Treble bleed with no load tone control

['59]

I have a simple treble bleed in my guitar of a single 150 (nf? pf?) cap. If I want to install a no-load tone control, will this cap make it sound weird if I have the volume at 5 and the tone at 10? I wonder because I sometimes have both pots at values less than 10.

 

[GuitarStv]

As you turn a volume pot down you increase loading on passive pickups, which has the impact of decreasing treble. This is why people put in treble bleeds - they want to keep their highs while turning down. The way a simple treble bleed works is it keeps treble frequencies (set by the value of your treble bleed cap) at max all the time. The rest of the guitar frequencies will be reduced as you turn the volume pot down. Sometimes this is exactly what you want, but especially at lower volume settings it can make the pickups sound too bright.

A no load tone control lets you remove the tone pot from the circuit entirely (making things brighter) but it also lets you use the tone control as normal. So worst case scenario, if things sound weird because they're too bright as you roll the volume back, you just need to roll the tone back too.

 

['59]

So it has nothing to do with tone control interactions? A single volume setup would still get darker as the tone is turned down for example?

 

[GuitarStv]

Tone controls (even wide open) add a small amount of loading on the guitar pickup. A guitar with a volume only and full up will be slightly brighter than a guitar with volume/tone full up. But they'll both lose some highs as you roll the volume control back as well. I'd expect the one without tone control will probably be a smidge brighter, but I doubt it would be very noticeable.

This is for standard modern wiring. If you're doing some sort of 50's wiring, all bets are off. Usually people don't put a treble bleed on a guitar with 50s wiring though.

 

[GuitarDoc]

^ This. Stated very clearly.

I have rarely found it necessary to use a treble bleed with 50's wiring.

 

[Clint 55]

The 150 pf cap is a good conservative value for a treble bleed, adding a no load tone will work fine.

 

[Chistopher]

50s wiring is gross, unless you never use your tone control