"boosting" treble on a neck p/up

bertie

Here's the scenario -   Two HBs,   two volume 1 tone.  Neck is disconnected from tone cos I use it wide open.  I still want more treble output from the neck HB.  Would changing the volume pot from 500k to 1mg  help ?  

I read this somewhere

"if u have a 10k p/u and it goes through a 500k volume to start with you would get essensialy half the available power the pickup gots

if you have a 10k p/u with a 1meg volume you are getting almost all the available volume/pwer/gain that the pickup has to offer, literaly if you had to compare next to each other, one will be louder, push the amp harder, cleaner notes, more defined...open bandwith, when stock they always sound soo shity, almost all guitar manufactuers put in 500k and 250k stock on guitars...also the .022 tone cap upgrade will roll off less of the tonal "voltage" lets call it, a .044 rolls off more tone, but also rolls off the responce of the signal as this slags the sound a bit"

p90fool

Every time I've dabbled with 1meg pots it's just given me more volume and and bit of a boost in the harsh upper mids area.

For the sake of pickup balance I'd be more inclined to cut the bass in your neck pickup with something like a cap in series before the switch.

richardhomer

Probably, as would a treble bypass cap across the volume when using lower level. Have you tried raising the pole screws and lowering the pick-up?

bertie

p90fool said:

For the sake of pickup balance I'd be more inclined to cut the bass in your neck pickup with something like a cap in series before the switch.

pretty sure there's a cap there already........... which I assume is a .022   -    will take a look tomorrow,  cheers    

Phil_aka_Pip

bertie said:

pretty sure there's a cap there already........... which I assume is a .22   -    will take a look tomorrow,  cheers    

I used to shoot .22 bolt action rifles, but they didn't use caps ...

ICBM

bertie said:

p90fool said:

For the sake of pickup balance I'd be more inclined to cut the bass in your neck pickup with something like a cap in series before the switch.

pretty sure there's a cap there already........... which I assume is a .022   -    will take a look tomorrow,  cheers    

This came up on another thread recently…

The cap in there is the standard tone cap, which you currently have disconnected. Put this cap in series between the pickup hot wire and the volume control. It won't make a huge difference - you need a much smaller value to do that really - but it might be just enough.

bertie

ooh OK - so I could get a *******  value one then ?? (insert recommended value please) 

ICBM

Difficult to say, because it's very dependent on the pickup type, but between .001uF and .01uF usually works well. Given the low cost it's worth buying a .001, .0022, .0047 and .01uF - and you can make in-between values by using two in parallel, eg .001 and .0022 = .0033uF.

bertie

its a Bulldog Cool PAF if thats any help

ESBlonde

Just because it says 500k on the pot does not mean it is, try and measure it on it's own. It may read about 460k or so. Another in the same batch might be 490k or 510k. It might be worth seeking a known 500k + pot from Shugs or another supplier prepared to check a few and send you a higher value one (if you're lucky about 570k or more).
@richardhomer makes a good suggestion which seems to work better on some guitars than others. All of these things make small incremental changes and can be reversed easily if you don't like the results.

Edit.
Have you asked Bulldog for their comments?

bertie

1) its the original CTS that Neil put in when it was made,  not measured it - I'll give it a go

2) done the adjustment thing, it appears to be less treble the lower it goes........which is a fuckin shame - cos it fucks the balance up when its high.

3) no not yet

ChrisMusic

You could try the "blower" technique, and just wire it straight to the jack for a test (or via a switch), then the pickup will just be loaded by the cable capacitance and by amp input impedance.  K.I.S.S.  Then make a decision as to what you want to do.

That should give you an idea of what the pickup is capable of by largely unloading it, the resonant peak will move up the frequency spectrum and also increase the upper harmonic levels a bit.  (Easier to explain with a graph if I can find one)

Probably as p90fool said above - a bit more volume and bit of a boost in the harsh upper mids area.

My Tom Anderson has a blower switch and that sounds bloody fantastic though.

The series cap will cut bass and with a volume boost will give proportionately more harmonics in the signal, but can only what the pickup and its position are capable of delivering.  A push/push switch on the pot (or a toggle) would allow you to get the Hi-Pass cap out of circuit if required.  And again a couple of caps and a toggle (maybe even in the control cavity) would allow you to experiment and see what sounds best with your set up, (with maybe 3 cap values switchable from 2 caps).

Alternatively a different pickup wind, or maybe blend in some of the bridge pickup are other options that come to mind.

ChrisMusic

A pretty rough graph, but it explains the point, it was measured with a strat pickup, but the basis it similar for HBs, they tend to have lower resonant ƒ, and less harmonic content though.  (note: this is NOT about series caps)

http://www.moore.org.au/pick/04/strat01scan.jpg

Curve 1:  Straight into the ultra high impedance preamplifier

Curve 2:  100 k ohms

Curve 3:  100 k ohms parallel to 0.001 uF

Curve 4:  100 k ohms parallel to 0.0027 uF

Curve 5:  100 k ohms parallel to 0.027 uF

Curve 6:  10 k ohms

Curve 7:  10 k ohms parallel to 0.027 uF

ChrisMusic

Another thought, it would change tonality significantly, but if your pickup has coil splits, then you could try the coils in parallel rather than the standard series humbucker orientation.  It would remain humbucking.  Again another switchable option should you try it and like it but still want flexibility.

ICBM

ESBlonde said:

Just because it says 500k on the pot does not mean it is, try and measure it on it's own. It may read about 460k or so. Another in the same batch might be 490k or 510k. It might be worth seeking a known 500k + pot from Shugs or another supplier prepared to check a few and send you a higher value one (if you're lucky about 570k or more).

It won't make any noticeable difference, despite the marketing of "selected" better-tolerance pots.

I did some direct-switching testing on this, and the smallest change in value that could just be heard was about 25%, maybe as much as 33% in the up direction - that means you'd need a pot of at least 625K or more before you'd hear it as brighter. There is a good reason why standard pots are made to 20% tolerance.

bertie

thanks folks,  

Chris - that graph means absolutely diddle to me, but thanks anyway     

John - I assume the old "sprague"  (and its relative cost)  is more snake oil than substance and any old cap will do ? 

Fretwired

Treble boosting pedal or EQ pedal?

ChrisMusic

OK, this is just me thinking out loud

(and I try to never let anyone catch me thinking, I have a reputation to live down to  )

I don't know if it is possible or would work, but if you were to lower the pole pieces a fair bit, and raise the pickup height to regain some volume, then you would be biasing the pickup more in the direction of a single coil by reducing the field strength in one of its coils.  This would also favour the coil nearer the bridge in a traditionally oriented neck humbucker.

I hope anyone will point out if this is just barking.

( The "full-fat" version of this mod would be to remove the pole screws entirely, thus rendering one coil much less significant in contribution of string related output, but still humbucking.  Voila, almost instant single coil conversion, and easily reversible. )

bertie

pole pieces are pretty much flush with the cover

dont want/cant/impractical to use a pedal  

ChrisMusic

Sorry about the graph bertie, they can be a bit of a foreign land, with a language all their own.

But once you have the hang of that language, then a picture becomes truly worth a thousand words (or numbers even)

I didn't mean to inflict that on you though, just forget you ever saw it.

Van_Hayden

More treble??? They're quite bright Cool PAFs, low output even for a PAF. Drop me an email.