How to Wire in a Humbucker & Single Coil into a Fender Telecaster. Also how to paint a guitar.

[yangadoshi]

isnt there going to be a bit of a volume drop with the neck and bridge pickup swtching. i watched this video and im gonna get a telecaster and do this to it, cuz i wanted to reduce the twang and get a more punk sound, thanks!

[TheARDENWOOD]

@yangadoshi No there won't be any volume loss when switching. If you do get volume loss when your using both pickups at once, then you wired the pickups in wrong. If your single coil alone is quieter than your humbucker alone....thats pretty normal. Just means your single coil isn't quite as hot. But running BOTH pickups at once shouldn't decrease in volume. Sure fire way to test if you wired them in right. Hope that helps.

[g3tard]

Hello,

Nice video and verry nice result! :) You sir are pro :P

I have one question tho. I want to upgrade the pickups on my guitar.

And i wondered if you knew if there will be problem installing EMG Hambuckers into a Telecaster.

I have Seymour Duncan pickups now but i want EMG because i'm such a EMG fan xD

And yeah i don't have that much experience, But i'm willing to learn so i thought i'd just go with it ^^

[TheARDENWOOD]

@g3tard Yes you'll have a bit of an issue trying to fit it in. The pickup cavity at the bridge position only holds a single coil, you'll need to route that out to be bigger. The neck pickup cavity is big enough to hold a humbucker without routing though. EMG's are also "active" pickups I believe. I don't have much experience with installing them, but you'll probably need to rewire the whole switch plate and pots. Tele's aren't set up to receive active pickups, at least none that I've seen.

[g3tard]

@TheARDENWOOD

Oh sorry, my bad.

Forgot to say i own a Fender Telecaster Special Edition. It contains 2 seymour duncan hambuckers.

Well. it shouldn't bring any problem, or will it?

Also i just wonder if you knew,

If i buy the two 81 and 85 hambuckers seperate,

Will it contain like switches and all the electronic i need?

[TheARDENWOOD]

@g3tard Ok so the humbuckers will fit the guitar then. If you buy the pickups separately you do run the risk of the pickups not coming with everything you need to hook them up. There are "Passive Conversion Kits" out there. Passive and Active pickups get wired in the same way, they just use a 9V battery as a preamp. The kits go for about $12 and nothing more than a pot with a battery box wired to it. Hope that helps.

[69erthx1138]

Very nice result!

[SirGuitarLord]

Use your wiring (red & white tied together, Black to ground & Green to the 3-way switch).

Insulate the red & white wires that are tied together.

Connect the bare wires to ground.

[aRietD]

fk the song is intense could you just record just the song? all i can do is try pls let me win

[iConverseMyLife]

what was the first song ?

[TheARDENWOOD]

@iConverseMyLife Its a song I wrote called "You can try, but can't win"

[iConverseMyLife]

@TheARDENWOOD I really like it :) sounds femiliar though ;)

[MattTMoss]

I have a question, i'm trying to do the opposite thing then you. I want to to put a single coil in the neck position of an HH guitar. How do i do this?

[TheARDENWOOD]

@MattTMoss That depends on the guitar. IF your guitar has a pickguard the answer is simple. Just buy a pickguard with a single coil cut out. If you don't its a bit harder. Sand guitar down to the wood then fill in the hole as much as needed with Marine Epoxy Putty.

[TheCemgesx]

You could just buy new guitar, or you could use Seymour Duncan single sized humbucker pickups. For colour, buying a new body would cost lower. or you could just use sticker-like things to cover body. Waste of time. But 5 stars for labor.

[TheARDENWOOD]

@TheCemgesx: I could also pay someone to do oil changes on my car for less than I could do it myself, but I choose to do it myself because I find it fun.

I like tools and tinkering with things.

If I were to buy a guitar of this quality it would cost about $500. After EVERYTHING I spend fixing my guitar I only spent around $250.

This guitar was also a special gift to me so restoring it was important. Its seen hundreds of shows, memories are something you can't buy.

[griffinmpable]

@TheARDENWOOD I agree 100% with you. I have an Arbor strat style all white guitar that is just your standard S-S-S and I actually handwired in a second single coil into the neck position to create my own humbucker. cut the slot on the existing pickguard and made sure my polarities were opposite and wired it right into the same spot as the regular neck pickup. since theres a little bit of space between them, this awesome weird tone comes out. wouldntve happened if i didnt tinker

[standardtele]

what size screws did you use for the bridge plate?

