Archtop Ground

[BlueTone]

Hi,
I seem to have a ground issue with an Archtop I just purchased. Before going to the trouble and expense of sending it off to PTC to remedy it, I wanted to see if I could diagnose for sure where the problem is. Is the ground from the bridge simply soldered to one of the pots? Assuming the ground wire is wedged between the bridge bushing and the body, if I can locate and verify that end is still good, then it must be a loose solder on the pot or ?? Any insight or suggestions would be welcome.
Thanks,
Ric

 

[jimfisher]

I think you're correct that one end is wedged under the bridge stud well and it looks like the other is soldered to the 3way. See the attached.

http://www.prsguitars.com/csc/schematics/2015/hollowbodypiezo.pdf

Jim

 

[BlueTone]

Thanks, Jim. I'll take a look

 

[ADP]

From memory, on one I own, the ground from the bridge is soldered to the metal shielding from the one of the pickups, which is then soldered to the volume pot.

 

[garrett]

Does it buzz all the time, or only if you're not touching a part of the string path? If it's the latter, that's normal.

If it's like my HBII, the ground wire goes from the stud well to the back of the bridge pickup.

 

[BlueTone]

Does it buzz all the time, or only if you're not touching a part of the string path? If it's the latter, that's normal.

If it's like my HBII, the ground wire goes from the stud well to the back of the bridge pickup.

I found out the issue. Just as ADP mentioned, the ground wire from the bridge should be soldered to the metal shielding of the bridge pickup lead. I found that when I pulled the bridge pup, the ground was loose, simple enough fix. Now all is good. A nice surprise when I pulled the pup, at some point the pups were replaced with 53/10's. Didn't see that one coming