What Did I Just Buy? (Are Axis Pickups Really This Good?)

[kleinenenten]

I'm going to be honest, I can't see in those pics super well... I don't really know how you can mess up the volumes like that with a switch.

If there wasn't a switch, it would be like that because they might have been wired "normally" with terminal 1 as the signal from the pickup to the pot, 2 as the output from the pot and 3 as ground. This sends all signal to ground when the pot is minimized so each wired like this would function as parallel master volumes, and a simple fix could be switching what potentiometer terminals function as input and output. If you wire so that terminal 1 is the output, 2 is the signal from pickup and 3 is still ground, it will rather move the wiper from sending the pickup signal to the pot output and ground. As long as the ground is the same it would function as normal but leave the knobs to their respective pickups rather than sending all signal to ground when either is turned all the way down.

That might be worth a shot but again I don't think that's the issue if there is a switch, nor can I identify why you would just want 2 volumes if you have a switch. It almost sounds more like they just wired a tone pot to ground without a capacitor? Regardless, that's how you can foolproof the independent volumes if you want, but it also might be worth getting your buddy to put a tone knob in there with one volume.

Thanks for the detailed reply! I'll be honest - pretty much all of that is over my head. I can kind of solder, but I don't get the actual implications of what I'm doing. I just need the diagram and step by step stuff. Hence why I'm not messing with any of it! The second pot (farther away from the switch) does have a capacitor on it, so I DO think it WAS a tone pot at some point. But not anymore!

The eventual goal will be a single volume and a tone pot, as that's the standard and what I'm used to. But seeing as I run both on maximum a vast majority of the time, I'm in no rush. I'll spend that cash on some other more pertinent things first!

Thanks again for the help!

 

[nightsprinter]

You can get solderless switches and pots. I use them on occasion for guitars where I want to try out different pickups quickly in.

 

[Ordacleaphobia]

I'm aware that pickups are not magical, and that they can certainly be removed and replaced with no loss of tone. I've done that before in a guitar with pickup rings. It was slightly challenging, but I did it. I've also tried to put springs in a guitar that needed them, that did NOT have pickup rings. That one I could not do. If any of you have any tips or tricks, I'm all ears. I'd love to be more competent at maintaining my gear, but the condescension is unnecessary. We were all newbies at one point. I'm actively trying to learn, and I know that many of you are much more knowledgeable on these subjects than I am.

Ignore way cool jr that's how he shows affection. Don't flirt back, you'll encourage him.
If you're thinking about having a tech rework the wiring you can probably ask them to check the pickups for you.
Idk if it were me I'd be happy to check 'em for ya and most techs I've worked with are nicer than I am lol.

I know what you mean with the springs being a pain in the ass; but if I can get it eventually, I'm sure you can too.
That said, if you aren't comfortable tinkering with 'em, who cares; leave 'em. You're right, knowing what they are won't make 'em sound any better. Personally I can't relate, the curiosity would kill me

 

[kleinenenten]

Ignore way cool jr that's how he shows affection. Don't flirt back, you'll encourage him.
If you're thinking about having a tech rework the wiring you can probably ask them to check the pickups for you.
Idk if it were me I'd be happy to check 'em for ya and most techs I've worked with are nicer than I am lol.

I know what you mean with the springs being a pain in the ass; but if I can get it eventually, I'm sure you can too.
That said, if you aren't comfortable tinkering with 'em, who cares; leave 'em. You're right, knowing what they are won't make 'em sound any better. Personally I can't relate, the curiosity would kill me

Thanks for the encouragement. I may have a go at it next week - we'll see how adventurous I feel. Usually curiosity kills me too, but when it's something that I'm fairly sure will be over my head, I'm a bit more cautious. And work starts up again soon, so my extended amounts of free time to actually focus on a new skill for more than a few minutes is soon up!

 

[sonoftheoldnorth]

I don't think anyone is being too condescending. It's a very very simple and quick thing to do.

They are direct mount pickups; which means the baseplates of the pickups are screwed directly to the wood of the guitar body. They may have some foam and/or a spring underneath. Either way, it will be no issue whatsoever. Unscrew them all the way. Look at the bottoms. Screw them back in. There's not much to go wrong. Worst case scenario the screws have been inserted and removed too many times and the holes are bored out. Jam some toothpicks, wood, cardboard, glue, improvise with whatever you have to hand, in the holes and you're sorted. Takes about 30 seconds and no skill.

 

[kleinenenten]

Alright, just re-strung this thing. Here are the findings:

As far as I can tell, these are stock Axis Pickups. There were no markings on their undersides. They also don't have "springs", instead, opting for a foam pad that actually incorporates springs into it. This made the process incredibly easy, as I didn't have to worry about exact string placement. I just put the foam under the pickup (it actually had some adhesive, so I just re-stuck it on) and screwed the screws into the body. I enjoyed that foam stuff - is there place to buy it? I'm not even sure what to call it to search for it. I searched "guitar pickup foam cushion with springs", but the results are all for bass. Not sure that matters much - I could likely trim the foam to fit the cavity size I'd need, but though I'd ask. The results all look something like this, but some are more square for P bass cavities, unlike these for J basses.

Which brings me to the last point - as I was doing this procedure, I realized I HADN'T done this on a guitar. I had done this with a bass, and putting springs on a bass's screws was nearly impossible. I had to line up two springs with their holes simultaneously while being unable to actually see where either hole was located. I'm not sure how the tech did it, but if I ever do this myself, I'm getting the foam. This was 100% super easy, and now I'm understanding why everyone seemed shocked I couldn't do this. I'm not an official guitar tech by any means, though I can do my own setup etc., but this is something anybody with a screwdriver and two working hands could have done. I retract my previous "condescension" statement.

Now, why somebody went through the trouble of re-wiring this and putting the foam under the pickups, I have no clue. But now that it's got fresh strings, the tone is more balanced without the "dead-ness" of the colored strings, and it's significantly brighter. We'll see what I think long term when the strings age a little bit, but I may still end up grabbing a Pegasus/Sentient set eventually as this much treble is a little much. We'll see, but it's certainly not a huge priority at the moment, and that's a topic for another thread. As an added bonus, I literally had to intonate only a single string during setup - the rest of it was spot on. Which tells me those strings were dead - because before changing strings NONE of them were intonated properly.

Anyway, gonna go enjoy my new guitar, and thanks for sticking with me!

 

[Grindspine]

I'm aware that pickups are not magical, and that they can certainly be removed and replaced with no loss of tone. I've done that before in a guitar with pickup rings. It was slightly challenging, but I did it. I've also tried to put springs in a guitar that needed them, that did NOT have pickup rings. That one I could not do. If any of you have any tips or tricks, I'm all ears. I'd love to be more competent at maintaining my gear, but the condescension is unnecessary. We were all newbies at one point. I'm actively trying to learn, and I know that many of you are much more knowledgeable on these subjects than I am.

Direct mounted pickups in Ibanez guitars often have foam weather stripping under them instead of springs.

If I had to guess, those pickups look an awful lot like Ibanez V87/V77, which are pretty good for stock pickups. The wire colors do not match Seymour Duncan (nor the screw/slug configuration).