hi . iam a new member .i own a guild nightbird 1985 gg model. i need the original wiring diagram for the guitar . years ago i installed jason lollars in it and it sounds good in my opinon better than the emg 85s it came with. i wish to put emg back in but have lost the wiring diagram. any help would be much appreciated .
guild nightbird wiring
- Thread starter kent
- Start date
SFIV1967
Venerated Member
Hi Kent, welcome to LTG! You ask a very good question! It's a bit a mystery, there is really no original wiring diagram that I am aware of. I have the same issue, I own a April 1987 Nightbird GG and the pickups are changed to periode correct HB-1s, which is great, but the wiring is also a bit strange to me as are the components which are not all original. So I was also searching but there are almost no pictures of the potentiometer chambers online for instance. I just found 3...
Our member GAD covered a lot of info in his blog posts, but not the original wiring diagram. Have a look anyway:
It would be great of members who have original 1985/1986/1987 Nightbirds could post pictures of the opened potentiometer chambers here, so we could see what parts and wiring was used by the factory. I have seen various push-pull pots for instance...
Do you have one with the square or triangle chamber?
Ralf
Our member GAD covered a lot of info in his blog posts, but not the original wiring diagram. Have a look anyway:
GAD's Guide to Guild Nightbirds | GAD's Ramblings
Guild Nightbirds are some of the best electric guitars every produced at the Westerly Guild plant. I own more than my fair share of them, and since I have a pile of Nightbird reviews pending I thought I would consolidate some of the repeating information I had into a single article. Nightbirds...
www.gad.net
Guild Nightbird I | GAD's Ramblings
Today we’re going to take a look at the Guild Nightbird I. Not the Nightbird or the Nightbird Custom or The Nightbird GG, or… You know what? We’ll talk about the crazy number of Nightbird models later. For now just accept that this is a Nightbird I. This isn’t really a model that I lusted after …
www.gad.net
Replacing Pickups in a Guild Nightbird | GAD's Ramblings
I was given the unique opportunity to replace the pickups in a Guild Nightbird. This guitar came with Fender HB1 pickups but the owner had managed to get some NOS Guild HB1 pickups in matching gold from the world’s finest purveyor of hard-to-find Guild parts, Hans Moust. When asked if I would do...
www.gad.net
It would be great of members who have original 1985/1986/1987 Nightbirds could post pictures of the opened potentiometer chambers here, so we could see what parts and wiring was used by the factory. I have seen various push-pull pots for instance...
Do you have one with the square or triangle chamber?
Ralf
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I have a beautiful GG but haven’t yet drawn it up. Looking at my pics I don't even have an internal shot. What's worse, it's currently in storage.
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Moving to Solid/Chambered
Hi Kent, welcome to LTG! You ask a very good question! It's a bit a mystery, there is really no original wiring diagram that I am aware of. I have the same issue, I own a April 1987 Nightbird GG and the pickups are changed to periode correct HB-1s, which is great, but the wiring is also a bit strange to me as are the components which are not all original. So I was also searching but there are almost no pictures of the potentiometer chambers online for instance. I just found 3...
Our member GAD covered a lot of info in his blog posts, but not the original wiring diagram. Have a look anyway:
GAD's Guide to Guild Nightbirds | GAD's Ramblings
Guild Nightbirds are some of the best electric guitars every produced at the Westerly Guild plant. I own more than my fair share of them, and since I have a pile of Nightbird reviews pending I thought I would consolidate some of the repeating information I had into a single article. Nightbirds...www.gad.netGuild Nightbird I | GAD's Ramblings
Today we’re going to take a look at the Guild Nightbird I. Not the Nightbird or the Nightbird Custom or The Nightbird GG, or… You know what? We’ll talk about the crazy number of Nightbird models later. For now just accept that this is a Nightbird I. This isn’t really a model that I lusted after …www.gad.netReplacing Pickups in a Guild Nightbird | GAD's Ramblings
I was given the unique opportunity to replace the pickups in a Guild Nightbird. This guitar came with Fender HB1 pickups but the owner had managed to get some NOS Guild HB1 pickups in matching gold from the world’s finest purveyor of hard-to-find Guild parts, Hans Moust. When asked if I would do...www.gad.net
It would be great of members who have original 1985/1986/1987 Nightbirds could post pictures of the opened potentiometer chambers here, so we could see what parts and wiring was used by the factory. I have seen various push-pull pots for instance...
Do you have one with the square or triangle chamber?
Ralf
thanks for the reply .its nice to see their are other guys looking for basically the same info. the chamber on mine is square .the articles on gad are good although not helpful. the pictures you sent are not correct for battery powered emg85s. i know that all the red wires are tied together and then go one battery two to the pickups. its the white wires that need sorting out. i left most of the wiring connected when i removed them .thank goodness the phase is still in order like i said its just the white ones. i guess ill have to reverse ingeneer them although i dont like soldering inside the control box.i agree with you on parts are strange . when i bought mine about 25 years ago little things like the strap buttons one plastic one metal came from the factory than way. makes me wonder what they were smoking back then. i guess ill keep you posted on my progress if all goes well ill draw a diagram and post it i hope that helps.
