2020 LIII HH with custom EBMM pickup wiring

[Rbg]

So I never was a fan of a neck custom MM on my 2022 LIII BFR. After the warranty expired I decided to pull the plug and try different pickups. While doing so I decided to perform some TLC maintenance for the MM pickups. They were taped terribly with wires tucked in between coils pretty sloppy so looked like pretty bad. On a top pole screws were flacking from the day I received it. Will be fixing all that, cleaning up wires ad repotting. Anyway, for now I installed Suhr TB+ and TB in the guitar and I am beyond happy with the sound. While doing so I had to figure out the magnet polarity and the wiring. I see some posts here about people swapping pickups, but there is no visual concise information on the forum. Maybe this will be helpful.

1. Bridge hum bucker is pickup is wired like DiMarzio with North Pole being at the slugs
2. Neck pickup has north at the screws and the wiring is different from the DiMarzio

Please take a look at the wirier diagram of the EBMM HH pickups with respect to some other brands.

BTW, I don't like this terminology at all, but it looks like that what people use

 

[DrKev]

I thought the neck pick ups were the same as DiMarzio too. Let me check with customer service and engineering on Monday morning.

 

[Rbg]

That would be nice. As this drawing is based on one set of pickups I have in front of me and one set of suhr TB that I installed according to my understanding that are, in turn, based on somewhat limited set of measurements I’ve done. I have a bridge transition that I can confirm matches MM bridge. I don’t have a neck DiMarzio, but from what I can see on the internet when standard they have same magnetic polarity with respect to slugs/screws.… but the magnetic polarity is swapped in the neck MM with respect to the bridge.

 

[Adder]

Just saw this. Very curious to know what the outcome was. I swapped out my EBMM pickups on my 2022 LIII with Dimarzio Transitions. The original MM neck pickup was pole reversed with North at the screws. So I did the same to the Dimarzio neck pickup, pulled out the magnet and flipped it so North was at the screws. Then wired as per the original wire colors as MM confirmed that their wiring colors are the same as Dimarzio. I read on the forum that this is to maintain humbucking configuration when two single coils are selected on 5 way switch 2 and 4.

 

[DrKev]

I’m sorry, it totally slipped my mind (my wife was in hospital that week). Stay tuned…

 

[Rbg]

to make this diagram I took apart my pickups, identified the magnets polarity and coil winding direction.

As a side note: if you look online, which I did a lot, there are examples where DiMarzio or SD change windings and magnet polarities in pickups made for particular guitars. So the transition neck can totally be “organized” differently thank the bridge.

 

[DrKev]

OK, official word from Music Man…

Music Man use the same wiring colors as DiMarzio for both bridge and neck humbuckers.

That should means that in a simple wiring scheme with no coil splitting, red is hot, green is ground, black and white are tied, for both pickups.

It’s worth noting that the Marzio virtual vintage and area noiseless single coils are wired opposite to the rest of DiMarzio’s line. That may be where a lot of confusion comes in. But to the best of my knowledge their full-size humbuckers are all wired identically.

 

[Rbg]

Please take a look at this thread I found: Music Man Luke 3 HH Hum Issues

It confirms what I found in mu guitar.

@Adder can you please follow the traces on your removed pcb to see if white and black or green and red are connected? If you don't mind of course.

 

[DrKev]

I’ve noticed some thing that may be part of the issue, common to many manufacturers...

For neck pickups, the screw coil is the north coil (red and black). For bridge pickups, the screw coil is south (green and white).

Cosmetically the screw coils are on the outside, and the slug coils are on the inside, but for any combination, a north and south coil have to go together.

 

[Adder]

I’ve noticed some thing that may be part of the issue, common to many manufacturers...

For neck pickups, the screw coil is the north coil (red and black). For bridge pickups, the screw coil is south (green and white).

Cosmetically the screw coils are on the outside, and the slug coils are on the inside, but for any combination, a north and south coil have to go together.

I checked the DiMarzio bridge and neck transition PUs. Screw coils are always South. Slugs always North. That’s why you have to swap the magnet polarity on one of ‘‘em so that when the two outside single coils are active ( the 2 screw poles they are North and South,) keeping the bucking properties.