3 Myths About Guitar Pots
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- Опубліковано 17 тра 2020
- 3 Myths About Guitar Pots
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In this vlog we talk about where guitar pots are made. Many people think CTS pots are made in the USA. We also talk about when it is good to change the pots in your guitar. There are 3 myths about guitar pots that i see a lot on the internet.
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If people put as much effort in playing as they do on obsessing over stuff like this, we'd have some really amazing guitar players.
EXACTLY
Things like potentiometers, capacitors and tone wood make an incredible amount of difference in the tone of one's guitar...in one's own head.
Haha, yeah. And if people focused on writing good songs as much as they practice playing guitar we'd have some really amazing music!
Hey! Tone obsession is a great obsession! But it's like vynal vs digital or solid state vs tube. Important stuff man!
True man true. I personally prefer Emerson pots and caps, just because of the looks. They really add detail and depth to the cavity.
Never even heard of matched pots. That’s a new level of being obsessed with absolutely negligible detail. Too many people are concerned with everything BUT playing their damn guitar.
LOL! Yeah, I had never heard of "matched pots" either. That is funny. Just another weird snake oil opportunity.
Me
I get people preferring 1 Meg, 250k, or 500k pots as well as the kind of taper for specific guitars, though people shouldn’t obsess over it. But damn, matched pots? I didn’t know that was a thing either.
All means more or less to different people. There's so many people on the internet nowadays that are saying tonewood makes no difference in guitar building which is the biggest load of crap in all of guitar building history.
@@timstudio1.... you are SO Right, about the tonal & sustain qualities of various woods in building ANY stringed instrument. The possibilities and variations are as endless as all the various wood types that are on the planet.
People who say "the wood make no, or negligible difference" in tonal (and sustain) qualities.... know nothing, or... extremely little about the subject.
they only really matter in 2 situations: 1 when you have a very desirable collectible like a Fender 1957 Mary Kay worth 90k with everything correct: 2 when you are gigging hard and use your volume knob on stage as i do all night. The small ones do seem to wear faster if you gig a lot. i have only used full size Bourne's in my strats since 2000. if you are a home player every pot is a good pot unless it is failing.
Your video answered all the questions I’ve been researching lately. I was considering replacing the stock guts in my 09 Epiphone Les Paul but watching this I can tell you it doesn’t make the first gate. The guitar works fine has all the tone I need so I won’t fix what isn’t broken. Thanks for this video - really useful info.
Saw the videos pop up and disappear and was disappointed. Glad to see you’re back!!
Useful info thanks, I appreciate your honesty in this video. I was going to change the pots on my Telecaster clone because I am upgrading the pickups, but now I'm going to leave them and just see if they work well with the new pickups. I've been to Myrtle Beach, it's a great place.
Its nice to hear some sanity in the growing mythology surrounding guitar technology.
This is really reassuring, thanks!
I bought a cheap guitar as a mod project and glad I don't have to worry about replacing the pots
My budget guitar has Mighty Might brand potentiometers. I think it’s owned by Cort guitars. It works fine. No need to change it.
I'm glad these replay.
Great video, my man... thanks. Alpha pots are made in South Korea, though. I use Alpha not only because of reliability, but also for feel...they are the smoother pots out there...
Thanks, Dylan. I didn’t know most of the stuff you covered here. I’m not a full time guitar tech but occasionally I’ll do some work for a few friends. It’s most common when somebody brings me an Epiphone or some $200 thing off Amazon and they want me to “Gibsonize” it with better pickups and CTS pots. The look on their faces is priceless when I tell them they have to put up another $25 or so for Gibson knobs because their imported ones won’t fit.
I'm in the uk love your channel and knowledge thanks Hill
More and more, I'm becoming a fan of Alpha. In my limited experience, they're just as tight on the tolerances as any others, but with a more consistently smooth action.
Anderson uses Alpha. The taper and friction is perfect.
I was CTS fan, now I prefer brass Alpha, smooth and fit 8mm hole in export guitar bodies. Anyway these days CTS are made in Taiwan.
I like Bourns, as they are smooth and attractively finished. But Alphas work just as well. Who cares? But CTS always seem to be priced at a premium.
algreen1231 Must check out those brass Alphas.
