Sexy Control Cavities

[Alberto7]

This is not cavities exactly, but what are the "parts" necessary to do the soldering like this pedal?

Like that's how I'd like to do it -- have some external harness that's like the shape of the cavity, solder all these straight pipes into really specific arrangements, and then plop it into the guitar and solder like the one or two remaining connections.

There was talk of this kind of soldering recently in a thread here (2-3 weeks ago maybe). I thought it'd have been this thread, but nope. Damn it if I remember where it was

It's super neat, but how serviceable is it though? Looks like it'd be okay-ish, but you'd need everything pre-cut to pretty accurate sizes. And good luck if what you gotta fix/replace is a component in the middle of all that scaffolding. Maybe I'm just shit at soldering! (I really am though... gotta practice that.)

 

[MaxOfMetal]

but what are the "parts" necessary to do the soldering like this

Really good planning, a bunch of patience, and damn good soldering skill. It's just solid core wire and the legs of components.

 

[SalsaWood]

You can do soldering like that with a custom jig or helping hands/third hands apparatus. The biggest hurdle is sizing and mounting everything correctly. It about triples the time it takes to wire something roughshod on a guitar, which isn't very long IMO.

 

[MaxOfMetal]

You can do soldering like that with a custom jig or helping hands/third hands apparatus. The biggest hurdle is sizing and mounting everything correctly. It about triples the time it takes to wire something roughshod on a guitar, which isn't very long IMO.

I always just mount everything on a piece of flatwork with holes drilled for pots and switches, and use double-stick or soft tack to place other components. That way only the iron and solder are in my hands. Pre-tin everything.

I absolutely hate those clip arm things.

 

[SalsaWood]

Yea the third hand (terrible name) is pretty much bunk for such intricate work, but it's an easy way to get it right with practically no experience. I've made jigs for my tech here and there which only hold the wires at their necessary general points so he can route everything, then he solders them. The jigs are basically just rigid helping hands with more work area clearance. It's not the easiest or quickest all things considered, but making the jigs is really easy.

 

[odibrom]

The serviceable aspect of my guitars' wiring is what made me go to the previously shown connectors. I can replace any part of the guitars' electronics without having the iron near the guitar. It improves a lot the access to soldering points and therefore the solder joint quality... and it builds confidence on what I'm doing. The chaos of my guitars inner parts is derived from the excess wire that I leave from the various elements they have inside, like piezos or pickups' leads...

 

[spudmunkey]

Those pre-cut, pre-bent wires remind me a lot of hard-line water-cooled PCs.