Pickup replacement tutorial?

[bhuether]

I want to change pickups on one of my Ibanez's. I have never done that before and was hoping to find some good resouerces online (I also have never soldered before). Any suggestions? I did some google searches and didn't find anything that good.

thanks,

brian

[warren]

before you take anything out draw yourself a diagram of where the wires go. and double check its all correct. once youre comfortable with that, heat your iron up for 15mins before hand. when soldering dont hold the iron on your pots to long, it may damage them. when you have solderd them, hold it for at least 3secounds to harden (i blow on them), if you get a bad joint you could have a bad connection.

hope thats any help.
warren.

[themadsplatter]

dude,go to seymourduncan.com/support/wiring-diagrams/ and also seymourduncan.com/images/support/schematics/color_codes.jpg.thats all the info youll need for the wiring.as far as soldering goes.go to youtube and search soldering tips,and guitar tech soldering.youll be a pro in no time....

[TMatt142]

sevenstring.org has a guy who does a good pickup install tutorial as well....Might want to check that out......Oh, and if you can, try and solder as much outside the electronics cavity as you can...Makes it a lot easier.

[bhuether]

I have a 30W soldering set from Radio Shack. Do you think that will do the job?

[kshands]

If its the gun then no. You have to get the pencils. I always use a 20w pencil. Spend $30-$40 and get a good weller pencil or something other than a radio shack that won't last long. Dont get nothing over 30w in a pencil. Tooo much and it could fry your electronics.

[bhuether]

Ok I think I have everything I need. Just a little unclear on cleaning. I bought some 91% rubbing alcohol because I read something about needing an alcohol based cleaner to clean up the resin or flux or whatever after done the soldering.

thanks,

brian

[bhuether]

Ok I did some practice on an old guitar cable. Didn't go so well. The iron tip looks pretty odd after just several minutes. All brown, black and white. I have wiped it down and tried tinning it. Every time the solder just forms in a bubble on the tip. I must be doing something completely wrong... Definitely not ready for the real deal...

brian

[waylay00]

The soldering iron will look like that once it has been heated up and it reacts with oxygen.

The trick in soldering that most people have difficulty with is to get the components hot enough so that they are melting the solder, rather than the soldering iron itself. That's where it gets tricky, though, as you don't want to sustain the heat on there long enough to damage anything. A 40w iron is not too much, and I think the higher wattage makes soldering onto potentiometers (which require more heat to create a joint) a much easier task. If this is a one time project, the 40w Radioshack will do just fine. If you plan on doing more soldering in the future, it'd be wise to invest in a nice soldering station with a variable wattage, such as the Xytronic 168 or Hakko 936.

Magnus Olsson has a very helpful tutorial on his website:

http://www.magnusolsson.com/index_music.html

Click the "Guitar Setup" link and scroll down. You'll see the two links under "How to change your pickups."