The Steel Guitar Forum

I have some older L-705 pickups that have different wires coming out of them.

One has five wires - red, green, white, black, bare sheild.

Another has three wires - red, black, bare sheild.

They look exactly the same, but wires are different.

How do I hook them up?

Thanx

The Ones with Red . Black. And Bare . Red Is Hot . Sorder Black And Bare Togather On Ground. Hope this Helps. SONNY.

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SONNYPRIDDY

This is just my take on this......

It's obvious that the 5 wire unit is a dual winding/humm-buckin' pick-up.

based upon my early training,many,many years ago, the colorcode of the wires are as:

1) the red is the "hot" lead for one coil.
2) the white is the "hot" lead for one coil.
3) the green is the other end of the red wire.
4) the black is the other end of the white wire.
5) the bare shield is to ground the caseing of the pick-up.

The same configuration is also use in the magnetic pick-up of hi-end phonograph players. (red,white black,green)


If you don't have a switch to change the P/U configuration...
1) just tie the "red" and "white wires together,That is now your "hot lead.
2) Tie the "green","black" and "bare shield" together,that is now the "ground" lead.

Next, if there is a switch involved, it gets kinda tought here. There are various ways to connect the 2 pick-ups together. (Yes,there are actually 2 P/Us in one singular caseing here.) Unless one is really into the tonal,impedience,or other frquency responce area, this method of connecting/configureing the wires is,at best,subjective. Mostly based upon trial and error and what your ear hears.

Most of the time these muti-wired P/Us are set up as for what they really designed for: a SINGLE hum-bucking pick-up device.

My 2cents.....


<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Bill Crook on 22 February 2003 at 04:15 PM.]</p></FONT>

Ya' sure they're Lawrence's?

Jeff, yes, these are Bill Lawrence P/U's, silver. The two with 3 wires, I bought new ,and still have the factory circular boxes they came in. The five wire ones are IDENTICAL in size, shape, and looks, plus they have the same paper label "L-705" on them, so they must be Bill Lawrence.

Vernon and Bill, thanks for the help in the wiring hookup. I will try it.

I looked around in Bobbe's shop and found an old 705 with the same Belden 4 conductor you have. On this particular pickup, the black and shield were ground, and the only hot wire was the green. Reading these on an ohm meter gave me the usual 19k/20k reading for a 705. Even with the 4 conductor, this was not a tapped-coil pickup. Get an electrical tester and check your pickup. This pickup actually read 19.4k.
Sorry it took me so long to get back to you, but Bobbe's pickup bin is huge, and seems practically bottomless. Also, you can not just say 'red is hot-no white-no some other color', or anything like that without checking first. These are very early pickups. Wire from pickups to jack do not need to be shielded, except I think for single-coil it helps. On humbuckers, it's a waste of wire, and can actually be detrimental resistance-wise.

Jeff, Many thanks for the extra info. I will check resistances, and see how close I come to what you got on the 'old' 705's.