[slugworth]

Solderless pickup connections came up recently in discussion, and instead of sharing them privately, I thought I'd start a new thread in case others may benefit. My method is not the only method for solderless connections, but it is the best I have found.

First, you need a crimp tool. Pololu.com has a great tool for a very reasonable price:

Crimp tool:
https://www.pololu.com/product/1929

There are lots of different styles of crimp tools out there, so for anyone who might say, "Oh yeah, I already have a crimp tool," just make sure yours can handle this size of connector. The one I linked to is solid, sturdy, and has ratcheting action. I like it.

You'll also need a wire stripper that goes down to at least 24 AWG. Pololu has those as well. I like their 16-26 AWG stripper: https://www.pololu.com/product/161

If you scroll down on the crimp tool page at Pololu, you'll see male pins, female pins, and housings that work with this crimp tool. However I would discourage purchasing these for guitar purposes, and instead get them from Mouser.com. The Pololu pins are inferior for audio signal, while the Mouser ones are gold plated and work wonderfully inside a guitar.

Female gold plated pins   - Mouser.com: 538-16-02-0104
http://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/Molex/16-02-0104/?qs=sGAEpiMZZMs%252bGHln7q6pm%252bS0pk2Wo0XxhtdxrEhfd7w%3d
Male gold plated pins -   Mouser.com: 538-16-02-0117
http://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/Molex/16-02-0117/?qs=sGAEpiMZZMs%252bGHln7q6pm%252bS0pk2Wo0Xxt9hCdZlOXuQ%3d

2-pin small housing (plug) - Mouser.com: 538-50-57-9002
http://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/Molex/50-57-9002/?qs=hSmm4fxMIuPN0%252b32zyqW%252bw%3D%3D
2-pin housing receptacle (socket) - Mouser.com: 538-70107-0001
http://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/Molex/70107-0001/?qs=3%2Fy1uQ6JZnnrUEDOV9OGOA%3D%3D

The female pins go inside a small housing (plug), and the male pins go inside a housing receptacle (socket).

Male pins + socket go on the guitar side, and female pins + plug go on the pickup side.

Using 2-pin housing is important, even when you have 4 conductors and 4-pin housings are available. Reason being, the 2-pin housings will fit through wiring holes inside just about any guitar. Sometimes passage is a little tight, but it's very rare that I find a guitar that won't fit them. Note that the 2-pin housing product pages at Mouser show 6-pin housings. Don't be concerned -- those parts are the 2-pin versions. You can see them if you click the Documents tab then click the "3D PDF" link.

So you will need 2 pins per housing. Actually you will probably need some extras as you are learning -- there is a slight learning curve with the crimp tool and pins, so if you are starting out then you will probably waste a few pins as you get the hang of it.

The receptacles have a place for a latch, and there are latching plugs available. I rarely use the latching plugs, though. They are bulkier and you can run into clearance issues. Plus the non-latching ones are easily reversible, which makes troubleshooting and resolving phasing issues very easy.

Next time I do a pickup swap, I'll take some photos. I can expand this post into a tutorial later if people find it helpful.

[slugworth]

I wanted to mention that my method is based on what was shared with me by Mr. Ethan Spaulding, the genius behind Instrumental Pickups. He makes some seriously killer pickups, especially for 7- and 8-string guitars.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Instrumental-Pickups/1389691651274679

You can hear some of his pickups up against Dimarzio, Bare Knuckle, and others here:

https://soundcloud.com/sludgestudios/sets/6-string-pickup-shootout
https://soundcloud.com/sludgestudios/sets/7-string-pickup-shootout
https://soundcloud.com/sludgestudios/sets/8-string-pickup-shootout

--

Back to discussing solderless connectors, and as I mentioned in the original post, there different ways to do solderless. Seymour Duncan's Liberator pots are another possibility. However, I prefer my method. Those pots cost what, $25 a pop? That can add up quickly if you are doing lots of guitars. Plus, you've got to solder the thing in to begin with.

With my method, I can leave the existing wiring fully intact. Just add receptacles on the guitar side, then swap out pickups at will. Once you get the hang of using the crimp tool, the pins, and the housings, it is a very fast and easy job.

EMG has been using similar connectors for quite a while, and now Gibson does as well. However, EMG uses a 3-pin connector, and Gibson uses a 5-pin connector. There are a lot of guitars with wiring passages too tight for those connectors. The 2-pin connectors I use work with just about any guitar. Sometimes it's a tight fit, but I think I've only ever worked on one guitar (out of ~100) that had passages too tight for the connectors I use.

[lok1]

Next time I do a pickup swap, I'll take some photos. I can expand this post into a tutorial later if people find it helpful.

A tutorial would be great. Not sure what goes where right now. This should probably become a sticky. Good info to know.

[slugworth]

The current discussion about capacitor values reminded me that I forgot to mention a neat trick with this method.

The plugs work perfectly with the legs of radial capacitors or resistors, so you can hot-swap them without soldering. You just have to be sure not to cause a short, which is easy enough to prevent with a piece of tape or a little heat shrink tubing.

When I rewire a guitar, I solder in a plug instead of a capacitor on tone pots, so that I can easily swap them out.

If I want to experiment with lower pot values, I just solder a plug across the outer pot lugs, then plug in resistors as desired.

[Chris]

Not sure if you're still doing this but I would very much like to see a tutorial or at the very least more information on this method.