2018 McCarty 594 Single Cut wiring

[Jimmy Norris]

Is there anyone with one of these guitars who would be willing to snap a picture of the electronics cavity? I just picked up a used one, and someone butchered the wiring. I am desperately trying to put it back to stock. I really just need to figure out how the pickups are wired in.

 

[garrettb]

Diagram is here: https://d159anurvk4929.cloudfront.net/documents/594_2017.pdf


Pics of my doublecut (but they're the same)...

 

[Jimmy Norris]

I am having a hell of a time trying to wire this guitar back to stock. The bridge pickup looks original, but it has a bare, a black, a green, a red, and white wire. The schematic on prs's site. matching what I see in your pic. I got the pickups working, but not the coil taps. I am at a loss.

 

[garrettb]

I am having a hell of a time trying to wire this guitar back to stock. The bridge pickup looks original, but it has a bare, a black, a green, a red, and white wire. The schematic on prs's site. matching what I see in your pic. I got the pickups working, but not the coil taps. I am at a loss.

That's not the original bridge pickup, then. Both pickups would have "58/15 LT" engraved on the cover and would only have a black wire with braided ground wire, plus a white tap wire.

You'd need to take the pickups out to check for sure what they are.

 

[Jimmy Norris]

They are both etched the same way. I got the neck working, but the bridge is the one with extra wires. The neck tone pot is missing the resistor, which connected it to ground. I shunted it for now and it worked. If I can get the resistor it will be “correct”.

 

[garrettb]

They are both etched the same way. I got the neck working, but the bridge is the one with extra wires. The neck tone pot is missing the resistor, which connected it to ground. I shunted it for now and it worked. If I can get the resistor it will be “correct”.

Well, that's odd. The previous owner may have gotten hold of a multi-tap version of the LT, as used in the Special Semi-Hollow and some Wood Library guitars. However, odd things do pop up from PRS sometimes, so it might maybe could be that the pickup simply got four conductor wiring for some reason. The Tremonti Treble is the only pickup I know of that is usually done that way.

Would be best to pull the pickup to check for labels on the baseplate. The other thing to do is test all the leads with a multi-meter to see what values you get. If it is indeed a multi-tap pickup, it does not get wired the same as a typical four-wire humbucker.

How do you have all the wires for the bridge pickup connected now? How does it sound? Are the pickups in phase in the middle position?

 

[Jimmy Norris]

Great questions. Right now I have the black and bare wires connected to the ground. The red is connected to the volume pot. The green and white wires are connected to the tone control push pull. It does not seem to have any effect. The bridge pickup tone control has the resistor connected to ground. I verified these connections with a multimeter. The pickups both have 7.9k outputs. I purchased a pair of 58/15 pickups on reverb last night that both have the braided/black/white combination. I will hook up that bridge pickup and see what happens. While it's in there, I will pull the cover off the one in the bridge now to see if it is indeed the correct pickup.

 

[JasonE]

PRS has used different color wires for different purposes at times. I put a set of 57/08 pickups in my 594. The white wire has been the split wire on all of my other guitars but if I remember correctly it is not the white wire on the set I bought from PRS and put in my 594. I would have to pull the backplate off to see what color went where. It has been too long since I put them in. I still have the stock pickups. I can pull those out and check the wire colors on them. The colors you are describing sound more like Seymour Duncan pickups than PRS. I wonder if they changed the pickups and put the covers from the stock pickups on them? You should be able to tell what they are by looking at the back plates on them.

As a note: When I put the 57/08 pickups in my 594, I contacted PRS on what color wire went where because they didn't work like my other pickups and there was nothing that came with them to tell me which wire was the split wire.

 

[JasonE]

I just pulled my stock pickups out to look a them. They are 3 wire like the ones in the pictures above, Black, shield and white. The white wire is the split wire.

 

[Jimmy Norris]

I put another set in I got off reverb and all is well. Oddly enough the old bridge pickup is a PRS stamped 58/15 LT. Somehow it has all those extra wires. I'll probably sell the old set, since the new ones match the hardware on the guitar gold/nickel. The old ones are just nickel. Thanks for the help. I am set now.