3rd (green) wire from Twisted T Neck in standard wiring

I have tried to wire a Baja with a standard 3-way switch circuit (from Acme) and I soldered the green wire from the twisted Tele neck pickup to the back of the volume pot with the rest of the black (ground) pickup wires. I thought the green wire from the TT (soldered to the chrome cover) was considered "ground." But I get a lot of hum/noise from the middle pickup position and neck-only position (most from middle position). Apparently there is a grounding issue. What is the correct wiring scheme for this set up?

Anybody? Need some help here!

Ah come on. Won't somebody please help?

why 2 posts on the same topic?
a 2 second site search yeilded this:
http://www.tdpri.com/forum/tele-tech/171261-going-custom-4-way-standard-3-way-baja.html


Happy wiring

why 2 posts on the same topic?

Cause there's apparently not much traffic in "Just Pickups" and I desperately need some advice. I would like to delete this thread but there is no option to do that. So I will completely change this thread if people such as yourself find it annoying.

There should not be any noise (well, any more than with just the bridge pickup).

The green wire does go to the back of a pot. You can see that in the Fender diagram here (http://www.fender.com/support/diagrams/pdf_temp1/telecaster/0141502A/SD0141502APg2.pdf).

It is frustrating, but debugging takes time and you need to be methodical.

Let us know which diagram you're using, preferably with detailed pics (i.e. several angles) of your guitar wiring also. What is the noise, is it hum, or radio interference, static, etc.

Here is a link to a diagram from Fender's site of a '60s tele http://www.fender.com/support/diagrams/pdf_temp1/telecaster/0131600A/SD0131600APg2.pdf which is exactly the circuit I got from Acme plus the "volume kit" as seen in this photo, on the volume pot if you can make it out.

http://www.acmeguitarworks.com/images/prewired/tele_control_plate_300.jpg

(close up of volume kit):http://www.acmeguitarworks.com/images/electronics/680_220_200.jpg


I just discovered this diagram from Acme's site: http://www.acmeguitarworks.com/pdf/modern_tele_diagram.pdf . It shows "shield wire from neck pickup" attached to a lug that looks like it's screwed between switch assembly and control plate.

So I'm fairly confused. I once read somewhere about taping off a ground wire so you don't "ground out." Maybe I should disconnect the green wire and tape it off (?).

Also the noise is not the typical 60 cycle Fender hum - it's a higher pitched buzz on top of the 60 cycle hum (on ALL pickup positions) and goes away when I touch the strings.

The noise you describe can be just a tele/amp thing. Can you confirm that the noise was *not* there before you made the change to your Baja, with the same amp, same cable, same stompbox chain, etc?

I'll go have a look at the links you provided now.

EDIT: the two diagrams are more or less the same, but I'm not a fan of placing the neck pickup shield wire at the switch - I prefer *all* ground wire to be on the back of the volume pot (neck pickup shield, neck pickup ground, bridge ground, bridge pickup ground, jack ground, ground lug of the volume pot, one leg of the capacitor)

The 'volume kit' is a treble bypass, I would leave that out until you solve the noise issue.

If you have the patience (and you'll need it), you have to try various parts one at a time. Try without the switch, with the bridge pickup hot lead connected to the input of the volume pot. That gives you the following:

- bridge pickup hot to input of the vol pot
- bridge pickup ground to back of the vol pot
- bridge ground to back of the vol pot
- vol pot ground to back of the vol pot
- vol middle to jack
- jack ground to back of the vol pot

Nothing else connected. Try that and see if you have the same noise. If you still have noise, I suspect your problem is not your guitar. Time to check other things.

The noise you describe can be just a tele/amp thing. Can you confirm that the noise was *not* there before you made the change to your Baja, with the same amp, same cable, same stompbox chain, etc?

I'll go have a look at the links you provided now.

It's absolutely not a tele/amp thing. I get it from my Peavey Classic 30 and it's the same out of my solid state Marshall. I'm using one very high quality Lava cable. Most importantly, this guitar was whisper quiet when I had a Don Mare set in there. I just took those out and installed a new set of Baja Twisted Tele and Broadcaster pickups and hence the horrible noise.


:confused:

The Twisted tele has three wires - green, black and yellow. The Green is the shield, it does go to the (single) star-earth point (e.g. back of tone pot). Twist the black and yellow into a twisted pair. If I remember rightly, the presence of a yellow wire makes this a reversed pickup, so the black is hot and the yellow cold. It should not be noisy either way, if it is out of phase then reverse black and yellow. Diagram for Baja on Fender/support SD0141502A.pdf.

isn't Don Mare hum cancellng?

isn't Don Mare hum cancellng?

I believe the Mares are totally hum canceling (RWRP, I think) in the middle position but there was no noise, only 60 cycle hum in other 2 positions. So it was fine - and with this control plate circuit. I also used this Acme control assembly in another Tele with a SD Broadcaster and a Rio Grande Tallboy neck pup and there there was never this noise. Both sets of pickups just mentioned only had 2 leads each for each pickup (as opposed to the 3 wires from the Twisted Tele). Now Jefrs says green to back of tone pot, cc9cii says green to back of volume pot?!?!?!?! :confused:

:cry:

Try my (edited) suggestion. You must start from a known working config (i.e. bridge pickup only) and work from there. If a single pickup connected to the volume only is still noisy, then that must be fixed before you do anything else.

Justa thought but is your bridge earth still connected? Jack connections not reversed? Hope you can get it fixed, I've had some bad buzzing problems in the past, drives you nuts!

Try my (edited) suggestion. You must start from a known working config (i.e. bridge pickup only) and work from there. If a single pickup connected to the volume only is still noisy, then that must be fixed before you do anything else.

I appreciate your involved suggestion but it is more than I want to take on. If I can't fix it by changing one thing (the connection of the green wire for instance) it's going to a guitar tech.