heights and pole pieces but don't think it will fix the problem. Do I have them oriented correctly? Neck screws facing neck? Bridge screws facing bridge? If I recall correctly I didn't touch ANY of the wiring in the control cavity wiring. Could I have messed up when soldering right at the pickups? If I open up the pickups themselves, how can I check that the wiring is correct? Thanks!

Thanks Mikeo that's helpful. Please see my reply below.

Quite a number of years ago I started to mess with the pickups on my SG. I think it was only with the neck pickup but I'm not a hundred percent positive. I ended up buying a couple of pickups to try out, but ultimately didn't like their sound and switched back to the original 'exposed' humbuckers. I have an extremely good aural memory for sound. Before I started changing the pickups I was getting a beautiful, lush, full round tone on all strings, and noticeably on the B and high E strings, which usually sound thinner on most guitars. This appealed to me for when I played jazz on the guitar. After I finished messing around with the other pickups and re-installed the originals, I immediately noticed that the G, B and E strings were no longer warm and full like they used to be. They now had an 'out of phase Fender type sound'. All the strings probably have this new sound, but it's most noticeable on the high strings. I went back and tried to find the 'original wiring' diagrams for an SG and checked, and double-checked my wiring. Everything looked right. So here I am. I need your help! Can any pickup expert tell me exactly what to look for when I open up my pickup cavity box? What are the signs that I got the wiring wrong? How can I fix this? Thanks very much!

Congrats, enjoy! Good thing she only caught you looking at a guitar. The compensated bass strings are a really nice touch!

I sure hope Thomastik Infeld manufactures theirs. Otherwise I'd be totally disenchanted.