The first thing to check would be the hookup wire at the end of the cable that's soldered to the pots or switches. The fine strands of wire at that end can touch making the pickup act like it's shorted out. Make sure all the insulated wires from each conductor are separated and not touching. Repairman often remove the tape to see what color conductor goes to each coil when replacing pickups. This needs to be done to correctly hookup the pickup for proper phase and switching. Many manufactures use Single, 2,3,4 or 5 conductor wire to hookup their pickups. Color coding from various pickups will need to be known be to do proper wiring and pickup installation. Several pickup manufactures use a different beginning and finish hookup a wire from each bobbin to the colored multiconductor cable. A chart will be done in a following issue to show the differences between each of the popular pickup manufactures.
The Color Coding example below is a standard Seymour Duncan Humbucker using a 4 conductor insulated cable. The drain wire is a multi strand or solid conductor that extends from the cable is non-insulated and used for grounding the pickup.
| Bobbin | Polarity | Coil Begin | Coil Finish |
| Adjustable Coil | South | Black | White |
| Non-Adjustable Coil (stud) | North | Green | Red |
I like using a 4 conductor foil shielded with drain wire and each are 28 AWG (7/36 Strand). You can use 26 AWG (7/34 Strand) or 24 AWG (7/32 Strand) but as the AWG number gets lower the diameter of the wire is thicker. When the wires become too thick it becomes harder to hookup and tape. If the pickup is too bulky you can have a problem being too tight in the mounting ring or even getting the pickup cover on.