General wiring questions

[jayj]

Hi all,
I completed (mostly) my RS modern wiring kit installation, and low and behold it actually works!

I've learned a lot about soldering and working with guitar electronics as whole, but I could use some general pointers on a few things:

-I ended up using my old switch with the wiring attached. this wiring is an insulated cable with individually wrapped wires. This works ok, but I ended up having to splice the ground and hot output of this to a braided cable out to my jack.
I stripped the braided cable back an inch or so, wrapping that around my output wire, and applying some solder. The ground wire I wrapped around the braid and soldered there as well. Is there a better way to splice a braided wire to a pair (hot/ground) of regular wires?

Ultimately, I think I need to run a solid braided wire from the jack all the way to the switch to keep it cleaner.

- I need some hints in dealing with braided wires. My previous wiring had the braided part peeled back off of the core, but I'm not sure how to do that cleanly. Any advice?

- A hint I can pass along, maybe obvious to others: my volume/tone knobs were too big for the RS pots, they kept falling off. I stuck a flathead screwdriver in between the two halves of the top of the pot (the part that goes into the knob), and pried them apart ever so slightly. Now my knobs fit securely.

The kit itself sounds great, I've got a lot more treble than I had before and things seem very clean, less muddy, but I need some more time with it to really get a feel for it (and adjust everything else in my signal chain, like my amp, my pickup heights and pole pieces, etc.)
Once I'm happy I know what it can do with my current humbuckers, it'll be time to drop in my GFS Dream P-90's, which I'm sure will really shake things up.
Another thing I've learned: if you want to understand how each of a set of changes affects your tone, only change one thing at a time!

[hillbilly]

Originally Posted by jayj

Hi all,
I completed (mostly) my RS modern wiring kit installation, and low and behold it actually works!

I've learned a lot about soldering and working with guitar electronics as whole, but I could use some general pointers on a few things:

-I ended up using my old switch with the wiring attached. this wiring is an insulated cable with individually wrapped wires. This works ok, but I ended up having to splice the ground and hot output of this to a braided cable out to my jack.
I stripped the braided cable back an inch or so, wrapping that around my output wire, and applying some solder. The ground wire I wrapped around the braid and soldered there as well. Is there a better way to splice a braided wire to a pair (hot/ground) of regular wires?

Ultimately, I think I need to run a solid braided wire from the jack all the way to the switch to keep it cleaner.

- I need some hints in dealing with braided wires. My previous wiring had the braided part peeled back off of the core, but I'm not sure how to do that cleanly. Any advice?

- A hint I can pass along, maybe obvious to others: my volume/tone knobs were too big for the RS pots, they kept falling off. I stuck a flathead screwdriver in between the two halves of the top of the pot (the part that goes into the knob), and pried them apart ever so slightly. Now my knobs fit securely.

The kit itself sounds great, I've got a lot more treble than I had before and things seem very clean, less muddy, but I need some more time with it to really get a feel for it (and adjust everything else in my signal chain, like my amp, my pickup heights and pole pieces, etc.)
Once I'm happy I know what it can do with my current humbuckers, it'll be time to drop in my GFS Dream P-90's, which I'm sure will really shake things up.
Another thing I've learned: if you want to understand how each of a set of changes affects your tone, only change one thing at a time!

You can certainly use your old switch & wires, but I often advise guys to change out the whole entire switch to the old-school design (2 wires to each volume, and 1 wire to the jack).

The metal-braided wire is just "push back" wire; peel it back a little, and push it down, exposing the black cloth over the wire "core". Push the black cloth wire back a little, and you are ready to go.

Glad you got things in there OK...if you ever have any questions about your kit, please call RS, or you can contact me here...

[jayj]

I had the new switch rigged up ready to install before I realised I mistakenly was sent a long-shaft switch, so I switched back to the old switch at the last minute. I was going to email your customer support about it next week sometime.

Rigging up the three braided wires to the switch was a bit fussy, what with all the grounds. I'd love to see a picture of how it is done "right".

[WildeStarr]

Originally Posted by jayj

Ultimately, I think I need to run a solid braided wire from the jack all the way to the switch to keep it cleaner.

If you do this, make sure you have shrink wrap or some other type on insulation covering the braided wire as it passes through the control cavity. This will keep the braided wire from shorting out against any of the lugs on the volume and tone pots