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Do your pickups say EMG on them? If not they may be Kent Armstrongs.
SFIV1967
Venerated Member
@kent: Did you leave the 25 k ohms pots in the guitar? My understanding was that EMGs used 25 k pots according to GAD. In my HB-1 equipped one the push/pull tone pot reads about 580 kohms and the volume pot 388 k ohms. So both are replacements I assumed but the odd thing is that my one is datecode 4-87 on the back of the headstock and the datecode of that 380k ohms volume pot is week 04 in 1987, so would fit to a April finish.
The DPDP (6P) toggle switch is a blue MIYAMA MS-500F-B.
Ralf
The DPDP (6P) toggle switch is a blue MIYAMA MS-500F-B.
Ralf
both pickups on mine were marked emg 85 on back of pu . tone pots vol was 25k and pushpull 500k . what seams odd is phase switch is a small circuit board which over the years started to come apart a little super glue fixed it .go figure//// when i changed pickups first.. i used classic 57s nice slide guitar sound. then later on down the road i swiched them to chris lollars . chris wired them to my specks not as dark as classic 57 in neck pu. guitar sounds good i just want to go back to emgs .everything goes full circle i guess lol
SFIV1967
Venerated Member
Hi Kent, any chance you could post a picture of that little circuit board you mentioned? Just curious! Also can you post a picture of the 500k push pull pot?
Ralf
Ralf
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Attachments
hey ralf sorry for crappy photos. thepp pot is a noble 15a 500k. the phase sw is a alco mtf 206n on on . lettering on sw is m8162 a+ lf 441cn 8604. hope this helps . retract from yesterdays post the pickup mentioned were jaso lollars not chris i had a corona brain fart lol
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Getting info about old EMG stuff has proven difficult. Hans would know for sure, but if that's acting as a phase switch then my guess would be that it's an early EMG PI2 active phase reversal. I'd bet the push pull is an EMG-DMSK Dual Mode Switch Kit like on the Setzer Bluesbird. If you don't feel like reading or scrolling, here's some useful information I found when I wrote that:
This could help you sort the white wires:
If you can't figure it out let me know and I'll go to the GAD-Vault and see if mine has EMGs.
This could help you sort the white wires:
If you can't figure it out let me know and I'll go to the GAD-Vault and see if mine has EMGs.
SFIV1967
Venerated Member
Now the fun starts! The mysteries of the Nightbirds! Thanks for the pictures! Let's see what additional info we can find.
I had not realized they are NOBLE potentiometers, interesting. This is the simple electrical drawing of a 15A (audio):
The little yellow (502k=5 nF) and green (10 nF) capacitors are between 5-7 and 8-10.
Now regarding the phase inverter PCB:
The ALCO MTF206N switch: (I assume the 8604 refers to 1986 week 04)
The IC on the PCB is like the one below. The 8612 seems to be datecode 1986 week 12.
The real partnuber is LF441CN. This is a National Semiconductor Low Power JFET Input Operational Amplifier.
A datasheet can be found here: https://www.chipfind.net/datasheet/pdf/nsc/lf441.pdf
The whole assembly is definitely a first generation EMG PI2 Phase Inverter.
I found an even older picture with a 1984 week05 switch, which exactly looks like your one with the 8604 switch.
And an unopened one also with 8604! Isn't this cool!
Ralf
I had not realized they are NOBLE potentiometers, interesting. This is the simple electrical drawing of a 15A (audio):
The little yellow (502k=5 nF) and green (10 nF) capacitors are between 5-7 and 8-10.
Now regarding the phase inverter PCB:
The ALCO MTF206N switch: (I assume the 8604 refers to 1986 week 04)
The IC on the PCB is like the one below. The 8612 seems to be datecode 1986 week 12.
The real partnuber is LF441CN. This is a National Semiconductor Low Power JFET Input Operational Amplifier.
A datasheet can be found here: https://www.chipfind.net/datasheet/pdf/nsc/lf441.pdf
The whole assembly is definitely a first generation EMG PI2 Phase Inverter.
I found an even older picture with a 1984 week05 switch, which exactly looks like your one with the 8604 switch.
And an unopened one also with 8604! Isn't this cool!
Ralf
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certainly is cool. i think iam going to attempt putting it back together tomorrow before i get much older and these 71year old eyes cant see anymore.iam sure glad i joined this soiree. which me luck.................. thanx ken
SFIV1967
Venerated Member
I added some more info to post #16.
Ralf
Ralf
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hey ralf upon looking at pp pot i forgot to mention [i hope this doesnt through a fly in the soup] the black wires u see in the photo 7 10 were origanally white . i removed them they were way to short and added the black [only color i had] i think u are correct saying the two two caps were connected at 7 and 10 maybe it will solve puzzel.
SFIV1967
Venerated Member
Now GADs diagram 3 makes sense and it is a DMSK, means coil tap.
Ralf
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