Bournes or Alpha ( normally marketed as Taiwan Alpha ) as both produce a true log pot if you want to pay the price but the multiple slope Log A are good enough . My local warehouse stocks Alpha at great prices , RS carry Bourns here in the UK .
Alpha are common in most amps too . You can buy conductive plastic by Omeg or Pfier but these are much more expensive and would you want to see a small green plastic square in your guitar despite being aerospace quality ? I have made a mini amp using these. 16mm Alpha round great for new custom builds where you don't want large cavities and covers , you don't need a 1 inch pot in there any more and stick to the 2 brands and you will have no problems whatsoever.
You can, with a little practice mod the pot slopes by thinning the carbon tracks after disassembly. So if your amp design calls for a 2M2 and you have only 1 Meg pots gently with very fine emery paper brush the track until it does its thing up to 2Meg or so .You can also cut and remove part of the track if you want it to do a certain job like cut volume at max , instead of using a switch .
I agree with everything you’re saying. I mostly play guitars with single pickups and have swapped a lot of pickups and pots cause it’s a hobby I like to fiddle with things. I’ve come to appreciate a smooth consistent taper more than anything. I find just as your saying that lower cost pots tend to perform more erratically ie you roll off the volume and it’s either no difference then it all drops off or the opposite. Also “cheaper” pots can some times be less smooth or gritty in the actual feel of the pot. I hav actually found rarely a 500k pot that is actually 550k ish. I like to swap these into guitars that I find muddy or pickups that to my ear lack a little on the high end and it seems to wake them up the difference is subtle but it’s there. By way of example I’ve found the newer Dimarzio super distortion kind of “flat” compared to older models but with a higher value pot it seems to sound better. Also a lot of newer Les Paul’s came with 300k pots I find them more pleasant with 500k. But your right the volume pot doesn’t change the tone it just lets more or less of what’s there out
Thank you! I bought a cheap guitar to mod and I left the stock pots and Switch. I did change the pickups but it wasn’t really necessary. Just was using it to improve my soldering skills and they sound slightly better. Most of what I did was fret leveling, neck adjustment, replaced a broken bridge with a roller bridge, replaced the nut, and tightened the tuners. It sounds great, looks great, and plays great for under $250. It stays in tune forever too without tuner replacements or any stupid monstrosities screwed to the head of the guitar. Also the volume pot doesn’t do smooth volume changes but I mostly dime the pots and if I wanna mess around with volume swells or something I have an expression pedal that can be mapped as a volume pedal. Most of the mods people do for better tone can’t really even be heard. It’s a waste of money.
Excellent explanation of pots. Thanks!
Thank You, Thank You, Thank You !! Greg from New Orleans. Just seeing this 5/17/22. Fixing & Playing since 1967. Some of the things players come up with blow my mind. I am in the electronic repair business as well. So I know a little more about the electronic guts than the average guy. I just smile and try to be polite. Just Subscribed Thanks
Cool video. THanks for a great insight!
I love MBSP there's an awesome little trail near the gift shop/ information center pier. Great place to watch a sunrise. Been to myrtle beach innumerable times.
Great video about pots, we are in agreement. I use several types from dime size to full size metric to cts and alpha.
Thx so much for this video!! very useful since guitar players love to feed on myths. I've bought a chinese tele, solid construction but bad electronics, bought some di marzio twang kings to replace the pickups, and was afraid i needed to also change the pots to get the full tone of the new pickups ! Cheers !
Thanks for this excellent video
great video, very informative!!
Very informative Dylan, thank you. There is a point related to this subject matter in this video that wasn't articulated overtly. I have many guitars, MIK, MIC, MII and I have no problem with their pots. I have a 80's MIJ tele, beautiful guitar! I felt it sounded not overly "open" and so I changed pots to Emerson traditional tele pots. It had the desired effect. So, is it that there was an opening up of the sound, more harmonic richness to the sound, or was I just wishfully justifying my purchase by hearing an improvement, placebo effect?
Wish the class was on a different day than Sunday. Have a great day
Looks beautiful where you are - thanks for taking the time to explain this. I'm sceptical by nature, so I've always assumed the pot fetish was nonsense. Of course having a son who's an electrical engineer and never really using the pots much anyway made it easy for me.
