Another 5-way switch Q

[Tahoebrian5]

Here's the deal... I have an RG560 (HSS), there is no actual wiring diagram available that I have been able to find. At some point in the past I had a tech install a pickup. It never sounded good, and I reinstalled the original. It never sounded the same after that so I bought a new guitar and it's been in the closet for around 10 years. Long story short... I have installed a D-sonic and am still having sound issues. I have used the RG570 diagram as a reference but the pickups have different color wires (no red, only blk and white) and there is no bucker on the neck. Help?

One more thing... looking at the pinout on Ibanez 5 way switches the center 2 poles appear to be the main inputs that gets jacked to the different contacts. Why does the RG570 diagram only show a connection on 1 of these poles?

[djohns74]

Essentially, the switch is a 2-pole design, so you have two independent sets of lugs, 4 lugs each. On a typical HSH Ibanez, one "side" of the switch (say, side A) is used for the actual selection of which pickup gets sent to output, and the other "side" (side B) is used for the automatic coil-tapping in positions 2 and 4. Side A gets output to the volume control and then on to the output jack, but size B requires no output, thus its common terminal is not wired up.

Your problem is most likely going to be due entirely to wire colors as typical HSS wiring is basically the same as HSH, just without the auto coil tap for the neck pickup. You need to figure out the color codes of your pickups, at which point following the 570 diagram should work out fine for you.

[Tahoebrian5]

I bypased the 5-way as a test and left the neck and middle pups unhooked. So the bridge pup (d-sonic) is hard wired directly (grn/red to ground/vol pot, and blk white soldered together for series humbuck per dimarzio). I am still getting what sounds like a weak signal. When I compare it my jem (evo's) it is night and day in volume. The d-sonic is raised pretty high so not a pup height issue. Any other thoughts? Pots? 1/4" output jack?

[djohns74]

I suppose you could take the volume pot out of the equation and just wire the pickup directly to the output jack. Beyond that, I guess you can't completely rule out a bum pup, say maybe a broken wire somewhere in the coils or something, but I wouldn't think that would be terribly likely.

[Tahoebrian5]

Didn't think of that, I guess I will give that a try. If nothing comes of that I will look into checking resistance values for the pup coils. Thanks for the input

[Tahoebrian5]

I took vol pot out and it sounds great! Thanks for the help

[OneShot]

the process of elimination. Nothing works better for problem solving.
Now just get a new potentiometer and your good to go!

[valriver40]

your wiring seems wrong to me. green and bare wire gound to back of v pot. red to selector switch. black and white together to sel. swith, that is how my ibanez is wired.

[EvoGiant]

the black and white go to the switch for coil tap. if you want just the full humbucker, the black and white are connected to each other and taped off, and left unconnected to anything.