Ernie Ball Music Man JP6 Restoration Project!

[jamminjim]

Aww shucks... it was nothing. Glad to help out and looking forward to seeing this great little JP6 come together ;-)

[ScoobySteve]

This thread and F5 are my friends.

[the24thfret]

This thread and F5 are my friends.

Get a Mac.

[bkrumme]

Get a Mac.

That makes no sense F5 is much easier than Command+R

[the24thfret]

That makes no sense F5 is much easier than Command+R

Ha, good point.

Still, though...

[Morbid]

So I'm messing with the wiring a bit now. Just got off work. I was wondering if I could trouble someone to take a picture of the tremolo cavity of their petrucci for me. I'm having difficulties figuring out what route the grounding wiring goes. Ya know, the one that screws into the electronics cavity, but is also soldered to the tremolo claw and is the ground that connects to the shielding as well. Unless there WAS a hole that is covered by paint somewhere...even still, I would benefit from knowing where it might be

[Morbid]

Nevermind. Found a pic of Spud's tremolo cavity in his stripping thread. Guess it takes the route I thought...interesting. I'll have to experiment.

[Morbid]

Done about all I can tonight. Got the piezo system back and wired up almost all the way (still gotta wire the switch). Got the volume and tone pots mostly wired as well. Had to pull out the switch and unwire it, so I'll have to redo that tomorrow after I call Ernie Ball and find out where I'm supposed to connect that bare wire to.

I'd show the wiring job, but truth be told, I'm a little embarrassed. I had to use different gauge wire that I pulled from a couple of spare pickups. It shouldn't make an audible difference, but it definitely doesn't look as nice as factory. Fortunately, it'll all be hidden. Nevertheless, point is, it's ugly and I don't wanna show it

Hoping to be done tomorrow...

[threeminutesboy]

good job, you're getting near the end

[Coffeemug]

It's gonna turn out awesome...!

[Kaloyan]

So is the new tone going to be

[mesaboogieman]

looks fantastic!

[browndog]

That black is looking good.

[ScoobySteve]

This long journey is almost coming to an end.

*tear*

[Morbid]

Alright boys. You've all been waiting for this, as have I.

IT'S DONE!

Well, mostly. The guitar clearly needs a set up, which as I mentioned is beyond me. It could also use a good fretboard cleaning/oiling.
The guitar seems a little noisie right now, but I can't fiddle with things at much of a volume due to the time of night, so I'll test it out a little more later.

Now, before I get on to the pictures, I'll go into some detail.

After getting off of the phone today with Ernie Ball, I was told that the bare wire that is supposed to go from the selector switch to the washer is supposed to be soldered under the white wire. As it turns out, there is indeed a soldering point there. Glad we got that taken care of. It took me all day and trial and error to get the guitar together properly and soldered up.

So after the guitar was all put together, it was time for the moment of truth. I was literally sick to my stomach...I couldn't help but think that after all these hours, SOMETHING is bound to go wrong. I plug the guitar in...I turn the volume up...I strum a chord...nothing. No sound at all. I fiddle with the knobs and switches, and not so much as a hum. Pardon my french, but "son of a bitch!!"

I swap the jack into the piezo/mono jack, and I have piezo...still not magnetic. Pull the back plate off, look around...the only thing I could see wrong was the selector switch had 2 spots touching that should not have been touching. Turns out it was just dust. Plug the guitar back in...turn up the volume...strum chord...nothing. I look around the inside of the cavity for a little while truly befuddled. I then have an epiphany...I cut the wire leading from the solder point to the washer. I plug the guitar in...turn up the volume...strum a chord...Eureka. Houston, we have D Major.

Now, all that having been said, I STILL don't know where that wire is supposed to be soldered! I'm assuming that the noise I'm hearing is likely from that. Either that or it's just in my head, which after these last couple days is possible. Again, I'll mess with that a little more later.

Unfortunately, I managed to put a small scratch on the back of the guitar (not visible in the pictures) It's not bad...I might be able to buff it out. I'll figure that out later also. I'm whooped for now. There is too much buzz in several areas to handle, so like I said, the guitar needs a set up, the big stuff is finally done.

I'm very proud of myself. It took me a lot longer than I intended for it to, but this is the only project like this I've ever done. I even learned to solder by doing this project...I've learned a lot. I cussed a lot too, lol. Of course, I have to thank a lot of you guys here on the forum for the constant motivation, patience and helping hands. You guys are troopers...thanks for hangin in there this entire time.


Now before I post the pictures, just a couple of questions to the other EBJP owners.

When using the Stereo jack, I can only get the magnetic pickups...no piezo. I'm assuming this is normal and I some special cable to use both?

When using the Mono jack, I CAN get both, but when I roll all the way off on the volume knobs, for some reason, I still hear sound from the magnetic pickups. I haven't figured that one out yet. It bothers me a bit. Any suggestions?

I wasn't playing at a very loud volume...as I said, time of night, but when using the push pull tone pot, I don't notice an extreme difference. Is that just me?


Alright, enough babble and questions.
I went overkill on both size and number of pictures. I figured better too many and too big than not enough and too small (that's what she said).