That was cool, I listened to the whole thing while cleaning. Thank you for that
Good video. I just bought some pots for my next build which is probably why this video appeared in my feed. Subscribed :) Anyway I ordered Gotoh pots, apparently made in Japan. Japan is known for excellent electronics, so I thought, cool.
Great video; very helpful for folks who are not sure about this stuff. The whole obsession with potentiometers, capacitors, DC resistance, magnets, strings, tone woods, bridge material and country of origin is out of hand. And this is just electric guitars! Forget about pedals, amps, speakers, microphones, and anything else.
"Lemme 'splain" - Dylan
Absolutely brilliant my guy. Most electrical components are made in the eastern seaboard. And lot is rebranded. It amazes me that how many people don’t know this as a fact.
What you Say it's always interesting and explicative...great job man...Keep on rocking 🤟🤟🤟👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼🎸🎸🎸
Wish you had done this two weeks ago, I just bought Gibson wireless pots for a left handed L.P. style guitar that I have turned into a right hander (getting sprayed as we speak) without even trying the small pots that came with it, damn!
Thanks a lot Dylan..
🙏❤
Very cool information!
The value of the volume pot does make a difference in my opinion. I have a Squire which I thought about switching the pickups on, when I tested the volume pot, I found it only had a value of 234k ohms, I replaced it with a 250k emerson and now I'm happy with the sound and won't bother changing the pickups. The taper also feels better.
LOOK BEHIND YOU! There's a Sasquatch watching you up the trail behind the picnic table...
Excellent work
You never mentioned potentiometers are marked Log, and Lin and that it’s important when replacing ! 😉
What about reverse log too. I've only ever seen them on boost circuits in audio applications but they are still a thing!
I agree. I do like the durable feel/look and the 3 different tapers you can get on CTS pots (never been a fan of the friction free Bourns), but...I NEVER had an Apha let me down, yet. Now, I still prefer the 24mm to the 16mm size, just because I want to be difficult :P one note: there are not as many cool knob options for the 24 fine spline "Imperial" split shafts as the "Metric" 18 spline split shafts...keep that in mind, too, when making a choice.
You mentioned those three brands of pots my question is what about the Dunlop 500 K super pots because they also say made in the USA and Dunlop is not a brand that you mentioned but yet they make the only according to them completely dust free basically I guess everything you read is saying that the Dunlop super pots are definitely the best on the market so I guess anything can be the best obviously as you’ve mentioned, these all share a common denominator which is tolerance and value. My only question is that I noticed with my Wiz premium PAF pick ups it suggested a 550 K pot same with my Doyle coils but with some of my last 4*TOWN pick ups and some of my throwbacks, they’re either using regular 500 K or the 550 K also there seems to be a lot of going back-and-forth between the 500 to 550 K although they’re still always recommending a minimum of a 15% tolerance so if that tolerance is lower all the better but it seems like to me the 550 K pot Would open up a larger volume but what I’m having in my double cut Les Paul is in changing the pick ups is what I’m going through right now, although I’ve tried a variety of recommended parts, I have not found the best tone pot because my volume is working great but the CTS tone pod I have does very little to change the tone. I have the same pick ups from Jim Wagner WCR they are the CrossRoads pair and in my regular Single cut Les Paul standard. I can roll back the tone and immediately get woman tone in the neck on my double cut a roll back to tone, and it does not definite enough to get me anywhere close and it’s a long roll back. I’m just not sure if the pot is bad or simply Ineffective or the fact that both pick ups are using a single volume and single tone is there a better recommended way or parts to use in a single volume single tone so that you do get a better response because it appears to me that on my regular Les Paul’s I’ve not had any troubles only on this one am I having trouble finding a tone pot that will actually truly dim and brighten the pick up It’s so frustrating I’m considering putting a push pole pot in on the tone side and attaching the split coil part of the pick up to it and actually that way as I turn the tone up-and-down to some extent on the pull it out, it will actually add in a part of the pick up. I’m not sure if this is a possible wiring scheme just an idea I’m not trying to have split coils, but if I can’t get control of the pick ups any other way, would it not be easier to control him by doing that and running darling? The amount I want of the additional split hum bucker in as needed and dialing it off with the tone like I said, much confusion here. Any advice on my comments here are any ideas on how I might get the tone working better in a simple way I am using orange drops for cabs .22 values And maybe I need to change the value on the bridge pick up or the neck pick up one and lower that Ferrett tolerance in an effort to get a better roll off. I have gotten opinions from several people, but I have to say I do admire the shuttle a great deal and I am thinking that I will get the right answer here. thank you Dylan talks tone. I hope you talk answers to me. Have a great day. 10:09
Great , sound info.
