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Post subject: Building a Strat - grounding advice
Posted: Sat Nov 12, 2016 4:11 pm
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Hi friends, new to the forum. I'm building a 62/63 Strat that's based on Gary Moore's Fiesta Red Strat. I have a loaded pickguard with 57/62 pickups put together by Twilight Guitars and will be putting together the guitar myself. I've never done any wiring before with a guitar, but because the pickguards loaded, it looks like it'd be incredibly easy to attach the wires to the jack and then the ground wire to the trem claw. However, as I'm researching I'm running into a lot of posts that say soldering the ground wire to the trem claw isn't as easy as it seems, that you have to get the claw really hot. Is this a difficult experience? I've so far only found one video of it on Youtube for reference and it doesn't look necessarily so difficult, but for a person who hasn't wired a guitar before, I'm just trying to cover my bases. How are your experiences with this?


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Post subject: Re: Building a Strat - grounding advice
Posted: Wed Nov 16, 2016 12:02 am
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Long time tinkerer here that just got done soldering a ground wire to trem claw . It's not hard but you need a good quality solder unit to generate enough heat to get the trem claw hot enough for the solder to melt and have good adherence. To solder term claw:

1. Always remove trem clawfrom the guitar since you will be getting it very hot. May not be good for your finish as the heat will follow the path of least resistance, trem claw screws will get hot if left installed in the cavity. I use a Helping Hand Magnifier unit which you can buy at any Hardware store, Walmart, Radio Shack http://www.ebay.com/itm/Hand-Soldering- ... SwubRXD1As. I use the Helping Hand to hold the trem claw while I am heating and soldering.

2. A professional quality solder station will be necessary. Those handheld cheapy soldering irons from Weller just don't generate enough heat to get the trem claw hot enough. Personally I use one of these types: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Hot-Air-Gun-Tip ... rkt%3D1%26

3. First you need to take a piece of sandpaper or file and scratch the nickel plating off a small spot on the trem claw somewhere around the center hook. The Nickel Coating will not accept solder so you need to scratch a small spot about the size of a Tic Tac.

4. Heat your solder iron up...I usually set mine to 450 degree Celsius, it is imperiteive that you have clean solder tip, tin the heated tip with a bit of solder, remove any drips or excess, this helps transfer heat to the part you are working on. Place tip of soldering iron onto spot where you removed Nickel Plating and let sit until the trem claw gets hot enough to melt the solder. Depending on the type of solder you use, the melt point will vary when it turns into a liquid stat, touch the solder near the tip and wait until you see it melt. Make a nice, shiny blob of solder. Try to keep the soldering iron from making direct contact with your solder, this will cause a weak solder joint. If you have applied the heat correctly and laid down a nice, shiny bead, then you have done it correctly. A dull, non shiny bead means you have a weak solder joint. Once you get a nice shiny blob, you are half way done.

5. Next, you need to "Tin" the ground wire coming from the pickguard. You want to heat one side of the wire, apply solder to opposite side and it should melt and move towards the heat source, in this case, your soldering iron tip. I get great results setting my Solder Heat Temp to 371 Degree Celsius. Once wire is tinned, lay the tinned wire on top of your shiny, blob of solder on the trem claw, when the blob begins to go to liquid state, use the solder iron tip to push the freshly tinned wire into the pool of melted solder. Hold the wire very still for a few seconds while the solder hardens back up. Wahlah, you are done.

Go to YouTube and look up "Proper Soldering Techniques Guitar" and you will see lots of guys soldering guitar components. You can learn a lot on YouTube. I highly recommend you practice soldering a few piece of test wire to get the technique down. Clean Solder tip, right amount of heat, don't touch the solder tip direct to the solder, let the radiating heat do the work melting the solder. Hope this helps. When you get the technique down, soldering the trem claw takes less than 5 minutes.

Here's a couple of good tutorial videos on YouTube to help you:

https://youtu.be/X-1lFKoJeZw

https://youtu.be/a2kYIrANWqw

https://youtu.be/NUVX_RTS-Z8

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Post subject: Re: Building a Strat - grounding advice
Posted: Wed Nov 16, 2016 2:09 am
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I'm glad I hadn't read this prior to doing mine as I wouldn't have realised how difficult it was.

I just used flux on the surface at the point of contact and a 40w Weller. You are only trying to heat the contact area not the whole claw.

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Post subject: Re: Building a Strat - grounding advice
Posted: Wed Nov 16, 2016 2:43 am
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What John said.
I use a 40 Watt iron, Laco flux paste and what is called 60/40 lead -based solder. The lead-free stuff may be ecologically better but is harder to work with.


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Post subject: Re: Building a Strat - grounding advice
Posted: Wed Nov 16, 2016 2:45 am
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Forty watts is a bit wimpy for a trem claw, John. I use a 100-watt industrial iron with a chisel tip, the same unit that I use when soldering ground wires to an amp chassis. Paste flux is mandatory of course and tinning the ground wire will make the procedure easier and quicker. RoHS-compliant solder should be avoided -- use only 60/40 tin/lead alloy for a durable weld.

Arjay

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Post subject: Re: Building a Strat - grounding advice
Posted: Wed Nov 16, 2016 5:00 pm
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Use plenty of acidic flux, and you can solder nickel plated parts. The acids dissolve the oxidized layer, making the lead connect with the actual metal. If you do choose to scratch the metal first instead of hunting down a proper flux, make sure you solder very quickly after that, because the nickel surface will oxidize (invisibly) within minutes, making the solder joint less solid.
80W Weller here.


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Post subject: Re: Building a Strat - grounding advice
Posted: Wed Nov 16, 2016 6:46 pm
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arth1 wrote:
If you do choose to scratch the metal first instead of hunting down a proper flux, make sure you solder very quickly after that, because the nickel surface will oxidize (invisibly) within minutes, making the solder joint less solid.


+1

Arjay

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