Replacing Pots

MAP70 · Post by **MAP70** » Sat Dec 07, 2013 11:21 am

Hey Guys, I am going to replace the pots in my Legacy Tribute... Should I be using short or long shaft?? Looks like the G&L store has sgort pots for the 250 and 500k ones but only long shaft for the 1meg... I assume I can use some washers to make it fit if it's too long... Also I know they are probably the only place to get the Reverse Audio Pot for the Bass in PTB.. I can find 1meg in alot of places but not reverse audio... any ideas if I should just use the G&L part or if anyone tried an Non-reverse pot in the PTB...

Thanks!

Mark

astutzmann · Post by **astutzmann** » Sat Dec 07, 2013 4:11 pm

I'm no expert, but you need short shaft pots, so get them somewhere else. I have used CTS pots with great success.

Being a lefty, I have had to replace the pots on all my guitars and I buy the lefty CTS pots from ALLPARTS. They work great.

I would recommend that when you change the pots, you also change the caps to really good oil in paper caps, they make a huge difference in tone!

Good Luck,

Alf

MAP70 · Post by **MAP70** » Sat Dec 07, 2013 5:49 pm

Being a lefty, I have had to replace the pots on all my guitars and I buy the lefty CTS pots from ALLPARTS. They work great.

I would recommend that when you change the pots, you also change the caps to really good oil in paper caps, they make a huge difference in tone!

Good Luck,

Alf

Thanks Alf, I was thinking the same thing... but finding a non ALPHA Reverse 1M Pot is hard.. i don't hear good things about ALPHA... but I may have no choice... I like the Mojotone CTS stuff myself... Also finding some of the capacitors in .0002uf, .002uf, and .001uf as per this post: http://guitarsbyleo.com/FORUM/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=2628 is proving difficult...

Anyone have any idea on getting some good capacitors in those values would be great, I can get them in ceramic at Mouser but it's harder to find... anywhere else...Maybe small bear???

Thanks

Mark

Zippy · Post by **Zippy** » Sun Dec 08, 2013 5:09 pm

What's a reverse pot? Is that the same as a lefty pot?

MAP70 · Post by **MAP70** » Sun Dec 08, 2013 6:00 pm

I believe it is just the reverse of a standard pot, so yeah... it's for part of the PTB system on the G&L stuff...

Mark

Zippy · Post by **Zippy** » Sun Dec 08, 2013 6:53 pm

What? The sweeper goes the other way? Why?

By the way, on tone caps. People will go nuts with cap material and design. Some caps hold spec tolerance better than other. Metal foil, film, beeswax and oil, you'll hear them all. Research and see what you think. Then you can join in the fight about nothing. Seriously, the only cap I ever heard that sounded obviously like <censored word> were ceramic. I don't know about that material or design but man, if you want your guitar to sound like Ann Drescher's voice, get ceramic caps.

I've never had issue with Orange Drops.

astutzmann · Post by **astutzmann** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 4:03 am

Don't want to get into a cap fight, but I used oil in paper and they make the guitars sound fantastic. I guess anything over the stock crap cap that's in there.

I assume y get what you pay for, the stock cap is probably 50 cents if that, but the caps I bought were $3-$4 each

As far as ptb is concerned, I thought one pot was treble and one bass. I did not know that one was reverse or lefty.

I agree that 1meg lefty are hard to find, I only found 250 and 500 in short and long shaft, never saw a 1 meg

Lefty · Post by **Lefty** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 6:46 am

astutzmann wrote:I'm no expert, but you need short shaft pots, so get them somewhere else. I have used CTS pots with great success.

Being a lefty, I have had to replace the pots on all my guitars and I buy the lefty CTS pots from ALLPARTS. They work great.

I would recommend that when you change the pots, you also change the caps to really good oil in paper caps, they make a huge difference in tone!

Good Luck,

Alf

I can't find lefty pots w/solid shaft on ALLPARTS site.. Do you use the split shaft pots? Thanks for any info

Lefty

astutzmann · Post by **astutzmann** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 8:33 am

yes, I went for the split shafts.

bloodied_fingers · Post by **bloodied_fingers** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 9:51 am

Replacing capacitors and pots for the same-valued components for the sake of improving sound makes no sense to me.