You should do a episode like this on pickups. Boutique vs guitar fetish etc. If you haven't already.
Thanks for this.
I'm changing my cheap tiny pots mainly because they have 3 settings - off, on and sound like a fart mode.
I'll take the opportunity to use push pull potentiometers so that I can wire in a couple of extra bits without drilling holes and make space for switches. I'll be putting in cheap, small Chinese pots because they will fit into the cavity without me having to rout the body.
Surely if you have matched potentiometers in your guitar as soon as you change the volume or the tone they are no longer matched as they would then have totally different resistances, so they are only "matched" if you always keep them on full - in which case why bother having variable resistors at all?
Great video. I've actually been disappointed when changing out decades old mini pots for same resistance new, full sized pots. Time to buy a multimeter and start labeling actual values for me. Just so I know if I'm going up or down in resistance when replacing bad pots. It was very valuable to know that you haven't noticed a huge difference when measuring pots. Feel- wise I like alpha pots and dislike cts, but that's not a quality thing. Just personal preference
I'm also very fond of the people that can't tell the difference between something that is theoretically true, and something that is practically true. If you can't hear the difference, it doesn't matter- no matter what electronic principles say. Not a hard concept.
Good video....only thing I'd add is some pots are easier to turn.....seems to be better made pots. Some of my older guitars have heavy duty pots and they turn easier. This is helpful if you use the pot as a volume pedal type situation.
Thanks!
Another really interesting video
Great info, changing pots, & pick ups can get expensive real fast, & how much a difference is it really compared to the expenses!?! One ? I have for you, are you a RV er? I ask this because my wife works at Camping World in Ft Myers & we love RV's!!! Great video, I just subbed to your channel based on your content, stay safe, Rock On & God Bless!!!
We live in a 38 foot Georgetown XL full time
Awesome RV, 'A' class looks like. How do you guys like it & how long full-time RV'ing? This is something my wife, Deb, & I are planning on the future. We were full time musicians traveling, but not in a RV, we'd sleep at Truck stops in our car, not comfortable, LOL!!! Stay safe my friend, Rock On & God Bless!!!
Changing pots and caps can make a bigger difference in tone than changing pickups. The lad at "the guitaristas" channel proved it with a Epiphone ES-335 dot. We could clearly hear the improvement with the upgraded pots and caps, but the expensive "Monty" PAF pickups didn't sound any better than the stock Epiphone pickups. Another video he changed the bridge and tailpiece, which improved the tone un-amplified, therefore amplified too.
Do you know how that "comparison" videos has been made? You really believe them? "Oh, yeah, everything is same, just pots and caps are changed". Of course that those elements can make a difference, but with value change, not a brand. And always, and I mean 100% always, the biggest difference makes a player. A good player can use a baseball bat and still sound good and make better music than, for instance, me, even on most expensive equipment.
I really like this channel, because someone actually explains tone in a good way. I hate those super specific "tone people". In a comment section once in a video of a guy burning his guitar body (to make a cool look) and one idiot commented: why would you do that? It will completely mess up the tone! I was like jesus christ dude, no it will. I dont get why people are afraid of "tone". Its like people are afraid of "changing" the "tone"
Thanks for keeping it real.
I don't think I've ever actually had a guitar that came with small pots (that I know of, anyway) but pots are usually not something I change unless, like you say, they don't have a good taper to my taste or the tension is not what I want. I actually used PEC amp pots in a couple of my guitars because they don't turn very easily and I wanted the knobs to stay in a particular place to balance the two pickups a certain way.
On another guitar I went the opposite direction and have a low tension EVH pot for the volume for control of swells, etc. Although I found I don't do that many swells after all and it's somewhat annoying because I can easily bump it out of place, so I may go back.
i keep being reminded of toasters it's a very basic device some resistors that heat up ,put bread in wait toast pops up (unless you're a rickenbacker player of course ;-) )
YESSSSS! That's what I want lol advice on a guitar part from someone sitting outside of a Winnebago.
