Jump to content
Gibson Brands Forums

Rewiring my Sheraton II


Recommended Posts

I am going to rewire my Sheraton II completely and get new pots, switch, and jack. I will also be putting in a new neck pickup. My store said that they would charge $100 but I feel like if I take my time I might be able to do this myself. Can anyone give me a step by step way of doing this with pictures? I need as much information on this as possible as I have never done anything like this before.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

well either way' date=' can anyone just show me some references? I probably will pay the $100 just because it is guaranteed to get done right but I just want to know. My grandpa is a master at anything having to do with electronics so I will have some help. [/quote']

 

You can totally do it yourself if you have the time and patience. Check out my post "Sheraton II rebirth" - I just did exactly what you want to do last week, and I'd never done anything like it before. It's not that hard. As long as you do it carefully and systematically you really won't have a problem.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Zergle just got parts from me, pre wired, for his sheraton. You can look for his thread.

He went with Alpha minis.. and sprague orange drops with independant volume controls and treble bleed caps, shrink tube,

wire, new output jack and a new toggle switch, which I prewired.

 

The hassle is threading them in. Mojo tone has a tutorial video on youtube showing how it's done.

A hundred bucks is too much.

 

Look, it's kind of hard.. you have to have patience, but it's doable.

I prewired Zergles, 'cause I do that free when people order the parts. Comes with wiring diagram printed out.

Some people don't.

I'm not supposed to sell in here.. and I'm not trying to, but holy crap, a hundred bucks is twice the cost of the parts prewired...

So.. shop around for parts..

 

Some guys have put full size pots in.. but they had either later model sheratons with larger f holes, or they had to file away some of the binding in the f hole to get them in.

The alpha minis are solid, smooth, sound great and fit right in.

 

If your grandpa has some electronics experience, I'm sure he'll be able to help you wire it or get it all inside.

 

What goes wrong:

usually, you pull something too hard and break a solder connection and then have to pull it out and resolder it.

You can do that more than once if you force things.. if you take your time however, they'll go in nice.

Another thing is last minute twists.. putting the nuts and washers on without holding the pot shaft solidly lets the pot or switch

twist inside the guitar.. and that can short a connection or cross a wire or pull a connection loose, etc.

 

You MUST remember, if you buy the parts and solder them together yourself, to have the pots turned all the way down. otherwise

the soldering iron heat can give you a dead spot on the path.

 

I test with the continuity function of my digital meter, grounds have to be solid with these.

Your grandpa will know!

 

Another thing to bear in mind is knobs.. I can only get usa splines.. which wont fit stock sheraton knobs as they are metric.

Zergle bought new knobs, too.

You can get the stock knobs to fit, however, but you have to mess around with them a bit and most people prefer not to do that

since the knobs are pretty cheap and it's nice to have them fit pefectly.

 

Seriously.. I think that an hour messing about is better than paying a hundred bucks by far!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Speaking as a guy who's done this exactly twice, it certainly is something any average do-it-yourselfer can manage. It is tedious and does require a good bit of patience. Not brain surgery. Twang's advice is spot-on.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm assuming the $100 is just the labor while the parts will probably be another $50-$150 depending on the pups you put in.

 

I did a LOT of research on this before deciding to take advantage of TWANG and have him set up the wiring for me. The pre-wired sets you can get at places like Stew Mac and Mojo are nice, but they are around $100 and will likely require either drilling or some sort of filing to get them in the holes and/or through the f-holes. From what I've seen the ONLY advantage to going that route is to have everything pre-wired and the wiring lengths set just right.

 

For me, I'd never soldered before in my life so that was my first fear. However, to get over that I went to a local electronics shop, got an iron and a couple of junior science kits that you can use as practice. After a couple of runs with that, I know now that I'll have no issues. If you've never soldered before, take that practice route before you try to do it on your guitar.

 

Ultimately the reason I went with TWANG was cost, and because of the wiring. Not the soldering, but the wiring itself. Getting proper lengths, proper wraps, etc. To me, having someone who's done that part a few times would save me a lot of headaches later. So now I have a nice panel with everything wired and ready to be put in the guitar. A couple of solder points on my end to hook up the ground and the pups, and all is groovy.

 

If you do it completely on your own, you should be able to get all the parts and wiring for less than about $50 at the extreme, plus whatever you spend on the pup. If it was me, I'd do it on my own. I haven't put everything in and hooked up yet, but I'm not concerned. Plus, I know EXACTLY what is being put in, how the wiring is, how everything is soldered...everything. It's peace of mind if nothing else. Having someone else do it...well...who knows what they'll put in there. As TWANG and others will tell you, pots are not just pots. There are significant differences in quality of construction and feel between each.

 

Also bare in mind that most shops are going to have a bit of a prejudice against Korean made guitars. They'll use cheaper parts and will probably do lesser quality work on them because they perceive them as inferior. If you do have a shop do it, make sure you know what they are putting in and the reasons why. If you get the impression from them that they don't think it's worth the headache putting good parts in that particular guitar, then I'd go elsewhere.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...