This project is almost complete, but. . .

[thearabianmage]

Right, so I've been fixing up this guitar. I just gave it my first-ever crown, which wasn't so bad, but now that I've strung it and played it, I've noticed two things:

1 - there is still a 'scratchy' feeling under the strings when I bend - the frets don't have that fully mirror finish yet. I crowned them, and I have this little metal shimmy with a slit in the middle, so I put that over the fret, and got 0000 steel wool and gave it a rub before using some metal polish called 'Maas' so give it a shine. Can anyone help with this?

2 - the volume doesn't seem to work. Before I replaced all the electronics, I made two very thorough diagrams for where everything went. I've checked all the connections and they all seem tight. The only thing I can think of is that originally, some of the wires were soldered into the same blob, and when I did it, I put each one separate.

There were no leftover wires, no excess wires needed, and after double-checking the diagrams, everything is in the right place. Are there any soldering rules that a self-taught solderer should know before connections work? I'm stumped.

Apart from these two minor hitches, the guitar works great! I'm well chuffed! But I need to fix them ASAP, the kid who's buying it wants his new guitar!!!

Cheers

[ted s]

Joe, I'm thinking you should hit those frets with some 900 or so grit wet paper (use it dry) or really fine emery cloth before the polish. Polish on it's own will probably not remove the scratches from the crowning. Having said that, I have never crowned a fretboard but I have cleaned up my frets on a cheapy that had similar symptoms to what you describe.
As far as the pups/controls go, can you give us more description.. HB's, singles ? how many ? switch and pot configuration ? I think once you give us that someone can post a link for a diagram.

[thearabianmage]

Joe, I'm thinking you should hit those frets with some 900 or so grit wet paper (use it dry) or really fine emery cloth before the polish. Polish on it's own will probably not remove the scratches from the crowning. Having said that, I have never crowned a fretboard but I have cleaned up my frets on a cheapy that had similar symptoms to what you describe.
As far as the pups/controls go, can you give us more description.. HB's, singles ? how many ? switch and pot configuration ? I think once you give us that someone can post a link for a diagram.

Thanks, for the info, buddy, I'll try that one with the frets :AOK:

As for the pots' configuration, I can't give an actual diagram but here goes:

It's an H-S-S with one volume and one tone - which I have just learned the tone isn't working, either. There are about 34 connections all together.

From the neck pup there are two wires - one to the pup selector, and one to the volume. There is a ground behind the actual pup that connects to a screw in the body near the volume pot. This is the same for the middle pup.

The bridge has a thick wire with 3 wires inside of it - 2 plastic wires and a metal wire. One plastic wire goes to the pup selector, the other two were twisted together and soldered onto the tone pot (that's how it was before. . .) There is also a ground going from behind the pup to the same screw.

There is one wire that connects the volume pot to the screw with the other grounds on it. There is one wire connecting the tone pot to the volume pot.

There is one last ground that goes from the tremolo to the volume pot.

The pup selector has 8 possible connection points, 3 of which are assigned to the pups and the 4th goes to the left-most prong of the volume pot, where another wire in the same prong connects that to the middle prong of the tone pot.

The input jack has two wires, one to the middle prong of the volume pot, the other to the top of volume pot.

The original groupings (before I separated them) were that the wires from the neck/middle pups, the ground from the trem, and wire connecting the tone and volume pot were soldered in one glob together and the wire from the input jack and the wire connecting the volume to the 'ground' screw were soldered together in one glob. Both of these were on top of volume pot.

The capacitor (a pretty sweet 'Orange Drop' as it's called) has one wire on top of the tone pot, and the other in the left-most prong of the tone pot.

I've mentioned 'left-most' prongs on the pots and have just realized that could be either prong that is not in the middle, so to clarify, the 3 prongs on the volume pot are facing the bottom of the guitar, and the 3 prongs of the tone pot are facing away from the bottom of the guitar.

I think that is every single connection! *phew*

Cheers, y'all

[ted s]

Check this out.. look familiar ?

http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/wiring-diagrams/schematics.php?schematic=1hum_2sing_1vol_1tone_5wa y

[thearabianmage]

Check this out.. look familiar ?

http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/wiring-diagrams/schematics.php?schematic=1hum_2sing_1vol_1tone_5wa y

Thank you thank you thank you thank you!!!! :AOK:

[ted s]

glad to help

[thearabianmage]

glad to help

Ted, thank you very much - both of your suggestions were correct!

Well, the Seymour Duncan schematic wasn't exactly like the Charvel, but the problems were that specific wires weren't soldered together, and I hadn't bent the right-most prong on the volume pot back and soldered the right wires to that. Funny, I never thought that made a difference, but that's what I get for assuming things about subjects I know nothing about.

Cheers dude! :dude:

[ted s]

here is a link where I snatched that pic.
http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/wiring-diagrams/

select your configuration and it will spit out a dwg.

[thearabianmage]

here is a link where I snatched that pic.
http://www.seymourduncan.com/support/wiring-diagrams/

select your configuration and it will spit out a dwg.

Sick. . . That is a handy little site, there, I tell thee what. :AOK:

Cheers mate