Just installed an Emerson Blend pot prewired harness setup in my parts Strat
The HAPPIEST i have ever been with a Stratocaster (have had 30+ fenders of all eras )
Since 1979 ! ! !
Can you do a video about varriatone pots and blend pots. I'm building a super telecaster. I'm wondering what if either I should stick either in.
Spot on!
Question… for a SG setup… are there any overall quality differences between the 3 manufacturers you listed ? Is one brand typically better than another?
Great video
The hard to swallow fact is that every single thing has a tonal difference if you can't hear it you don't have the ear to hear it but I have changed the same value caps in guitar circuits with different brands and I can absolutely hear a difference, same thing in guitar amps, I can hear that difference and so can the boutique amp and guitar builders .
It’s all in where you put your focus.... are you having a pissing match over capacitors, or are you making music?
Love it, just common sense and no just hype.
I want to put a couple of pushpull pots in my epiphone les paul. Which one do you recomend?? Thanks😊
I believe tone comes from the fingers. And mainly from the guitar perspective from a bone nut and decent setup. Including the amp also
nice background charge that RC truck :-)
Thank you for busting this myth that is perpetrated in order to profit from peoples ignorance. I bought a Carvin guitar that came with small pots in the late 90's. Once in a blue moon they need cleaning, otherwise they work fine. The same goes for my 2014 Squier Classic Vibe 60's Strat which sounds great. I HAVE had full size CTS pots go bad on other guitars.
I purchased a Squire not that long ago and as I was checking it over, I did notice that it has the small pots installed. I left them alone because the guitar sounds great and the taper is fine. In fact, I left everything electronic stock but the output jack. The only things I changed out were the tuners and bridge using Gotoh.
In most cases, cheap pots and electronics will be fine. I have experienced a faulty switch that needed to be replaced on my budget guitar. If you’re constantly gigging, then in my opinion you could change the electronics just for peace of mind
@@ramencurry6672totally!
You made everything clear to me.
Thank you!
If you use your pots a lot, feel is extremely important, too loose, too much friction can be very problematic
Everybody has their favourite type, i use CTS 450 series 250k linear taper,9% tolerance, brass shafted pots...to my ears they are superior,i need linear as i play Jazz's ,Precisions & a Jaguar PJ bass...the linear pot gradually fades in the bridge pickup but if i use a log pot nothing happens till 9 to 10 on the volume knob..great for guitarists were a little turn cleans up their tone and makes it slightly darker sounding...all tone pots should be linear if you want a proper range on the pot where at 5 or halfway it is roughly 50% ...these are just my opinions & what i have learned over the years,being a bass player now i think good quality,tight tolerence,linear pots are the only pots to use as we use both volume & tone knobs a lot ,& a hifi grade polypropylene capacitor fitted to the linear tone pot, a 2% very high quality one, personally i like the Fender bass Greasebucket tone circuit ,it only uses 2 x 2% polypropylene caps & a 4k7 1% tolerance resister...after many hearing tests & blind hearing comparasing tests i can hear the superior tone of the Greasebucket tone circuit using high grade components, if it made no difference hifi companies would not use high grade very expensive capacitors & pots etc...ask any speaker maker if passive component quality is important & they will laugh & say of course it is...poor quality caps in their crossovers & without the other high grade components, air core inductor⁰ coils, resisters,capacitors etc the speakers would sound nowhere near as good...same for bass's & guitars imo...glad we all have different views or it would be a boring world if we all liked the same things.......
I have a schecter c-1 apocalypse that has active pickups and I was planing on putting Seymour Duncan sh-8 invader humbuckers which are passive been looking to see if I need to change the pots out and which ones would be best if I need to change them
Hwy Dylan...Is there a difference in the 3 big manufactures … Alpha vs CTS vs Bourn's…. you had mentioned in passing that there was some kind of structural difference between CTS( i think) and the Bourns you were wiring at the time….I have always used either CTS or Emerson simply because I thought the quality and tolerance were better….. love to know your thoughts on this and why you prefer what you prefer ???
Useful info, learned something here. Thank you. Subscribe...
Hello! I have 2 pots. One is 500 and one is 450kOhm. Which one should I put on tone and which on volume in that case? Will there be any difference in swapping them?
