I was just looking at Mayones Velvetrone pickups and see all their models use a new kind of baseplate with an integrated multi-pin connector. So you solder a harness to your guitar electronics like you normally would with a standard pickup. And you never need to mess with it again. The pickup-end of the wiring is a quick connector. New pickups are plug and play, like what you might find on EMGs.
Why hasn't the rest of the industry moved to this? It's much like USB on computers. There should really be a universal industry standard so we don't have to solder ever again.
̶D̶o̶e̶s̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶a̶l̶r̶e̶a̶d̶y̶ ̶e̶x̶i̶s̶t̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶I̶'̶m̶ ̶j̶u̶s̶t̶ ̶l̶a̶t̶e̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶p̶a̶r̶t̶y̶?̶ ̶W̶h̶y̶ ̶i̶s̶n̶'̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶a̶ ̶u̶n̶i̶v̶e̶r̶s̶a̶l̶ ̶"̶U̶S̶B̶"̶ ̶c̶o̶n̶n̶e̶c̶t̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶p̶i̶c̶k̶u̶p̶s̶?̶
I see DiMarzio actually has this! But it's specific to only
their pickups. But what if other pickup companies all agreed to use the same pinout? Then we could all swap pickups using the same wiring harness and never have to mess around it again.
Instead of pickups having hardwired leads, why don't they all have integrated five-pin connectors? The wiring harness stays on the guitar and you just plug and play new pickups at the pickup end instead. Additional wiring harnesses could be purchased separately. No more wires attached to the pickups themselves.
Pickup manufacturers would have to be convinced one by one to adopt a universal base plate or simply agree to use the same 5-pin connector pinout as each other. i.e. pin 1 = ground, pin 2 = hot, etc.
Swapping pickups would be as easy as a string change.
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