Capacitors and trimpots have specifications and ratings. If they meet those then buying $90 PIO capacitors will not change anything about the sound. "Upgrading" your pots for the purpose of 'tone' is even more pseudo-scientific. It is a filter circuit, there isn't any magic.

What you hear out of the guitar can not change because of the 'type' of capacitors or the brand of pots - its impossible. If neither the capacitance, nor the resistance change then frequency response won't be changing.

How will the frequency response of your filter change when you go from a 1M ohm resistor to a 1M ohm resistor? What will the effect be of going from a .1uF cap to a different .1uF cap? Even if there are small differences, due to tolerance, the change will be inaudible.

Replacing components for the sake of reliability might make sense and certainly failed components must be replaced. Capacitors in guitars are likely to never fail. Unless, ironically, they are really old electrolytic caps.

I can also understand if you don't like the taper or even the feel of a pot.

Salmon · Post by **Salmon** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 9:57 am

EDIT: Deleted, after further reading my guess was wrong.

astutzmann · Post by **astutzmann** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 10:32 am

I play lefty and every new guitar I have boughten, 3 G&Ls and 2 Heritages, have all had, either Righty POTS or Righty POTS, wired backwards.

In case of righty pots, they turn backwards, in case of the righty pots wired backwards, the taper did not work well.

In all cases, I replaced with correct lefty pots and at the same time, I put in good caps.

If you are telling me that the good caps did not change the sound or the tone over the cheapy caps, then I guess that's possible.

However, I can claim that once the guitars had the correct pots and new caps in, the guitars sounded much better.

Could have been just the pots.

I don't know, never changed one without the other.

bloodied_fingers · Post by **bloodied_fingers** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 12:41 pm

I can understand swapping them if they spin backwards (or you play backwards

As for sound, unless you're changing the values of either the caps or pots there shouldn't be any audible difference. But don't just take my word for it, this guy did some good comparisons http://www.planetz.com/is-tone-love-blind

If you're replacing the pots/caps anyway then you can just cut one lead on the stock caps, and then bypass in the new stuff so you could easily A/B them.

If I were going to geek out on the electronics then I'd buy some different value capacitors from mouser and try them like here: http://www.planetz.com/guitar-tone-capa ... explained/

imho, there is more variance due to fingers and pick attack than what brand of pots or type of capacitors you've got.

+edit+ actually here is a shorter one, which to my ears pretty much debunks all the cap-type snake oil. https://www.youtube.com/watch?annotatio ... 1vXoLXIejY

astutzmann · Post by **astutzmann** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 1:22 pm

thanks for the info, I appreciate it.

MAP70 · Post by **MAP70** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 5:37 pm

Well I think you can geek out on anything.. I know guys who spend TONS on NOS tubes... In reality how much better will it sound?? I need to see what the guitar has in it.. I just got it today and tore it apart (gonna copper foil the interior and change pots, switch etc)... looks like someone changed the nut since it's not plastic, which is good..... it has Mighty Mite pots.. was that stock back in '04?

Here are some interior pics of the electronics..

bloodied_fingers · Post by **bloodied_fingers** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 11:22 pm

congrats, hngd!

whatever you do with it, I hope you enjoy it

MAP70 · Post by **MAP70** » Tue Dec 10, 2013 3:06 pm

I finally found a quality Reverse Audio Taper 1M pot here: http://www.digikey.com/product-detail/e ... DPU=submit

As opposed to the cheapo Alpha pots... Hopefully I can get this up and running in a week or so...

Mark

Zippy · Post by **Zippy** » Fri Jan 03, 2014 5:45 pm

Mark, did you shield that pickguard or is that the way they come now?

Larry

MAP70 · Post by **MAP70** » Fri Jan 03, 2014 7:40 pm

Zippy wrote:Mark, did you shield that pickguard or is that the way they come now?

Larry

Hi Larry, This Tribute is a 2004 model... It came shielded but I used some copper tape with conducting adhesive to extend it to the shielded cavity I did....