Hey Dylan,,, I have Dimarzio pickups in my Ibanez RG 550 guitars, IF I remove the tone pot how would the tone change if at all,,,? I mostly never use the tones on my guitars there always on ten,, you know the Vanhalen thing, what do you think, my pickups are wired in series,,, just thought I would ask,,, let me know what you think,, thanks RJ Bacha.
Thanks for that. There is a bunch of myths in the musician world. That makes me crazy!
What is your opinion on the Dunlop super pot? It has a protective cover on it thinking of putting a 250k for volume and 500k for tone on my tele. I want something to take a beating on tour.
I’ve got a set in a double cut special wired 50s. I really like them. Smooth, easy turns and roll down the P90s nicely. I did have to replace one though cuz I replaced the knobs and one was so tight that I pulled out the whole shaft from the pot. Probly would have happened to any brand. Short of that they feel like they’ll last forever.
Hello Dylan,
I hope my message finds you well.
I would like to know what pot should I use for a HS Telecaster? (humb in the neck, single in bridge)
I know to use 2x 500k but bridge pup will sound so trebly
thank you
Try using 300k pots
Some of bourns pots are made in mexico, the high quality expensive ones, i think there the bourns 82 pots for vintage sound and taper. I actually like the small bourns pots, i use them and never have a problem.
In your personal opinion, Should the tone potentiometer have a linear taper or logarithmic? I'm in the camp that taper doesn't matter much. Does the curve really matter because it's just a certain position on the twist of a potentiometer? I've tried the 30/70 "Vintage Taper" but I don't know I'm sure that it matters. The touque is lower than I like. I like the "resistance" [not the electronic resistance] in adjusting the levels to be higher than "Mojotones" vintage taper.
I believe Wampler just changed their verbiage on the "Made in the USA" because there are laws about this.
Dylan,
I have been repairing, restoring and building guitars for over 34 years and I did not know that ALL pots are made over seas!!! Thank you for that information. Gonna use it hard and fast now.
Would I be correct to assume that Jacks and switches are also all made over seas???
Vic F.
More than likely man, manufacturing of these types of small components isn't really something that's stayed in the west, most companies have shifted production to china to cut costs, and at this point, I'd suppose there's no real point in a small company starting production of those components domestically. Even companies like Pure Tone, who make that great multi-contact 1/4" jack, that's more than likely just a design they have made by an overseas production facility.
That ‘chinese small pots’ thing always makes me smile as most of mij guitars used to have those small sized pots also back in the time.
Btw anyone knows for sure what’s the oem brand of pots made for emg? Those funky circle with a wavy line strike through the middle ones?
After getting my hands on a set of 1964 Centralab pots (from a Joe Maphis double neck Mosrite) I care for pots no more - it’s totally clear no brand would put that much effort into quality nowadays, considering all that global industrialization, making that part cost insanely high. If it works and Feels for my needs, it stays there.
Have you ever notice a difference in build quality from brand to brand? I have gotten some pots that felt sticky, but just as well, some cleaner could do the trick.
Do split coil pots affect the over all tone of the pick-ups? On humbuckers?
Is that to say tht even tho there are different tolerances are they all the same quality ?
I just watched a video on the Bourns manufacturing/assembly plant and it was was located in Tijuana with some of the parts coming from Idaho. Care to comment on your source of information?
There is a brand that wasn't listed in the video that makes quality components including a variety of potentiometers.
Alps Alpine (alps electric). There is a manufacturing facility located in texas.
Love a good taper! Reason #1 to change pots and I find 500k pots are indeed brighter \m/
THERES 1 for fact
I had a cheap Chinese pot that would cause any pickup I attached to it to squeal at a very high frequency if the gain was even remotely turned up. Same pickups with different pots and there was no squealing
Which has the better taper from 10 to 0? log/audio tapered or linear, and which is best for volume or tone?
Audio taper for volume, linear for tone, though Dylan has said that he prefers audio taper for both.
Good info Dylan but if the volume pot doesn’t act like a tone pot, why does the guitar lose tone when you turn the volume down?
If that bothers you look into treble bleed pots
Guitar.... Pot... Oh guitar pots... Yeah I like those two . Now onto the recording session.
