Tip: use Fender TBX tone pot when mixing HBs and SCs

[RichardG]

Just finished wiring my S/H/S strat (thanks to advice from Fritz through my other thread regaridng a minor out of phase glitch ). Tried S/H/S as an experiment but it's an amazing combination, and with a neck blender pot all seven PU combinations really are very useable.

The only problem was that the HB was a bit bassier than the SCs, as you'd expect.

So I robbed a TBX (tone) pot from another guitar and it's worked a treat:
* For the SCs leave TBX in centre notch, but move anti-clockwise when I need to take off a bit of the highs.
* For the HB turn TBX clockwise from the centre notch to add some highs and brighten things up.
It all takes a fraction of a second to find the right tone and avoids the need to wire the HB and SCs through different value pots.

TBXs cost just 20 bucks I think and the mod takes a few minutes so it's worth trying if you are struggling to balance the different tones of HBs and SCs.

 

[JB_From_Hell]

Re: Tip: use Fender TBX tone pot when mixing HBs and SCs

Interesting... I saw Dave Navarro with a Modulus strat with an S-H-S setup awhile back, and have been curious about it.

The TBX control sounds cool, too. How does a passive tone control do so much tone shaping?

 

[RichardG]

Re: Tip: use Fender TBX tone pot when mixing HBs and SCs

I'm not sure how the TBX it works - all I know is that it adds trebles as well as rolls them off. I have them on some of my other guitars and although I have always liked them I haven't really used it to add the trebles much until now; just used them for a lovely smooth rolling off of trebles, much better than most convetional tone pots I've used.

The reason I went for S/H/S is that previously the HB was in the neck which was an awesome sound but perhaps just a bit too 'necky' for practical use when gigging. The HB in the middle suits me as it's really the sort of bridge PU tone I've always wanted, not being a big fan of trebly sounding bridge PUs. Plus mixing the HB with either or both of the SCs gives some fantastic country-like tones, but big and full. Reminds me of a lot of Ry Cooder's stuff on the Mambo Sinuendo album etc. Go on . . . get the hacksaw to your scratchplate . . . you know you want to.

 

[itbepopples]

Re: Tip: use Fender TBX tone pot when mixing HBs and SCs

The TBX control sounds like its just high value pot with a detent (maybe at a value a 250k pot would be bypassed) and a different capacitor packaged as something else. I'd like to know what goes into one of them.

 

[RichardG]

Re: Tip: use Fender TBX tone pot when mixing HBs and SCs

All the techie stuff I know is that:
* TBX stands for Treble Bass Expander.
* It's a dual concentric stacked tone control.
* It uses a .022mf capacitor and 1-Meg resistor.