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Forum Menu: Forum Home | Guitar | Acoustic Guitar | Bass | Clips & Pics
Overworked Knob
Submitted by Tim on Mon, 12/04/2006 - 00:06.
I need to switch-clean my Tone knob again and it got me thinking, every note ever played on this bass has gone through this little sucker. As posted elsewhere, I want replace my P-ups but are tone pots something people 'upgrade' I assume, like any electrical component, quality can vary but I was wondering if anyone had any experience of the difference an upgrade can make? It must be a fairly cheap one to do?
Tim.
It's a good point Tim (although, given recent posts, I might've deleted it without looking :) ).
Korean instruments use locally-sourced electrics and, especially for 90s instruments like the Aria, they can be a bit not-great. I have ridded some of their useless jack-socket which would DURDUR incessantly, but not bothered with the tone knob (principally because I rarely use it).
If replacing the pups, it is well worth spending a few extra pounds and minutes following through with the rest. CTS pots and a Switchcraft jack are more substantial. OTOH, many pup people supply the rest of the kit anyway (EMG being an example). There comes a point when the switch cleaner is fighting a losing battle and that grit being swiped around is ruining the contacts. BTW, the rule is to use the type with no residue on sockets and suchlike, but make sure you use the type leaving a lubricant for pots.
I just got a Warwick cataloge with a magazine and one of their signature series just has 1 P-up and a volume knob, that'd do me. Although I don't really lower my volume that often either...
EVH designed the Wolfgang guitar with one pot and, because he's so witty, it has a "tone" knob, haha and, er, ha. With passive 'lecs, I rarely touch the tone - just set it about where it needs to be and leave it. Even though I like actives, it's more for the output boost and low s/n rather than fiddling with eq. That said, the treble boost/cut is absolutely useless on my Jim Reed.
I prefer a useable pair of pups to switch between, such as you get on the Jazz. One of my pet hates (again, a feature of the Jim Reed) is a pair of identical pups placed too close together to make much difference. Might as well just have the single.
My problem is that it's tricky to find an apt moment to leave the note hanging and start fiddling with my knob. Changing my string attack is a lot easier.
Exactly, add to that none of the knobs on my bass are numbered or marked at all I've got used to using them all as 'on' or 'off'. As a result, 1 pickup with no knobs or 2 pickups with a 3-way switch would do exactly the same job for me, with less components in the circuit, which has to be a good thing?
Agree about the spacing, the ideal for me would be a layout like that EB 2D that I posted up with a big fat neck pickup for the majority of the sound, then the bridge pickup for some extra attack and to round out the sound for fingerstyle lines.
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