[TheARDENWOOD]

@standardtele Not really sure. Went into a well stocked hardware store and just found screws that fit the holes flush and were stainless steel. Different brands of bridges will have slightly different specs and designs. So you might need to do the same.

[AlexJGuitarnut]

I think you might need to improve your spelling..

[Prelude1383]

@AlexJGuitarnut yes! he jst mite needd to improv his speling

[JoacoDolcemascolo]

i got de same straplocks,are great

[mrFatalDemize]

I like the color Naked!

[stratgeek09]

Did you have to do any routing?

[TheARDENWOOD]

@stratgeek09 Yeah I routed out the bridge pickup area using a little handheld router from "Harbor Freight Tools".

Check out 0:42 - 0:53 in the video.

[kummempaa]

Where you bought that humbucker bridge?

[TheARDENWOOD]

@kummempaa I actually forgot the name of the company. I got it online threw ebay though. Just type in "Tele Humbucker Bridge" and you'll get tons of them that pop up. They range from $17 - 300. Most are in the lower range though. Mine was $23. I had to replace the saddles on it though because they made my high strings go flat. Hope that helps.

[kummempaa]

@TheARDENWOOD Okay, thanks for help!

[Rachda81]

you can find it on the seymour duncan site , hum/single telecaster

if you know yout pu and you know how a switch works..simple.

I build guitars myself.

[TheARDENWOOD]

@Rachda81 SM didn't have a hum/single tele when I did this video. This was also my first guitar so no I didn't know exactly how the switch was going to work.

[Rachda81]

finding a wiring diagram isn't that hard....let alone 'impossiable'

[TheARDENWOOD]

@Rachda81 Finding a digram that depicts 1 single coil and 1 humbucker wasn't something I was able to find. I found 2 single coils and 1 humbucker and 2 humbucker 1 single coil diagrams.

It took calling a bunch of guitar repair places to find out how I would go about wiring it in.

Funny, like I haven't been made fun of for my spelling before. Frikin hilarious. I bet everyone at home reading your brilliant joke is rolling on the floor from laughter right now. I'm dyslexic, get over it.

[leadistac]

your painting method sucks,you should ask the pros.....

[TheARDENWOOD]

@leadistac Its the same method that Dan Erlewine uses. Many professional guitar making shops have seen my guitar in person. So if your a guy trying to make a living doing this and hate seeing others do it, well I'm sorry. This is just as good as any paint job you'll see any guitar in a store. The only difference is color preference.

[joelbyrne]

Nice demonstration. Terrible guitar playing!

[gunsandammo92]

do i need a preamp on my guitar to get amplitude? or can i use the amplifier to do all the amplification?

[TheARDENWOOD]

@gunsandammo92 Not totally sure what amplitude means, but yes if you want your electric guitar to be loud or have any volume at all you need an amp.

If your talking about recording then you don't NEED an amp. You can just use pedals if you want, but it won't be quite as nice as a mic and an amp. Tube Amps are where its at, but they can be pricey if your poor like me.

[gunsandammo92]

@TheARDENWOOD amplitude is teh sound pressure level. pretty much the volume. i meant pre amp. the volume knob on the guitar. do you need that to get volume on the guitar or let the amp do all the work?

[TheARDENWOOD]

@gunsandammo92 No you could wire a guitar without a volume knob, but your always gonna be stuck at one volume for your guitar.

Me personally I always have my volume on my guitar all the way up and turn it down between songs.

[RUINSMASS]

Hey what should i use if i just wanna fill the neck pick up whole in (single coil hole) ?

i just got done putting an EMG 81 in the bridge, sounds amazing....but im gonna tear it down again, fill in the whole and paint it...what should i use to fill the whole in ?

[TheARDENWOOD]

@RUINSMASS Def Marine Epoxy Putty. You can get it at ACE for like $5 a tube. Let it fully cure and dry out before you attempt to paint over it though. Depending on how big the hole is it could take a month or more to fully dry. But if you don't do that it will cause the lacquer to crack over time. Make sure you get the PUTTY not the resin. Its usually green and comes in a tube. In the middle of it is some white stuff. You'll take some of it and mix it together with your fingers. Cool stuff.

