[Drache713]

i was wiring up a 5-way switch for my guitar, and to just make sure everything was clean i undid everything and redid all the wires. I also added a volume bleed cap on the volume pot. the only problem is, the volume knob doesn't act as a volume knob anymore - it acts as a tone pot. and I wired it up exactly like the wiring schematics on the ibanez web site. i have no clue what's going on, can anybody help me out - what is going wrong?

[Drache713]

well, got a new volume pot and that fixed the volume problem. Only problem left is that I wired up the switch and wires just like the ibanez site has for the 7620 and the neck series and bridge series both work (positions 1 and 5), but position 2 (neck in parallel) is dead and positions 3 and 4 (both humbuckers series and coil tapped bridge/neck respectively) both sound the same. Hmmm...any ideas? I just got a new switch too and it's still doing this...

[Drache713]

update again, lol

put the other 5-way switch i originally had in, and bam, no dead spots. But, positions 1 and 5 work (neck and bridge series), but 2, 3, and 4 all sound the same. Again, wired exactly like the ibanez diagram. Could it just not be the right type of switch? it's a ym-50, the guy i bought it from said that's the replacement for ibanez 5-ways...

[giannifive]

Boy, sounds like you're having a lot of fun!

The 5-way switch that Ibanez uses for H-H guitars is not the same as the 5-way for H-S-H guitars. I can't remember the names, but the H-H 5-way is the one that allows you to get the two coils of the neck humbucker in parallel. The way to test if it's working like you think is to tap on the pole pieces with something metal (I use a small metal ruler). If the coil is active you'll hear a loud thunk. If it's not you'll hear a dull thud or nothing at all. Try this for each position of the switch.

[Drache713]

yeah, i figured out right as you posted this that indeed the switch i bought isn't the same one used in the ibanez schematics, so it won't work to wire it the same...

that being said, does anybody have wiring schematics for two humbuckers for a YM-50 or a VLX53?

[7 Dying Trees]

Go get yourself a VLX91, despite being a bit stupidly complicated, they will allow you to do pretty much any wiring you want as it's a switch with 4 independant plates...

[Drache713]

whew, okay, we can all relax now, lol. I managed to make the ym-50 work.

i took a wiring diagram off of seymour duncan's website, and noted the cable color differences between them and dimarzio's, adapted accordingly, and adapted the 4 to a side switch they had in the diagram to the 8-inline ym-50, and now this is the switching system i have:

position 5: bridge humbucker
position 4: bridge and neck humbucker
position 3: neck humbucker
position 2: bridge humbucker with neck split
position 1: bridge split

pretty versatile tones and single coil sounds, so i'm happy! everything's good now.

[Metal Ken]

wouldnt you want pos. 1 and 5 to be the extremes (bridge and neck only)?
Weird. But hey, if you dig it, and it works.

[Drache713]

Originally Posted by Metal Ken

wouldnt you want pos. 1 and 5 to be the extremes (bridge and neck only)?
Weird. But hey, if you dig it, and it works.

would I want it that way? yes

do i know how to wire it that way? nope

do i want to try to go through the hassle of trying to wire it that way when it works this way? nope, lol

it'll take some getting used to, cause i'm used to just throwing the switch all the way to the neck bucker for some leads then throwing it back to the bridge for rhythm, but i'm sure i'll get used to this over time. plus the sounds i can get are different than if I were to use say an ibanez 5-way like i've been used to for years, so the change is pretty cool.