Recipe for a brighter tone

solspirit

solspirit

Ultimate Post Liker
I love the guitar, but it's too dark sounding. I have no idea what electronics it has and haven't done any mods yet.
. I'm thinking higher value pots and maybe higher value caps.

Tell me if I'm on the right path, or not. . . .
 
Higher value pots will make the guitar brighter although be careful when changing the volume pot to high values - it makes the pickup more peaky, which can sometimes be a little much. Tone caps don't really make much difference until you start rolling down the tone pot, but you can try adding a no load pot to cut the tone circuit entirely, that will brighten things a little bit more too.

Also use good quality low capacitance wire and use the minimum possible while wiring up your new harness - that seems to brighten things too.
 
What guitar? Bridge/saddles, nut, strings, pickup type, pickup placement, pick material, cable length, buffer... all of it plays a role (in addition to concerns about the internal electronics) and most of it can be tweaked.
 
Seashore said:
What guitar? Bridge/saddles, nut, strings, pickup type, pickup placement, pick material, cable length, buffer... all of it plays a role (in addition to concerns about the internal electronics) and most of it can be tweaked.
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Good call. I was figuring that most of the acoustic elements had already been addressed. But if not, lighter strings tend to sound less bassy in my experience. Bridge saddles can make a difference. Nut will only brighten up open strings, so isn't usually all that helpful.
 
If there are 500k pots in there already, buy a set of 550k pots and choose the ones that meter the highest. Or go to 1meg which can make things peaky like Stv said.

If there are 250k pots in there, then just go to 300, 330, or 500k.

Change the tone pot to a 250k no load.

These will brighten it up.

Of course eq is extremely effective in all cases. It's totally transparent, so it's not like an effect that colors your tone. And it doesn't make sense that most people don't have one.
 
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Most dual humbucker guitars are darker than most three single coil strats

I am curious as to what guitar is so dark

A long cheap off brand guitar cable can bleed highs off
 
I tend to swap pickups and or pots out and that generally fixes any darkness issue.

I've only ever had one guitar that just refused to get bright enough.... I ended up switching to emg 85/81 and it's fixed now.
 
ehdwuld said:
Most dual humbucker guitars are darker than most three single coil strats

I am curious as to what guitar is so dark

A long cheap off brand guitar cable can bleed highs off
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Its a SKI? Lp type body. 2 humbuckers, 3 way toggle, 2 volume, 2 tone.
I've never heard of the brand.
 
Brighter cap?
lower the pickups?
higher value volume pots (the tone pot isn't necessary in this)

As I said shorter cable
Or wireless/George L cables are bright
 
I'm going to change the pots first, and possibly different strings. It has Dunlop 9-46 now and it's the first time I've ever tried them.
I'm probably going to try a set of these.

DR Strings VTE-10/52 Veritas Electric Guitar Strings - .010-.052 Medium to Heavy | Sweetwater https://share.google/P48X3UNOIfrt499Tv
 
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I'd also start exploring the EQ on the amp, too. Most people just set the EQ on an amp to be the same for every guitar (and the same on any amp, too). Other than that, I'd suggest an EQ pedal, or a drive pedal with the gain set at 0 (but used as a tone control). Before I started swapping out pots, I probably would look at pickups, too- pots can certainly get 'peaky' and affect the sound in a strange way if the value gets too high.
 
Mincer said:
I'd also start exploring the EQ on the amp, too. Most people just set the EQ on an amp to be the same for every guitar (and the same on any amp, too). Other than that, I'd suggest an EQ pedal, or a drive pedal with the gain set at 0 (but used as a tone control). Before I started swapping out pots, I probably would look at pickups, too- pots can certainly get 'peaky' and affect the sound in a strange way if the value gets too high.
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Do you set your amp differently for different guitars?

Maybe I'm just lucky or something, but I've got like seven guitars - all with wildly different pickups ranging from low output singles to high output humbuckers . . . but they all seem to get along with the same amp settings. At most I might tweak the bass or treble a notch when switching.
 
GuitarStv said:
Do you set your amp differently for different guitars?

Maybe I'm just lucky or something, but I've got like seven guitars - all with wildly different pickups ranging from low output singles to high output humbuckers . . . but they all seem to get along with the same amp settings. At most I might tweak the bass or treble a notch when switching.
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Yeah, especially if there are single coils, vs humbuckers. And some guitars are just brighter, so I need to reduce the treble when I use those to sound 'normal' to me. The EQ in many modern amps are active and can do a lot of tone shaping without having to spend any $.
 
before anything else lower the pickups a bit and raise the poles to make up the height, then see how far you have to go
 
Securb said:
The 5-band EQ on my amp is foot-switchable, so I set it up for a mid-boost for those pickups that need a bit of help.
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That's a good point that I didn't think of. I do tend to use pedals with mid humps with scooped single coils for the same reason.
 
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