The Electra Forums

Of course I'd rather just use some contact cleaner but that is not an option. These photos are the inside of our favorite switch. They should be rated for 20,000 cycles. But if you drop, smash, or abuse it, this is what you get. It starts with the cover coming off and a few shots of the insides scrambled up. Then for no good reason, I put the springs back for a shot of what it should look like. Except for the one damaged insulator. This is done and needs to be replaced. All but one of the lugs get soldered. But the ground on one side of the case and the capacitor and resistor on the other side, more than make up for that little bit of relief... The greasy substance on the insides is a mystery to me. It looks like WD40, maybe contact cleaner residue. IDK. I did not spray anything on this one. You will also notice in the last picture, the plastic carriage for the first spring is damaged. Enjoy.

Some scary and dangerous looking stuff...you are brave to tread in the area of that switch!

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Electra 2236 Flying Wedge
Electra X330 MPC

the residue is their attempt at factory lubrication... unfortunately the 20k cycles rating would be a perfect no load switching action, which is something you probably would never give it in real use there's too much going on while playing to be that careful... the softer plastic parts just don't hold up to the abuse...

it's always fun to look inside these types of switches to see where the failures occur... that one looks fixable...

so it's a STQP toggle?

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My Electra Pages
I have too many projects!

This is it (I think.) a 4PDT (four pole double throw) Actually the picture is wrong but the description and datasheet are correct.

http://www.newark.com/jsp/search/produc ... ku=66K9642

You've got more patience than me man. My X270 switch is broke off in the on position... I'm never touching that thing! Mike.

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Electra Guitar Videos ===> http://www.youtube.com/user/mjm33mjm?feature=watch

I bought two switches. One is the correct flat lever type for 15 bucks, the other is the mini bat type, same style as the coil taps for about $3. The cheap one was just to practice on. So I do the swap with the cheapo. The 12 pins are easy to do and come out great. The grounds to the sides & the cap and resistor? Forget about it. The solder will not stick to the switch case. I cleaned it and filed it down to give it some tooth marks to grab onto. Nothing. The solder won't stick. I use flux, my high power solder gun, all the tricks I can think of... Finally I get the junk to stick. Not fun!

So I go to try the preamp out, Fresh batteries and all that. I hear it click on... I try the tone control. I can hear the EQ "hum" go from Bass to Treble and back to Bass. Good so far. I grab the Active Gain knob and it is all the way up. No output at all. Just the Active EQ hum. What? I am torqued.... So I roll that volume off. I can hear a very low clean signal coming thru. OK so the pot seems OK... Well Next I change the cap and resistor thinking I fried them when I was fighting with the solder. Same thing as before. I am thinking the preamp is fried. I get out the multimeter and start checking my leads, the switch continuity, and soldering work. All seems good. I start to jump the switch with some alligator clips on lead wire. Crackles here and there and then I jump the orange wire to the brown wire and bam! it starts working. The Preamp lives! All the controls function as they should. I can't say it sounded very nice because I did not have time to assess that, but it is working. Now I know better than to press my luck on these things, so I disconnect the shorted lead before some thing burns out, and same as before, nothing but hum.

Out of all the resistors and caps on the PCB, there must be one that is no good. I am just too burned out on it to hunt it down right now. Since it worked when jumped, I am guessing the LM358 is OK on the preamp. The next step is going to be pulling the wires back apart and creating a schematic of the preamp board. Then start testing each part one at a time.

If anyone at all has any suggestions please send them my way. I would love to hear them. I do not do electronics regularly and may be missing obvious.

Thanks Folks
Vid

I have pictures of the preamps in the X150, X250 and X270, all of which I own and I still can't tell for certain if they are all the same board! It may be an optical illusion, but I've always thought the X150 board was slightly smaller. Here is the X150:

The X250's preamp:

And finally the X270 preamp:


I don't envy you trying to troubleshoot it without any schematic, but we wish you the best of luck man, Mike.

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Electra Guitar Videos ===> http://www.youtube.com/user/mjm33mjm?feature=watch

http://www.westone.info/wiring/thunderl ... ndex1.html

This is great info. Hopefully it will not be too painful. The Electra Forums should definitely have a permanent link with the Westone Forum for this info. It is an X-150. When I short the Orange and Brown wires, it does spring to life. Like others have said, the usefulness on Modern High-Gain amps is debatable. This guitar sounds great unplugged, very loud body and resonance, but so far I think that the active stuff will be bypassed in the not to distant future. That is of course if I can't figure it out. My X130 kicks ass with just the Volume and Treble.

http://www.westone.info/spares/index.html#order This may be a good replacement for the old preamp. I e-mailed a few questions...

Here is a 4PDT mini toggle switch on a surplus dealer's page, it may be helpful to someone.

Part number 5930-01-005-5041, also called (SWT) 7401SYPZQE on the following page:

http://www.surplussales.com/Switches/SWToggle-1.html

The guy selling the pre-amps sold the westone site. Vanished MIA etc...

Yep... same guy that used to run the Westone.info site. He just up and cleared off, though a couple weeks after he vanished taking his info with him, he relented and presented the information to the Westone enthusiasts, thankfully!!

I'm guessing he probably dumped all of his spare parts, too - he certainly threatened to do so....

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Because even the Australians need heroes."

I just had my tech replace the active switch in an X640. We ordered the switch in vidmachine's link but it didn't work, had to get a different one from a local supply shop. I will try to get details.