Can anyone help me troubleshoot Freeway wiring issue?

[cromulent]

I just wired up the Freeway switch, and everything seems to work except for position #6.  This should engage middle and bridge pickups in series, but it only engages the bridge.  I don't see any glaring issues with the solder work, and every other position seems to work just fine.  I did also install a treble bleed cap on the volume pot (between the 2 non-ground lugs), though I doubt this would explain it?  I emailed the company to help troubleshoot, but somehow expect this forum might be able to get me an answer faster

Thanks in advance for any help!!

 

[Rick]

Hard to tell without seeing it.  Did you send freeway any pics.

 

[cromulent]

I think I figured it out.  I had grounded the bridge/plate to the common ground (volume pot), which somehow messes up the switching.  I removed that ground wire and now I believe it all works ok.

However, now the control plate is the only true ground, so I get noise in certain positions.  Where can I ground the control plate if not the bridge?

 

[stratamania]

You need to post pics otherwise no one can see anything.

Is it possible you have shorted some of the terminals inadvertently on the Freeway?

Can you clarify a bit more about which control plate and true ground you are referring to?

 

[Spud]

You probably have maybe on small wire/hair/part of a strand accidentally touching an adjoining terminal. Only guessing.

 

[cromulent]

Looks like this guy had the same problem: https://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/freeway-switch-problem.2240410/

The company responded quickly and told me to isolate the bridge and neck grounds (ie, snip the wire connecting the ground to the bridge pickup baseplate and neck pickup cover).  Now everything works just fine!

Thanks to everyone for the input.

 

[Spud]

Glad it is fixed! I always thought tele pickups with a base plate needed grounding.

 

[TBurst Std]

By definition there my are via mounting springs to the bridge.  Without pics we’ll never know, but I believe the culprit was the neck pup.  The cover for it has a separate ground.  Even to do the 4 way switch, you have to unground the neck pup cover.

 

[cromulent]

Glad it is fixed! I always thought tele pickups with a base plate needed grounding.

Yeah it's kind of a clever system.  The middle pup is grounded to the volume pot like normal, and then the neck and bridge pups have isolated ground wires that run into the switch, which (I believe?) are used to remove these pups from the circuit in certain positions.  Tbh, I don't understand exactly what the switch does to get these new pickup configurations.

And also to be clear, the bridge baseplate is still grounded through the bridge screws.  By snipping the wire, it just makes it so the actual bridge pup not 'hard-grounded' - its ground wire runs to the switch as explained above.  I ran a ground wire from the volume pot to the bridge baseplate so the overall harness is still grounded like normal.

Anyway, thanks to everyone for the kind help and comments!

 

[cromulent]

By definition there my are via mounting springs to the bridge.  Without pics we’ll never know, but I believe the culprit was the neck pup.  The cover for it has a separate ground.  Even to do the 4 way switch, you have to unground the neck pup cover.

Yes, this plus the bridge.  They make the 10-way for strats, so people don't tend to run into these issues.  They probably should include Nashville tele instructions as well.