Hey everyone, hope you are all well!?
I'm looking to get the flagship preamp, though I'm struggling how to wire it. I understand how to connect the piezo and so forth. What I'm struggling with is connecting the magnetic pickups.
I'll have two pickups on a 3 way switch with two vol and two tone, how on earth do I connect it properly to the preamp? The preamp will be used a 5 way blade switch to control the features of the preamp.
Just totally lost how I'd go about it. I'm guessing wire the magnetic pickups like normal, I assume the wire going to jack will go to the preamp somewhere. But any other wiring to the preamp I'm lost.
Many thanks,
Reece
I'm looking to get the flagship preamp, though I'm struggling how to wire it.
@schwifty You lost me at “flagship preamp” I’m afraid. 🤣
Wiring/soldering etc is my worst skill in guitar building so I can’t be any help. I’m sure there are others here that can help you.
Good luck and post some pictures when you are ready.
Make guitars, not war 🌍✌️🎸
@tv101 Let me link the preamp details, I cant find an actual wiring diagram that includes this preamp. Hence why I'm scratching my head, currently getting a bald spot lol
https://schaller.info/en/flagship
@Boo haha tell me about it!!!
Hi
Ok, pick up hot to volume pot like normal whether you have tone pot connected with it or not. Outward wire hot on the middle terminal of the volume pot going to the solderless terminal ports of the preamp normally a screw that tightens it in place and requires a special screwdriver, I think that comes with the preamp harness. One for bridge and one for neck pickups. Twist both pick up ground wires together and insert also in the solderless middle terminal of the preamp for ground. Can you see it?
Clinton
@clinton Thanks so much for the reply, I think I'm starting to make sense of this now. So you would wire it from the volume pots as oppose to from the pickup selector? What I'm stuck on is the preamp has one terminal port marked yellow for the magnetic pickup, while the one next to it is for the magnetic shield (what is that? 🤣 )?
After what you said I checked Schaller again and I think they say use the wire that comes from the selector to jack, but that's just one wire. So how do I plug the magnetic shield crimp? Or I suppose in other words, what is that? Haha Sorry to be so daft, but I'll get it I'm sure!
Many thanks in advance for all the help I'm getting here!!
Hi
Ok, I use tone monster harness that has the same principle of solderless wiring system. Keep in mind pick ups have different color coding based on the manafacturer. The yellow and red terminal ports are your positive hot one for neck and one for bridge pick up, the black is your negative ground. I think next to the yellow is a port option for magnetic shielding ground if you choose to shield tape or shield paint your guitar. Ideal if your guitar will be around a lot of electrical current such as arena concerts. Regardless it is still a common ground and can be utilized as such. All preamp active wiring powered with 9volt has a stereo output jack(3 prong) unto which the negative ground of the 9volt battery is automatically connected to the extra 3rd prong. It acts as a ground so that you do not need an earthlink apparent to acoustic style wood bridges that accomodates piezos to where no metal is involved to conduct grounding to eliminate buzz. This pre amp already built in has that stereo output jack and 5 way selector that just simply plugs in to it’s onboard terminal jacks. It is basically plug and play with your existing vol and tone pots with your pick ups. It also has a seperate vol/blend pot for the piezo in itself. Just screw in hot wires in red and yellow and ground wires in black and uncolored ports. The iron gear wiring diagram is passive wiring for push/pull pots for series/parallel coil splitting. If you have that set up already it can be installed to the flagship and omit and overide the existing 3 way and the mono output jack. Keep in mind the flagship requires a space 9 volt battery in either your wiring cavity or a seperate battery box on the side or back of guitar.
Clinton
@boo Yes it is cool, my last build had a piezo tune o matic and wired passive. Was not fully satisfied. Recently got a pre amp from tone monster. Solderless wiring harness. Had the same principle. Made the modification to active but with passive humbucker with dpdt switch coil splitting. Seperate vol/tone for each pick up 3 way switch. Difference of night and day. The middle on the 3 way runs active with piezo and passive with humbucker. Sounds like a super beefed up acoustic/electric tone. Nuances of acoustic but driven with alnico magnetic sonic qualities. Quite unreal.
@clinton Thanks for that! Though I do have a question, I forgot to mention I have a schaller hannes piezo bridge. I'm rather sure the red and black port is just for the piezo + & -, so it only leaves one other port for the magnetic pickups being the yellow right?
Just to clarify, after all your help I think I've got it now.
• Red and black port for Piezo
• Yellow for magnetic (wire comes from pickup selector that originally goes to the jack (jack is replaced by the one that's included with the preamp))
• Black is for grounding any shielding in the guitar.
Therefore you'd stick to the same wiring harness other than the wire leading from the selector to jack going to yellow port.
Something like this;
Have I got this right? If so I'll celebrate with a whiskey thanks to your help! Haha
@boo It's rather neat! A great way to try make your guitar a hit more versatile!
Only thing I don't like a huge amount is two pickup selectors, because the 5 way on the preamp is there to either give you raw piezo, preamp piezo, piezo & pickups, pickups powered by preamp and pickups alone.
You then need another selector to choose the pickups you want active which is a little bit of a pain. But I'm sure it will sound great 🙂
@schwifty The beauty about it is that there is no soldering. Basically easy for trial and error troubleshooting which input ports to insert hots especially phasing on the humbuckers and piezo that may occur. That could only be done by ear. Your diagram Looks about right I think but I think the ground wire coming from your 3 way switch may be inserted to the copper shielding port as indicated. Also you may need a crimp style terminal to consolidate all the bridge piezo wires. Right? I think the stereo output jack is all you need for I think this system reads and distinguishes mono or stereo signal depending upon what type guitar cable you use. Anyways, hope it works out. Interesting wiring harness. Looks freakin awesome. Got me thinking now.
Hey Bill,
Not sorted yet...in fact it has evolved a little 🤣 I think I may actually cry here as I don't know why I do it to myself.
Instead I've made a decision to have two Seymour Duncan P Rails that will run through a ON/OFF/ON Mini Toggle switch to select;
1: Humbucker
2: P90
3: Single Coil Ceramic
The two pickups will be selected by a ON/ON/ON Mini Toggle switch and rather than having two volume and two tone pots, I'm going for two 500k/500k concentric pots which will then finally go via the preamp to output.
I'll send a diagram I'm working on for your guys seal of approval, I'm yet to finish a guitar I'm building. Just started placing the frets in so may be a little while before I get the wiring done but hoping to do it sooner than later.
Let me know your thoughts!
R