StewartB Posted February 5, 2010 Share Posted February 5, 2010 Posting this to declare my pleasure after doing an upgrade on the wiring harness of my Epi Dot. I bought my brand new Epi Dot a few weeks ago and mentioned in a previous post how good I found it to be. It's a Qingdao factory job made in September 2009, but the wood is good and the finish also good. I can't resist modding guitars, so it was only a matter of three weeks before the soldering iron got warmed up! I have read many times that forum members often swap out the pups for Gibson 57 Classics or similar because the Epi 57 stock pups sound a bit muddy. I did play it for quite a while and fiddled with EQ. Yes, stock Epi 57s do sound a bit muddy (not real bad though!). Rather than rush out and buy Gibson 57s (here in Australia you have to take a second job if you want to buy new Gibson pups - a pair of the 57s cost AUD$500 retail), I thought I'd upgrade the electronics first. I bought 4 matched 500k CTS pots - 2 x audio taper and 2 x linear taper- and decided to use the Gibson 50's wiring layout. I had two of those Russian PIO caps - each .022mfd and used them in the circuit. Anyway, after setting out the pots on a piece of cardboard as a working jig, I soldered caps and a bit of earth wiring (picture below). After three hours and two skin burns from the soldering iron, my new wiring harness was installed (pictured also below). Trepidation before plugging in.....what did I miss, will it work? All good. Fired up the bottles in the Blackheart Amp and was pleasantly surprised at how the pups had cleaned up. Better string definition, no mud or icepicks, good mids, overall sound is excellent. I think that I will still go for the Gibson pups once I find an affordable pair on ebay, but for now this Epi Dot sounds great. I'd also comment that the Grovers, nut, and bridge parts as stock are pretty good. I'm a habitual "string-bender" and the tuning seems to stay rock solid. I will eventually upgrade the bridge and stopbar to Tonepros and get a graphite TUSQ nut in place, but all good for now. Word of warning - anyone with blood pressure problems or stress issues should NEVER replace the harness in a semi-acoustic! Wish I had xray vision and elastic fingers!! Total frustration!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dfarrell Posted February 5, 2010 Share Posted February 5, 2010 Your a brave man, changing out all the pots on your dot! I had to change the switch on mine,and that was bad enough to make me think long and hard about changing the rest of the electronics on mine! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StewartB Posted February 5, 2010 Author Share Posted February 5, 2010 Your a brave man' date=' changing out all the pots on your dot! I had to change the switch on mine,and that was bad enough to make me think long and hard about changing the rest of the electronics on mine! [/quote'] I love the challenge - my doctor doesn't! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruce_09 Posted February 6, 2010 Share Posted February 6, 2010 I've considered doing this with my Dot, but I'm not keen on all the F-hole fishing it's going to take... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StewartB Posted February 6, 2010 Author Share Posted February 6, 2010 I've considered doing this with my Dot' date=' but I'm not keen on all the F-hole fishing it's going to take... [/quote'] The f-hole fishing is not too bad. The process is to take off the plastic knobs, then tie a strong piece of cotton or string around the split shaft. It needs to be a long length, maybe 30 cm (12 inches). Next, release the nuts and washers holding the pot and use a long piece of stiff wire to pull the pots out of the cavity through the middle of the f hole.. Unsolder. replace, (tie the string to the replacement pot), then pull back through the relevant hole in the laminated top. The process works. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AS90 Posted February 6, 2010 Share Posted February 6, 2010 Looks like a neat job, I can knock up a harness like that in 30 mins so was it the fishing part that took so long? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sFLsniper Posted February 6, 2010 Share Posted February 6, 2010 you did it smat with the card board jig- good job Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gordy01 Posted February 6, 2010 Share Posted February 6, 2010 I haven't had the opportunity to work on a Dot yet. Could you not pull the bridge pickup out, and fish through the bigger hole? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strumbone Posted February 6, 2010 Share Posted February 6, 2010 Good job! Been there, done that...yup, it's kinda tedious and frustrating, but the end result is well worth it! The pup cavity on my Sherri was only large enough for the wiring, and definitely not for the pots, switch, and jack, but I've heard that some are large enough to pass through. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StewartB Posted February 6, 2010 Author Share Posted February 6, 2010 Looks like a neat job' date=' I can knock up a harness like that in 30 mins so was it the fishing part that took so long?[/quote'] Hi mate. Yes, the fishing took a while, but I forgot to mention in the post that the four holes for volumes and tones needed to be very carefully drilled out to 10 mm because the shaft diameter on the stock pots (Alpha BTW) was 8mm whereas the diameter on the new CTS pots is 9.3mm. I was a bit slow but took it steady. Stewart Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StewartB Posted February 6, 2010 Author Share Posted February 6, 2010 I haven't had the opportunity to work on a Dot yet. Could you notpull the bridge pickup out' date=' and fish through the bigger hole?[/quote'] You probably right Gord. I didn't think to do that probably because this is my first mod on a semi. I've done alot of strats and a couple of LP style guitars before. Will try that next time as I may decide to change the taper on the volumes to linear.. At the moment the tones are linear and the volumes audio taper. May also go to the 300k pot values for volume. Have you tried that? Curious to know if it makes much difference compared to the 500k? Thanks for the suggestion. Stewart Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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