Problem with my 650 Neck PU

[edski]

I'm transitioning back to guitar after a few years playing bass. For the moment, it's going to be all acoustic while I toughen my fingers up again, and get my singing voice back into shape. But I see electric coming back into the future.

My last days playing 6 sting I was having an issue with breaking strings on the Dakota - probably a couple bad sets of strings, but I stupidly put on 11 or 12's and then didn't touch the 650 for the few years. well I did a few times, enough to know that the strings choice was a mistake. I put 9 1/2's on, and it feels great.

Today I finally got the motivation to fire up the old, noisy Peavy Triumph and see what I got out of the old tubes. Yes, some noise, really needs a re-tubing, and I'll get to it. But I was surprised to have very little output from the neck PU.

By itself, the neck PU volume control has effect - cut out all the way the PU is dead like it should be. But the tone seems to increase the volume, and when the tone and volume are maxed the PU volume is about 1/10 of the bridge PU volume. Real weak...

Not sure what could have gone wrong sitting in a case for 3 years. Any suggestions would be helpful, maybe the best suggestion would be a trustworthy Rick tech in the Tampa FL area.

Thanks!

BTW - the treble PU and controls work just fine....

[johnallg]

Ed, not sure on the pickup volume, but for the tube amp, I would unplug it, let it sit for an hour or two, then pull each tube out, then reinsert them into the sockets, wiggling them in to "wipe" the contacts. Do this for each tube one at a time. Also run the volume, tone, and other pots end to end about a dozen times. See if things have improved.

[edski]

Thanks John - I was thinking of getting some contact spray for the guitar pots. It's the only think that makes sense - the guitar funtioned perfectly before I switched to bass a few years back, save for breaking D strings a lot, which I presume was just a bad lot of strings...

The amp has always had extraneous noises, anyone with a late 80's early 90's Peavey tube amp will tell you they are not the quietest amps (but this particular one is such a crisp clean sound and can rip on it's distortion channels, so it's worth it). It seemed to behave about as I remember it, but taking out the tubes probably won't hurt. I know that I need to retube the whole thing - it was getting close to that time back in '04 when I took the 4001 out of mothballs.

[johnallg]

Then for the amp, when you clean the guitar pots, clean the amp pots too. They could have used lesser quality pots that allow dirt and dust in.

[jdogric12]

Just saw this... how's it going Ed?

[edski]

Busy as #%!!, as usual...

Band is done (anyone need any PA gear??? ), starting to play acoustic again.

I'll try to give you a call in a week or so!

[BlueAngel]

I was surprised to have very little output from the neck PU.

By itself, the neck PU volume control has effect - cut out all the way the PU is dead like it should be. But the tone seems to increase the volume, and when the tone and volume are maxed the PU volume is about 1/10 of the bridge PU volume. Real weak...

Not sure what could have gone wrong sitting in a case for 3 years. Any suggestions would be helpful...

The pickup has a broken connection at the ground end of the coil (or the lower end of the upper coil/upper end of the lower coil in a humbucker). This will usually allow a small amount of signal through (by capacitance coupling to the pickup casing, which is also grounded), but it will be very thin and weak-sounding, and the tone control will affect the volume too since there is so little real fullness to the sound. (If the break is at the hot end of the coil, the result is silence.)

If you're lucky, it will be a bad solder joint either where the cable is soldered onto the volume pot casing, or on the PCB baseplate of the pickup itself. If you're unlucky it will be in the coil itself, which in the case of a Rick humbucker unfortunately is Game Over because the coils are resin potted and there's no way to repair them. I would put a small bet on it being one of the joints on the PCB since the coils being potted will help to protect them, so there is (some) hope.

The likely cause is corrosion, which can happen if an instrument is left untouched in a case for some time. A guy I knew some years ago bought a 360WB from a shop - when he tried it it was fine (I know, because I was there with him), but he had it on layaway for several months before he paid it off, and when he got it home he was shocked to find that the guitar was almost completely dead - BOTH High-Gains had failed coils and had to be rewound. But that's extremely unlucky.

[jdogric12]

Actually, my band is just starting to play out. We have a ton of PA speakers but no amps, so yes, please let me know whatcha got!

[edski]

A couple Crown XS 900's...900 W a side into 4 ohms, 600 W a side into 8 ohms.

A BBE Max-X3 crossover

2 Samson s-com 4's (4 channel compressor/gates)

A nice nominal 12 space rolling rack...I say nominal bc 1) not really sure, and 2) I know from getting units in there that there's probably a missing space if you tried to really fill the thing. We have it maybe 2/3 full (the ex-drummer has an old Yamaha processor that really doesn't do **** anymore in there), and it's friggin' heavy...not sure I'd really want to fill it more. Take 3 guys to lift it at that point.

Speakers - pairs of EV Eliminator i mains and subs. A pair of Yamaha floor monitors - think they handle 300W each, so they're at least heavy duty. I know they've gotten some abuse the last few years and work fine after the spilled drinks dry out.

As for the Dakota -

No dice trying to clean the pots, but the switch is getting really balky...I had the same issue once on my 4001, which seems to be a similar switch. All the soldering in the wiring harness is fine, the only other possible problem is the PU is 90% dead, which seems bloody unlikely.

Any suggestions on how I might solder a couple simple shunts to bypass the switch? Or should I just test the resistance of the PU first?

[johnallg]

Ed, if you have an ohmmeter, compare the two pickups. If not, to short out the switch, look at it and there are 4 tabs, two vertically to a side. The top one will have the gray shielded cable from the pickup and a cap to the tone pot, while the bottom will have a red wire to the volume pot. Short these two tabs together - if you have a clip lead, use one clip and short them. If not, use a screwdriver and short the two tabs while you strum the plugged in guitar and see if it improves. If it does, and you want the short permanent, solder a short wire between the two tabs.

[edski]

If you're lucky, it will be a bad solder joint either where the cable is soldered onto the volume pot casing, or on the PCB baseplate of the pickup itself. If you're unlucky it will be in the coil itself, which in the case of a Rick humbucker unfortunately is Game Over because the coils are resin potted and there's no way to repair them. I would put a small bet on it being one of the joints on the PCB since the coils being potted will help to protect them, so there is (some) hope.

The likely cause is corrosion, which can happen if an instrument is left untouched in a case for some time. A guy I knew some years ago bought a 360WB from a shop - when he tried it it was fine (I know, because I was there with him), but he had it on layaway for several months before he paid it off, and when he got it home he was shocked to find that the guitar was almost completely dead - BOTH High-Gains had failed coils and had to be rewound. But that's extremely unlucky.

Missed this last night, so I'm going to have to get inside there and have a look. Thanks for the advice, and I guess I should learn a lesson about this climate I live in...

[jdogric12]

Yep. I've had brand new hi gain button tops rust in about five years.