Mark

Zippy · Post by **Zippy** » Wed Jan 08, 2014 4:26 am

The Legacy Tribute has 1 meg pots? Wow, I never would have guessed. I'm sure there is some mathematical reason for this I didn't learn in the Jethro Bodeen school of mathematics. I did learn my gizinta's though.

Aren't 1 megs just bright as hell? Pairing them with big caps?

Zip

MAP70 · Post by **MAP70** » Wed Jan 08, 2014 10:45 am

Zippy wrote:The Legacy Tribute has 1 meg pots? Wow, I never would have guessed. I'm sure there is some mathematical reason for this I didn't learn in the Jethro Bodeen school of mathematics. I did learn my gizinta's though.

Aren't 1 megs just bright as hell? Pairing them with big caps?

Zip

Hey Zippy.. It's just a the one tone pot for the ptb system.. It seems to be in all the USA and tribute models that use that system..

Mark

patricks · Post by **patricks** » Wed Jan 08, 2014 11:29 am

This "lefty" and "righty" pot has me intrigued - I never knew that true left-handed pots even existed before today. I was about to write a long post on taper and wiring orientation, then did some googling and sure enough, there they were. Left handed pots. Neat!

If you're keen to nerd out on pots, check out R.G. Keen's page called The secret life of pots. All the info will be applicable for left-handed pots, you'll just have to read the article backward and upside-down...

MAP70 · Post by **MAP70** » Wed Jan 08, 2014 12:14 pm

patricks wrote:This "lefty" and "righty" pot has me intrigued - I never knew that true left-handed pots even existed before today. I was about to write a long post on taper and wiring orientation, then did some googling and sure enough, there they were. Left handed pots. Neat!

If you're keen to nerd out on pots, check out R.G. Keen's page called The secret life of pots. All the info will be applicable for left-handed pots, you'll just have to read the article backward and upside-down...

Yeah when I did a lefty strat right project I used a the opposite pots for tge controls.. But it doesn't come up often..

Mark

Zippy · Post by **Zippy** » Thu Jan 09, 2014 11:23 pm

Cool. As a left handed guy who plays guitar righty, that's right up my alley, if you'll excuse the double entendre.

I'll check out the information on pots.

Have some fun today,

Zippy

bloodied_fingers · Post by **bloodied_fingers** » Fri Jan 10, 2014 11:27 am

Zippy wrote:Cool. As a left handed guy who plays guitar righty, that's right up my alley, if you'll excuse the double entendre.

I'm also a lefty who plays righty.

Did you learn righty on purpose?

Zippy · Post by **Zippy** » Sun Jan 19, 2014 10:21 am

I'm sure y'all are fairly used to my idiocy by now. I was installing new pots in this '63 Harmony I've been working on last night. I got a new meter so I had to test everything in reach of course. Messing with the pots and my meter, it suddenly dawned on me what a reverse taper pot is and what it does differently. It's exactly as stated.

The low side is opposite of what we typically find. Man, that was simple.

Have some fun today,

Zippy

Zippy · Post by **Zippy** » Sun Jan 26, 2014 7:33 pm

Post Re: Replacing Pots
Zippy wrote:
Cool. As a left handed guy who plays guitar righty, that's right up my alley, if you'll excuse the double entendre.
I'm also a lefty who plays righty.

Did you learn righty on purpose?

_________________
'Would Leo have wanted it this way?'

I'm not sure. It was just handed to me that way. You know as lefty's, we are forced to do many things right handed. How did you learn? I guess I just thought that's the way all guitars were built, like a piano.

bloodied_fingers · Post by **bloodied_fingers** » Sun Jan 26, 2014 8:48 pm

Zippy wrote:
I'm not sure. It was just handed to me that way. You know as lefty's, we are forced to do many things right handed. How did you learn? I guess I just thought that's the way all guitars were built, like a piano.

I am semi-ambidextrous. I write lefty, throw righty. Kick lefty, dribble basketball righty. I think I spar best as a lefty. Since playing fingerstyle I let some of my nails grow out, so now I bowl left handed - to spare my nails... (get it?)

I went into guitar with the intent to learn right handed, lefty is too constrained. So much guitar material is right-handed-focused it just didn't seem worth the hassle.