[shinfo002]

@TheARDENWOOD word i was thinking maybe get a peice of wood or somethin and screw it actually into the body first...then use that epoxy you were talking about, so it doesnt take forever to dry and crack evently....thanks for the tips man! your guitar came up fuckin so good!

[TheARDENWOOD]

@shinfo002 Thanks. Yeah that wood idea is what most people think, but trust me you don't want to go that route. Let me put it this way. That chunk of wood and your body will play "tug of war" with the epoxy and it won't be good. If you do get cracks it will be yrs from now. If you do get cracks this is what you do. Take the same color spray paint and a tooth pick. Get a tiny bit of paint on tp and drip into crack. Let it over flow a little. Then lightly sand and buff it. DON'T put clear on top.

[EliSexyton]

Didnt actually start from scratch :(

[TheARDENWOOD]

@EliSexyton Cutting out a body shape, picking out the wood, making sure you have the proper tools, and making sure your numbers are perfect is a bit more than that majority of people are willing to go through.

I'm just showing that you can alter already existing guitars and get a custom guitar without having to actually cut out the shape or build the neck. Thats a little more involved than a 5 min video could do. If your looking for instructions there are tons of books out there for that.

[TheARDENWOOD]

Cool.

[IAreCrazyChris]

p.s. im getting a dimarzio 36th anniversary PAF humbucker for the bridge.

[IAreCrazyChris]

what about the single coil? does the humbucker sound good along side the twangy tele single coil? what single coil would you recommend?

[scott24071991]

im sure fender loves its narrow neck and wide brides lol 0:46

[TheARDENWOOD]

@scott24071991 Never played a Tele have you? Your not the only one who seems to think this is odd. Tele's have a bridge thats wider than normal because it wraps around the pickup. Making sure your bridge covers the humbucker hole is a little difficult when your routing your own guitar. The necks are also thinner than most. Many Ibanez fans say "nope Ibanez is thinner". It is thinner in the back of the neck, but across fretboard its wider than a tele neck. Go work on a tele and you'll understand

[scott24071991]

@TheARDENWOOD i intended to point out the spelling mistake

[XAlphaZEROX]

What kind of Fender Tele was it? The standard?

[TheARDENWOOD]

@XAlphaZEROX It was a Mexican Fender Tele. 94 I think was the yr, not sure though. Don't really care, this guitar got me threw quite a bit. Several yrs I actually a broke saddle and just never fixed it. I never play the high E anyway lol.

[MusoJTM]

Your guitar turned out pretty kool, I'm just finishing building my own, i started from scratch, n wiring was a bitch, you got it right when you said its confusing.

[TheARDENWOOD]

@MusoJTM Yeah its not so bad once you start thinking about it more like a single coil. Problem is no one wants to put a humbucker into a tele so finding diagrams was difficult.

[stainonsociety3451]

Just a thought, when i painted my last guitar i didnt take it back to the wood, just keyed it then sealed it with a few layers of water based primer, you get the same effect as taking it right back but with much less effort, and you dont need to wait nearly as long for it all to set if you keep it near a source of constant heat. Some people say thats cheating but my local car body repair shop gave me that info, it really works.

[TheARDENWOOD]

@stainonsociety3451 Ummm really??? I'd imagine that would work for a few years but then you'd start getting cracks and dull color from mixing auto paint with nitrocellulose.

[stainonsociety3451]

@TheARDENWOOD Thats why i used a water based primer, i built up about 6 layers, then 2 layers of auto paint primer that matched the paint. I must admit the finnish isnt quite as deep but i'm not a pro, tbh the finnish i got was better than i've seen on decent epiphones/squires so i'm not complaining, lol. I just like to stand out at a gig. When the lights are shining on you and your moving around people dont really notice the finnish you spent weeks building up, lol.

[coketherealthing]

Nice Job from what it used to look like to awesome

[vainparasite]

Nice job dude, I did one last year but it was a squier tele and put 2 buckers in that i picked up on ebay, I ended up selling it to a guy for a huge profit after he pestered me for a few weeks. Ive just finished a dean ML now which was my latest project but my son tooka liking to it and that was the last i saw of it ;0)

[lyle18Metallica]

who could be arsed with ALL that waiting just save up all that time and buy a new guitar :s

[brownbigb]

s playing the guitar in the video?

