Fun wiring ideas to do with push/pull pots?

[Rex_Rocker]

So I ordered a couple push/pull (or rather, push/push, really) 500K pots. One, I used in the bridge position with a JB. In one position, it sees a 300K-ish load. In the other, it sees 500K. It's cool to have both sounds available, subtle as the difference may be.

However, I've got another spare push/push pot, and no idea what to do with it. Ideally, I'd like to be able to coil split the neck pickup, but the 490R I have in there right now is a braided wire, rather than 4 conductor... so there it goes.

I really don't want something that means having to completely rewire the whole guitar. I'd like to keep it simple. I was thinking about splitting the bridge pickup there, although the "pot" part would be controlling the neck volume. That is doable, right?

But what other fun ideas do you guys have that I could try out? I suppose the rules of the game is I want to have two volumes, one for the neck, one for the bridge. I want to keep the bridge volume with the function that it has right now as is. It's just I've got an extra DPDT switch to play with. I don't want to add tone controls either. Not a fan. I want something that I'll actually use even if it's just from time to time.

Thank you!

 

[beaubrummels]

What is the guitar / pickup configuration? 2 Vol, but an extra DPDT, ok. 490R neck, and ...?

Yeah the switches are completely independent of the pot they are on, so they can do anything a switch can do, (as long as you can remember what it does while you are playing.)

FWIW not really a suggestion for you, since it sounds like you might be talking about an LP type, but for anyone else reading, in my Jackson HSS with vol/tone 5-way blade (Custom Custom, DMZ Injector neck in the middle, DMZ '54 Blues Pro in the neck), I wired the vol and tone as triple-shot push pulls on the bridge Custom Custom.

Both down equals normal humbucker
Tone up equals screw coil near the Floyd
Vol up equals slug coil near the middle
Both up equals parallel coils

With humbucking bridge alone, I get a hot PAF tone that can handle classic rock to EVH
With parallel coils, it sounds like a Telecaster bridge, can do anything a Tele can do, even twang and chicken-pickin due to the neck scale
With screw coil, it sounds like a punk P-90
With slug coil, it's very Fendery, almost quacks on it's own (think E.C. Lay Down Sally)
With slug coil + middle, it's definitely Fender quack, a la Dire Straits Sultans Of Swing
Injector neck in the middle gives me Gibson neck tones, combined with the bridge humbucker, I get Gibson middle positions tones
Injector + 54 Blues Pro in position 4 gives me absolute funk quack (Cory Wong / Vulfpeck)
'54 Blues Pro gives me Fender / Hendrix / RHCP neck tones

So I get a Gibson Les Paul, a Fender Strat, an LP Junior P-90, and a Telecaster with just one guitar.

 

[Rex_Rocker]

What is the guitar / pickup configuration? 2 Vol, but an extra DPDT, ok. 490R neck, and ...?

JB/490R.

It's a Les Paul Tribute.

 

[freefrog]

However, I've got another spare push/push pot, and no idea what to do with it. Ideally, I'd like to be able to coil split the neck pickup, but the 490R I have in there right now is a braided wire, rather than 4 conductor... so there it goes.

OOP wiring of the JB? It's a current solution with 2 HB LP type guitars.

Or a series capacitor to make the neck PU tighter. If you don't use fuzz pedals, it might be useful.

Or a parallel cap to make the neck PU more mid focused, in the PRS / Santana "Sweet Switch" fashion.

Or some inductor/choke/coil(s) in parallel with the neck PU (or with the bridge. Or both): it allows to mimick split coil(s) / parallel wiring with external components (which could be the coils of some old/cheap HB, simply buried in the electronic cavity). If you want an acoustic tone from your neck PU, just put a cap in series with the inductor/choke/coil(s) and mount the whole in parallel with the pickup...

Non limitative list. I've mounted such things dozens of times for other musicians or for myself. Depends on your tonal needs.

HTH.

 

[Mincer]

My first thought would be phase, and it would keep everything noise-cancelling. Another option would be parallel for the JB, which is a useful sound if you don't always want to hit the amp that hard.

 

[AdrianSD]

JB sounds super cool wired in parallel.

 

[Artie]

Fun, you say? Here's something I never see anyone do. It's common to switch a 500k resistor in parallel, with a 500k pot, to make it effectively 250k. But I never see anyone do the opposite. Switch a 250k resistor in series with a 250k pot to make it a 500k pot that you can only turn down halfway. Not exactly halfway, since we hear logarithmically. But now you have the whole pot to give you finer control over just reducing volume, rather than turning it to zero.

This also leaves the other side of the switch for maybe splitting. So you could have "down", split with a 250k pot, then "up" for a full humbucker, 500k pot, and "fine" volume control.

Just a thought. (Note: The resistor is switched into the ground side of the pot.)

P.S. Doing a little math would allow a resistor value selection that would provide actual half volume, or other percentage.

P.S.S. Oh crap. I drew that backwards. Flip it left-to-right.

 

[Chistopher]

Fun, you say? Here's something I never see anyone do. It's common to switch a 500k resistor in parallel, with a 500k pot, to make it effectively 250k. But I never see anyone do the opposite. Switch a 250k resistor in series with a 250k pot to make it a 500k pot that you can only turn down halfway. Not exactly halfway, since we hear logarithmically. But now you have the whole pot to give you finer control over just reducing volume, rather than turning it to zero.

This also leaves the other side of the switch for maybe splitting. So you could have "down", split with a 250k pot, then "up" for a full humbucker, 500k pot, and "fine" volume control.

Just a thought. (Note: The resistor is switched into the ground side of the pot.)

P.S. Doing a little math would allow a resistor value selection that would provide actual half volume, or other percentage.

P.S.S. Oh crap. I drew that backwards. Flip it left-to-right.

I have hardwired something similar. I got inspiration from the Fender Greasebucket circuit. The intent is to make the bottom 10% of the tone control off limits. I did it because with small capacitors, sometimes that resonant peak just sounds bad.

 

[Artie]

I have hardwired something similar. I got inspiration from the Fender Greasebucket circuit.

I've been wanting to try that GreaseBucket circuit. Somewhere, in another forum, is someone who modified it to work and sound even better than Fender's take on it.

 

[jeremy]

id use the switch to put the jb in parallel