push pull idea

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Tallwood13

Tallwood13

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so I have a box of push pulls I got in to try out various things. One out of the box idea I had was somewhat inspired by tonefiend but instead of using capacitors I was thinking of using resistors. Figure someone on here knows more about push pulls than I do.

so here's the idea. Lets say one volume for the wiring that is a push pull and a selector switch.

what I'd want is
bottom position I want a straight forward humbucker tone ... easy
but .. in the upwards position of the push pull I was thinking of adding a resistor to drop value of the potentiometer to darken the tone
if I wanted to do so where would I attach the resistor?

My theory as I'm new to push pulls is to use top two lugs closer to the knob of the guitar if it was mounted and ready to play. If I'm wrong this jpeg may help as I'm a visual guy.

thanks in advance

push pull.jpg
 
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Re: push pull idea

With the switch down, terminals B, C, E and F are in circuit.

With the switch up, terminals A, B, D and E are in circuit.

Since it is possible for there to be slight signal leakage across the internal contacts of the switch, it is advisable to add your resistors to terminals A and/or D.
 
Re: push pull idea

alright thanks for your help. I'm going to try this tonight when I get the chance and let you know if I get any results.
 
Re: push pull idea

The difference in tone between pot values is there, but it is minor. It's so minor that it is hardly worth the mod to install a switch that changes your effective potentiometer value IMO. To get the effect you want, I'd rig up a simple resistor and capacitor in series. That will leak a portion of high end from the hot signal to ground when you pull up. It would be a switch that instantly simulates rolling your tone pot down to a pre-selected setting. You select what frequencies get dropped by choosing the cap value, and how severely they get dropped by choosing the resistor value.

Alternately, the same effect can be achieved, but from the reverse angle, by taking the same approach as a Fender Esquire. With that guitar, when you have the switch in the 1st position, it's the same as having your tone pot on 10, no matter where it is actually set. But you also pre-set your tone knob to the desired level anywhere along the rotation of the pot. Then when you switch to the middle position, you get the pre-selected tone setting. It's a much better way of going about it, because you get to finely tune the pre-set resistance, and you can change it any time. The first way, you have to try a bunch of resistor values to find the right one, and once you have it, it's fixed.
 
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Re: push pull idea

the kinman treble bleed I've had on this guitar and really liked it. For the esquire style wiring it is interesting.. saw one guy solder a few capacitors and resistors to a 3 way switch like a 1950s broadcaster for a super bass like tone and it wasn't for me. But I do like 25k pots for certain things.

On my 1980s Hamer guitar one with 27 frets it had a megaton potentiometer in it and it wasn't suitable for the guitar. At this point I'm experimenting with various potentiometer resistances and so forth so I'm still in the learning stage. But anyways I really liked it when I put a 100k resistor across the outer lugs so much I figured this box of push pulls I have may get some use other than the kinman treble bleeds. The push pull is going in my warlock to drop the value when I pull up. More the less I'm curious to see what it will sound like and at the same time it would be kind of cool to sell locally if all goes well.

So as an update , I did attach the resistors across A/D on the push pull, everything is grounded but when I pull up I get no difference at all. Any suggestions?

** edit **
the contacts are ..
A/D have the resistor , A also has a ground wire
the rest have nothing as I don't want a coiltap or anything
 
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