wiring routing question - Page 2

yamasaki760 · #16 12-06-2012, 10:15 PM

what do you think about this.. should just the bare be grounded, and the white+red go to the microswitch?

silverctr · #17 12-06-2012, 11:35 PM

I think you'll be good to go if you swap the red and white wires based on this diagram.

yamasaki760 · #18 12-07-2012, 08:30 AM

ok, i will swap the red and white wires tonight when i get home (or more than likely tomorrow since we're gettin sloshy after work).

dam that red wire is short.. ugh.. lol

Takin' a Ride · #19 12-07-2012, 09:09 AM

Let me pull the control cover on my '87 Saber today and snap a pic. It won't be 100% the same as a Power, but the switches and pickup wiring should be the same.

Question: are you using the on/off toggle for the bridge humbucker (which should be correct for an '87) or do you have the on/off/on 3-way switch?

yamasaki760 · #20 12-07-2012, 09:17 AM

good question.. im just using the 3 microswitches to control on/off for each pickup.

im not doing any coil splitting on the HB and i just have regular fender 500k volume/tone pots on the guitar right now.

i cant remember if i had coil splitting on my original 540p back in the day..

i have a bunch of beaters at home. i currently play an LTD most of the time right now, so, i'm really looking forward to having a decent ibby to play with.. i'm picking up a really nice strat in a couple of weeks too, so, i may eventually take this one apart again and do it all up original (or hopefully just either buy my old ibby 540 back from my friend or pick up one in originaly condition here or on ebay at some point.. and keep this one as a player)

yamasaki760 · #21 12-07-2012, 09:30 AM

lol, alright, i didnt wanna do this, but this is one of the only pics from back in the day that survived and has a decent pic of the whole guitar.

i'm the goofy looking kid on the right holding the guitar.. this pic was probably 88-89 somewhere in there i think

yamasaki760 · #22 12-07-2012, 09:31 AM

if anyone has a rosewood fretboard, 22 frets, with a black headstock that says Ibanez (and nothing else, it does not say "Roadstar Series"), please let me know.. im not a fan of the neck i got on there right now.

Takin' a Ride · #23 12-07-2012, 11:23 AM

On an '87 they used 3 on/off switches and the coil tap was either done by the volume knob (Saber) or the tone knob (Radius/Power).

In '88 the Radius went to a 5-way switch and the Saber and Power went away from using the knob to switch the coil tap and instead went with a 3-way switch for the humbucker. The Power ditched the tone knob. You can see it really well in this picture:

I have some pictures I'm working on of my '87 Saber wiring and have a wiring harness from an '87 Radius that I can take pictures of as well. I'm still trying to figure it out myself. I'm working on assembling a Power today.

Takin' a Ride · #24 12-07-2012, 12:02 PM

So after looking at my Radius wiring, I'm inclined to believe it's been modified. Lots of messy solder work and the humbucker switch has been changed to one of the 3-way toggles. I think I've figured out why which should be clear after you see this picture.

The three toggle switches are wired in parallel off the center lug, then there's a lead back to the typical volume position off the neck position switch.

On the humbucker, the red is wired to the side lug of the switch and the white is tied back to the middle position on the top part of the volume switch. Remember, this is a coil tap volume switch.

So regardless of what position you're in, the volume knob should control both coils identically. On the Radius and Power, the setup is reversed. The tone knob serves as the coil tap control. This would allow you to have totally independent control of the volume of both coils, but it would alter the tone at the same time. The only reason I can think to do this is if you had the tone all the way up, you'd only want to bring in second coil at full power?

Makes no sense to me. I'm thinking about either wiring it like the Saber or just ditching the coil tap thing altogether. I'm using a Duncan JB in the bridge so I'm not sure I even want to bother with that. I can always use the Saber if I want something with coil tapping.

yamasaki760 · #25 12-07-2012, 12:52 PM

Takin' a Ride, thanks for the awesome posts.. much appreciated..

looks like i'll be on the hunt for a coil tap pot at some point..

LonePhantom · #26 12-07-2012, 02:39 PM

Coil split everyone, not tap. Coil tap is when a single coil has a secondary hot wire earlier in the coil, used to drop output for more vintage tone.

yamasaki760 · #27 12-07-2012, 03:06 PM

10-4 LonePhantom... thanks for the education.. ive been out of the game for a while..

Takin' a Ride · #28 12-07-2012, 05:56 PM

Huh, never knew that. I get what's going on. The red wire is the hot lead on the humbucker. You should have it wired to the toggle switch. The white wire goes to the left lug on your push/pull pot. The right lug is tied right into ground. When you hit the volume knob (Saber) or tone knob (Radius/Power), it grounds that rather than leaving it floating and you get a coil split.

The pickup behaves like a single coil in that configuration and you get much lower output.