500ohm pots for "lil buckers"

[omni 1]

I have a Strat with a hot rail /vintage rail/ vintage rail. B/M/N.. I think the 250 pot is not enough for the hot rails but I think if I put in 500k it would make my middle and neck pups sound too bright. Hot rail just sounds kinda dead to me with the 250. Thoughts? Thanks

 

[Clint 55]

The lil buckers are kind of compressed and don't get tinny like true single coils do if you use higher pots. I've taken them up to 1 meg and they sounded good to me. If you put in 500k and the neck and middle did sound too bright to you, you could just knock em down with resistors.

 

[omni 1]

I thought of that but I have no idea what size resistors, would they go wired to the hot side or the neg side. I have been wiring pickups for many years but only as a hobby, I have never dealt with resistors on pickups. I guess I could look up some diagrams.. I appreciate any help and advice.

 

[omni 1]

I'll throw on the 500k pot then I guess I will decide. I. have always been a full size humbucker type player so I never really bothered with lil buckers or single coils.

 

[omni 1]

I found this and it's a pretty simple explanation. I'll have to mess with values. If. it helps anyone else , here is the video. I wonder if SD has a video somewhere. I would prefer that, personally, but anyways..https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rphND3goqAI

 

[Clint 55]

Yeah it's easy peasy. All you do is bridge the pickup's hot wire at the switch to ground using the resistor. I don't think you'll need to though. You'll probably get a little more presence with the neck and middle but it won't be brittle.

 

[omni 1]

Great! Thank you!

 

[Clint 55]

You're welcome!

 

[marcello252]

rule of thumb: since two resistor in parallel with the same value give half the resistance of a single one, if you put a 470K in parallel of the outer lugs of a 500K pot you'll have (more or less) 250K R equivalent, so, use a general 500K pot then solder across each single (hot to ground) a 470K resistor.

(beware that you will feel a different taper of the volume pot for the singles than the same without the parallel resistance)

 

[marcello252]

(btw, the actual equivalent resistance of two resistor in parallel is R[SUB]eq[/SUB] = (R[SUB]1[/SUB]R[SUB]2[/SUB])/(R[SUB]1[/SUB] + R[SUB]2[/SUB])​ )

 

[omni 1]

R[SUB]eq[/SUB] = (R[SUB]1[/SUB]R[SUB]2[/SUB])/(R[SUB]1[/SUB] + R[SUB]2[/SUB])​ )​ Thank you professor!

 

[Rex_Rocker]

I always found the 'lil buckers don't sound brighter than humbuckers just narrower and thinner. But "narrower" meaning less bass and treble. So yeah. 500K for sure.

 

[omni 1]

I have a JB laying around but my strat is routed for singles only so, I hate to carve up the body for the true bucker tone. I may have to though.