[mligh2]

good work man. im gonna do something similar i think

[marcifer69]

nice work for the new paint job and rebuild. great patience. i think i would have smashed it and bought a new one.

[guitargod1598]

ok i need a little help, i have a real basic setup, one humbucker 1 vol, but the jack doesnt werk, with certain positions of the cable i lose my signal completly...any ideas?thax

[belfastgiants09]

dude i need your help please .....im new to this stuff ... can you put seymour duncan blackouts into any guitar that already has humbucker pick ups ? write back thanks

[TheARDENWOOD]

@belfastgiants09 Yeah I don't see why not. You'll just need to figure out what the color pattern for your pickups are vs. your guitars.

[stevoe1000]

it sounds really good now..I have a tokai japan tele too..did you replace both pick ups or just the bridge....really sounds and looks a lot heavier than a normal tele now :)

[leavingpastime]

@guitargodattheheart The sound was incredible. Heavy sounding, just like what I've expected. At least I'm happy with it. As for the battery, I did not route out a battery compartment for my Tele. I placed my battery at the empty routed neck pickup since I'm not using a neck pickup. I've got an Esquire pickguard to cover up. :)

[TheARDENWOOD]

@leavingpastime Ah yeah. So you went with Active pickups then. I probably will with my next tele but I'm not sure. I think I'm stuck on the traditional sound.

[toolpool]

Thanks for the effort and the post.  And at last, another guy who wears it low!

[BassplayerGC]

nice job!

[McKinoza]

"...Fenders have narrow necks and wide brides..." there a joke there but I'm going to leave it alone. :-)

[cakire82]

Find a wiring diagram for HB and a SC pup is not impossible. You just need to look for it. Seymour duncan website was wiring diagram in their support page.

[volt9stormrider]

How did you route out the bridge pickup cavity to accommodate a humbucker?

[xiisign]

Go to seymour duncans website and they have wiring diagrams for every possible config you can think of.

[leavingpastime]

Great job on the Tele! I fitted my Tele with an EMG 85 on the bridge and had the stock neck pickup removed.

[guitargodattheheart]

@leavingpastime two questions. 1, how does the tele sound with the emg? iv landed myself with a mustang style body so im fitting a new neck ect but with that style of tele bridge with an emg and single coil copy. second question, where did you put the battery case thing for the emg? thanks :)

[DemonLlama25]

awesome i want to put in some seymouir duncan invaders in a tele

[AmeerTUB]

dude, love the Tele. it looks so good and good video too. i need to rewire my tele now.

[off9]

Wow..Cool..I just want to ask something from you. Can i actually modify my Squier Bulletstrat from single coil pickups guitar into humbucking guitar? For example, like buy a pickguard that suits two humbucker pickups and do some wiring.. sounds ridiculous right..

[TheARDENWOOD]

@off9 Yeah you can do it. Your going to need to make sure its a Squire pickguard though otherwise it wont fit perfectly. Or if your happy with your pickguard you can cut out the pickup holes to accommodate at humbucker. A dremal tool is best for that job.

[SwordMasterz2]

Not a tele fan at all, but I love what you did for it. Great tips!

[6ties66]

I only have 1 red whire on the humbucker

[TheARDENWOOD]

@6ties66 every pickup company is different

[Sh0w3rH3ad]

@6ties66 it's probably because the connection between the two coils are inside the pickup. this just means that you couldn't wire the humbucker for a coil tap feature. it also sugests a lower quality pickup but i have nothing against that pickup design. just a little limited in it's capabilities

[wildchild1970]

great job man

[CeefBurtains1901]

nice job, looks really great I cheated though I used paint stripper on mine and put a P90 in the neck, it gives you a better sound, when you've got bridge and neck together.

[TheARDENWOOD]

@CeefBurtains1901 Eh, I'm not a huge fan of using both a neck and bridge pickup at the same time. It def makes it much more full sounding, but to much clarity is lost on high gain amps. However clean sounds better. Next guitar I'm going to get rid of the switch and put 2 volumes and 2 tone knobs. That way I can have my bridge 100% and bleed to neck into it a little.

[kdjfnvjvd]

great rebuild dude! before it looked like a hunk of shit now she looks like one KILLERRR guitar!

