So another hobby of mine is making/fixing/modifying/breaking music gear. Whether it's laser cutting a custom pick guard, swapping out pickups, building a tube amp, or making pedals and weird synth things, it's been something I've obsessed over off and on over the last ten-plus years.

This latest project was born out of a Fender Squier Paranormal '54 Jazz bass. I had already made many changes to it, such as putting a '90s Japanese Jazz Bass neck on, new tuning machines, new nut, Fender hi-mass bridge, and a custom pick guard cut out of acrylic. The pickguard was a tedious project, and it was far from perfect, but I like it a lot better than the anodized gold one that came with the bass.

If I was just using this as a home recording bass, like I had for many years, I'd likely leave it be. But I've been playing bass in a band for the last year or so, and I want it to sound and play a certain way, and I want it dependable.

So, in that constant pursuit of better sounds and playing experience, I decided it was time to swap out the original Squier J-Bass pickups. They weren't awful, but my goal with this bass is to have a Jazz Bass that sounds like a P Bass. I'd already hardwired the pickup wiring to series instead of parallel, which gives it more of that P Bass bite. But I wanted more. I looked at several boutique pickup sets, because I prefer to support the smaller guys when I can. But I also didn't want to put $300 into this project just now. I read a lot of good things about the Dimarzio Model J pickups, which are humbucking (another frustration with switching to series was losing the hum cancelling). For half of the cost of a boutique set, I was sold.

There are not many diagrams out there for non-standard J Bass wiring schemes that do not have the dual volume/tone setup. I wanted this simple, like a P Bass: one volume, one tone. I also decided I may as well make the series/parallel wiring switchable.

As a result. I spent way too much time trying to find a diagram, so I made one. Verified and working on my Squier Paranormal '54 Jazz Bass. I've only played it through a Princeton Reverb here, but it sounds really good in both series and parallel modes.

You can download the PNG version here

You can download the PDF version here

Hopefully this saves someone some time out there. Enjoy!