Jeff,

It’d help if I could see what you describe. Apart from the general point that 25k or 50k pots are the things to use with active electrics, I’m not a great deal of help without either pics or some model names/numbers that I can look up on the web.

Even so, you might want to look up this extremely useful site:
http://www.guitarelectronics.com/

90+% of people with an electronics problem that post here find the answer they need on that site. They even invite you to post in your unsolveables.