[TheARDENWOOD]

yeah it was seriously a garbage guitar. Thats what you get when you don't take care of it for 10yrs. Sad thing is I actually still played with that guitar for shows, sucked big time! The guitar is now awesome, even for non-tele fans.

[lodir]

thx, that was a lot of help, didn't know how to connect the cable from the volume pot onto the switch

[H3lloSE]

i installed 2 blackouts emties on it though. So mine was easier than this.

[H3lloSE]

im doin the same job more or less. took me quite a lot of time :/ but its coming good xD

[TheARDENWOOD]

yeah it can be time consuming and expensive. There aren't that many reliable resources out there for doing this sort of job, so I messed up a lot and had to spend almost 2x what I planned. This video should help prevent mistakes.

[H3lloSE]

@TheARDENWOOD lol am just finishing some wiring for 2 humbuckers. I got the new blackouts EMTY of mick thomsonxD btw do yo have the name of the heavy riff?

[tkdbender]

good job!

[IbnzArtist]

way cool ! about to undergo the pick up mod on my 2000 American . thanks for posting !

[82markyboy]

5 days of sanding with a block. LMAO Buy an electric sander!

[TheARDENWOOD]

didn't feel like spending the money on a tool I'd use once. Besides you can end up sanding to much off and messing up the body, if your really lazy you can use paint remover.

[JohnathenDavis]

Never heard of bare knuckle. I also find these to be very nice passive pups. Gibson Dirtyfingers, Dimarzio Super Distortion, Seymour Duncan JB, '59, P Rail, and my favorite pup, extremely awesome, very affordable, the Bill Lawrence L500XL, $50 from Elderly's Music. It's the same one Dimebag used.

[TheARDENWOOD]

Bare Knuckles are handmade pickups out of the UK. They run about $100 per pup. They don't use machines to determine if a pickup is good its all tested by ear.

Artec makes Gibsons pickups.

[Hazel8Gaze]

awesome job man! respect!

[nirson123]

is it hard to "expand" the singlecoil hole to fit the humbucker?

[TheARDENWOOD]

It was more scary than hard. I used a hand held router so it jerked quite a bit. I accidentally took to much out so I filled in the mistake with Marine Appoxy Putty. You could make it easier with using a power drill with a big drill bit. Having a stationary router will make a pretty hole but it really doesn't matter long as everything fits right.

[nirson123]

@TheARDENWOOD

I think I'm gonna try to modify mine, thanks for the answer and BTW nice guitar

[PdashT]

I was surprised at how many coatings you need on a sand polished body... I thought I'm good with 3-5. Do you think metallic car paints would work?

[TheARDENWOOD]

I've never used metallic paint before. I'm assuming if its car paint it will work very similar. Still stick with Dupli Color though, cheap brands like Krylon are just unstable and can break down. Try on a little extra piece of wood before you attempt your guitar. Make sure it will work.

[JohnathenDavis]

Nice work man. But I would have used either EMGs or Bill Lawrence pickups, depending on if you are a passive or active man.

[TheARDENWOOD]

I personally like Bare Knuckle Pickups. EMG's are supplied Artec pickups. They also supply Gibson with their parts. I didn't feel like spending my money on a brand name.

[DemonLlama25]

guitarfetish have realy cheap pickup like $20-$50 for like to humbuckers depending on what kind

[JackHargreave]

im well scared in doing this. I was thinking of making a new guitar gonna get some strat ody cba to paint it then put in some DiMarzio pickups to make it win

[TheARDENWOOD]

Yeah a strat would be a safe way to go. They are the easiest and cheapest guitars to find. Plus you wont need to route out a guitar like I did. I would have but I wanted something different. Every guitar out there you can find a humbucker in, but teles atleast like this are hard to find.

[JackHargreave]

kk how hard is wiring the pickups to wereever it goes?

[TheARDENWOOD]

Reading wiring diagrams looks more confusing then they really are. Basically every pickup has a signal out and a ground. All you really need to do is solder the signal out to a switch then the ground or grounds (humbucker) to the volume pot. Also making sure you have a bridge ground. Its not that bad really.

[JackHargreave]

kk i will have to try this but not buying the expensive shit first try it with cheap shit it works then ill try

[TheARDENWOOD]

A strat would be a much easier project than what I did. Only because most strats are routed already to fit humbuckers and parts for strats are much cheaper. Good luck. DiMarzio pick ups are very good too.