Any reason why a pickup would just suddenly die?

[tremoloman]

After about 1 year of ownership, my bridge pickup in my Jazzmaster died. I took it to the dealer and they confirmed it is a dead pickup. I haven't mistreated the guitar in any way, so I'm curious why this happened.

I had a DiMarzio do the same thing to me only a few weeks before, so I'm really puzzled why this is happening.

 

[Robert]

I had that happen on a new pickup I bought. It was the wiring - it had broken where it joins to the poles.

 

[Tim]

This could also happen if it was not waxed properly. Over time and vibration an improper waxing could cause two wires to touch each other and ground out the pup.

 

[Katastrophe]

Perhaps a broken solder connection? Or was this with the pup itself? I'm curious about this... My guitars mainly die due to bad soldering connections at the jack or pup switch.

 

[ZoSo65]

hmm, maybe another piece of your equipment has a problem, bad cable(s), faulty ground, something with an intermittent short and the pup is getting hit with it, guessing here?
Unless it is a real coincidence that the two pups went so close to each other.

 

[Tone2TheBone]

One time one of the original pups in my Gibson turned on itself and became the coolest sounding single coil ever. I played it that way in the neck for YEARS (well over 8 years at least) and it was fun (it was originally the bridge pickup but put it in the neck because of the sound I was getting - figured it would sound cooler in the neck). Don't know why it happened but it did. Probably "one of those things". I eventually replaced it with another PAF. I still have that "single coil" humbucker pickup but it is not in any of my guitars at the moment.

 

[tremoloman]

Well it turns out that I had a defective pickup. Unfortunately for me, I have to pay for it because I didn't keep the reciept. I thought registering the serial number would be enough, but apparently that's not the case.

 

[Tim]

What a bummer there Tremolo. A good lessons learn for all of us. Keep the reciept.

 

[Katastrophe]

Well it turns out that I had a defective pickup. Unfortunately for me, I have to pay for it because I didn't keep the reciept. I thought registering the serial number would be enough, but apparently that's not the case.

You'd think Dimarzio would take the bad pickup back, just for good customer service. That's not good, especially when you registered the serial #.

 

[tremoloman]

You'd think Dimarzio would take the bad pickup back, just for good customer service. That's not good, especially when you registered the serial #.

Kat,

DiMarzio DID take the pickup back with no questions asked. No only did they take it but they shipped a brand new pickup back to my local music store in under 3 days!

It's FENDER who is making me purcase another pickup even though the guitar is a year old. I'm very unhappy about that since I didn't even do anything wrong to it. The inferior wiring job inside shows whoever did it performed a lousy job on installing the components.

Oh well... lesson learned: SAVE YOUR RECIEPT!!!

It's been over a month and still no pickup.