Hey, if y'all plan to come through Birmingham, AL. Come stay near us at Oak Mountain State Park. I have my dad's 66 Jaguar that I'd love for you to help me get back working. Its 100% vintage, and I tried on my own to replace things getting it to work, and only got half way there. I'd love to hire your help and give you some cool UA-cam content.
i have kind of a weirdly specific question about volume pots. i have an HSS strat that used to be SSS, and when i installed the humbucker i just left all the 250k pots as is. many years later i wanted a slightly brighter tone, so i got a 350k pot. it did indeed brighten the tone as expected, BUT it also killed all my low end. like absolutely zero bass in the signal. did i get a bad pot? bad solder job? it was my first and only time soldering myself so its entirely possible i screwed up somewhere lol.
If all is okay then you shouldn't have that result. I am certain something wrong, most likely with the wiring.
Pints of Guinness No potentiometer value or taper would cause the problems you describe. A bad soldier job definitely could, and a grossly defective pot could as well. For future reference, make a diagram before replacing any components or wiring. It is very easy to get even the super simple wiring of a guitar wrong. Take a few close up photos and make some notes before removing parts.
I was thinking about putting a 250K pot in my volume and a 500K pot in my tone on my Fender Telecaster. Will this work ? I want to have my highs but also be able to roll them off.
Stuff like this is why I'm glad I got an electronics degree, but I probably would have had a better career as a guitar player if I had majored in music.
Does the same go for switches, I see a lot of folks say Epiphone toggle way worse than Gibson for example like Trogly (not trying to throw anybody under the bus I enjoy his channel I just really want to know if it's worth upgrading my epiphone or not)
David Morales Switches are far simpler and more consistent than potentiometers. However, there are really bad switches out there, with low quality contact material and poor mechanical qualities. These can be easily avoided by skipping off-brands. The big manufacturers do not produce low quality switches. Ditto potentiometers, btw.
I'm TBD and I approve this video.
TBD3.0
Thoughts on replacing the volume pot with a 3 way switch (bypass-80%-ground)?
I prefer using the volume knob than a boost pedal but sound guys hate the resulting inconsistency.
That would work. You could even do a 7 way to get more levels, then series the switch circuit with your volume pot, and you'd still be able to use it. Just turn the pot to full when you need to use the switch, and let the resistors on the switch supply the load the circuit needs to reduce the volume. Or replace the volume pot with a 5 way rotary switch and do it that way, rather than using your pickup slider switch.
this is a really cool idea.
@@theonlyrobot Anything more than 3 way would require a strat/tele style switch. I hoped to avoid the woodwork by popping out the pot and replace it with a LP style switch.
But after reading your reply I am thinking or removing the tone and placing my switch there so I get to keep my first volume pot.
Thanks for the idea mate.
@@MrMortadelas If you get the right rotary switch you can even keep the tone's knob. The mod would be invisible.
The longer I’ve been playing, the more I realised there are no “rules” when it comes to guitar sound/tone, it’s all preference as to what inspires you.
I guess people should buy a cheap pot, or take one from any broke device, and dismantle it. They would see a board with a printed graphite track (the resistor) connected to the outer pins, and a kind of sled, connected to the middle pin and sliding on the resistor. So I guess that the quality of a pot is more related to its mechanical properties, if it will last or start scratching, crackling, bouncing soon. Also, if you use 10/10 (volume/tone), maybe you could have tiny benefit getting rid of the pots and connecting right to the jack.
PastelComGini Yep. My Alpha pot feels and works great. I need to have a volume pot because I tend to play extremely loud and need it to reduce the signal when I’m not playing or I feedback like crazy. Plus I back off the volume pot for my “cleaner” sound. But when I want to bypass it completely, I just hit the blower switch I wired up.
Between Alpha, CTS, and Bourns, which would you recommend? Is there any significant difference in build quality? (Eg. do their tapers match spec, do they rotate without feeling "gritty", do they produce noise while adjusting, etc.). How about reliability? (How long do they last?). Are they all equally good?
Bourns are my favorite because I like how easy they turn. they last and are affordable
Alphas tend to have a very smooth action albeit with some weight to it, and I've yet to have one fail. Some of my CTS are great, some not so much.
There's very little difference in my experience. ... and unless you are a teenager, they'll probably outlast you. ;) (or unless they get wet and rust or something like that, or you are continually doing swells or whatever all night)