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ISSUES WITH TONE POT WIRING

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  • ISSUES WITH TONE POT WIRING

    Over 2 years ago I tried ,out of interest, wiring a tone pot in acordance with a suggested diagram on the Mod Garage..See 50's wiring below. For some reason tone control had no effect whatsoever. The usual checks revealed no obvious connection problems and as I was in a bit of a rush (it was somebody elses axe) I rewired in a the more standard fashion and there was no problem.

    Recently I tried the wiring again with exactly the same result. Am I missing something?

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  • #2
    Re: ISSUES WITH TONE POT WIRING

    Check for cold solder joints and make sure nothing is touching such as pot contacts as well as the pot over heated which is rare. That diagram suggested does work. I've seen Don Breja (brejatoneworks on youtube) to many others use it.

    I usually use an A500k volume, B500k tone. No need for treble bleeds

    this is an old diagram I modified and it does work for what you'd need. However I'm also linking Don's video as he's very insightful as he goes step by step.


    this is an older video he did so i suggest bumping the quality up past my usual cheap skate 240p quality

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    • #3
      Re: ISSUES WITH TONE POT WIRING

      I'm confused by the 60s wiring in the diagram. Isn't that pretty much the same as modern wiring?
      Join me in the fight against muscular atrophy!

      Originally posted by Douglas Adams
      This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.

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      • #4
        Re: ISSUES WITH TONE POT WIRING

        Originally posted by GuitarStv View Post
        I'm confused by the 60s wiring in the diagram. Isn't that pretty much the same as modern wiring?
        Well kinda. It's just that 60s connects to the #3 lug on the tone pot and pure modern connects to the #2 lug. Regardless of what he says in the video, I have never noticed any difference between the two. The main noticeable difference in the various wirings is how the vol pot is wired in one of 4 different combinations...

        Lug #1 connected to input wire and tone pot, lug #2 to output (modern tone, dependent volumes);
        Lug #2 input and tone, lug #1 output (modern tone, independent volumes);
        Lug #1 input, lug #2 tone and output (50s tone, dependent volumes);
        Lug #2 input, lug #1 tone and output (50s tone, independent volumes), my personal favorite.
        Originally Posted by IanBallard
        Rule of thumb... the more pot you have, the better your tone.

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        • #5
          Re: ISSUES WITH TONE POT WIRING

          Originally posted by Gstring View Post
          Over 2 years ago I tried ,out of interest, wiring a tone pot in acordance with a suggested diagram on the Mod Garage..See 50's wiring below. For some reason tone control had no effect whatsoever. The usual checks revealed no obvious connection problems and as I was in a bit of a rush (it was somebody elses axe) I rewired in a the more standard fashion and there was no problem.

          Recently I tried the wiring again with exactly the same result. Am I missing something?

          [ATTACH=CONFIG]102823[/ATTACH]
          Yes.
          You connected the tone pot lugs incorrectly.

          Look at the diagram closely and keep in mind that you are looking at the backs of the pots and that the tone pot is rotated 180 degrees from the vol pot...this affects which lugs appear to be used. Also keep in mind that lug #1 of the tone pot (the top lug in those diagrams) is never connected to anything (not even ground...especially).
          Originally Posted by IanBallard
          Rule of thumb... the more pot you have, the better your tone.

          Comment


          • #6
            Re: ISSUES WITH TONE POT WIRING

            Many thanks for your contribution Guitar Doc but the wiring is exactly as shown. Also pretty sure using the top lug would not cause an issue other than reverse the orientation of the pot. I use the "other " lug when rewiring Lefties without problems.

            Shadowfire, Thanks also for responding. Checked everything again but still mystified . Have reverted to "normal" 50s wiring and all is well. Guitar is a 2 pot using CTS 500k Push pulls which give Artie's coil swap mod and series/parallel on the bridge.

            Will have to experiment more with this tone pot wiring sometime to find out where I am going wrong..

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            • #7
              Re: ISSUES WITH TONE POT WIRING

              Additionally, the wiring of the pot itself won't shift the way it works (loads the pickup).
              If you were simply to take the modern wiring and move the cap across 1 lug on the vol pot you'd get the effects of 50's.

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              • #8
                Re: ISSUES WITH TONE POT WIRING

                Originally posted by Gstring View Post
                Many thanks for your contribution Guitar Doc but the wiring is exactly as shown.
                Well, here's the thing. If you indeed wired the pot correctly as you say, and if there is no solder/stray wires shorting out the lugs on the pot, then there can only be one reason for the tone pot not working...the pot is dead/defective/shorted internally/worn out.

                But if the pot is fine (which seems to be the case since it works correctly when you wire it standard/modern wiring), then there can only be one reason you're getting no function from it...your wiring is NOT "exactly as shown".

                But it is a simple thing to check. Take out that pot and put in a new one and wire it 50s as in the diagram. If you get the same results, then you know you are doing something wrong. It most likely is not the pot.

                I'd like to help you solve your problem, but you need to be objective about it.
                Last edited by GuitarDoc; 01-18-2020, 08:24 AM.
                Originally Posted by IanBallard
                Rule of thumb... the more pot you have, the better your tone.

                Comment

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