Why are they inferior?

CampbellH

I hear and read mini pots are inferior to fullsize pots. But I never ever hear or read why. I have looked everywhere but haven't had anything more than the same old echoes of'they are'.

Having designed and built all kinds of electronic gismos, I am well aware of tolerances, resistance curves on variable pots wtc but I am yet to see or hear of why just the physical size is the only deciding factor of inferiority. (backed up with repeatable hard facts would be nice as well)

Is this just folklore because 'everyone says it's? Just like saying it so many times means it must be true.

OilCityPickups

If you have two pots, one full size and one mini that are made using the same standard of materials and to the same tolerances, with the same wiper arrangement, and with the carbon film deposited on a equally high quality substrate ... then the pot performance will be identical, simple as that. 

The bad reputation mini pots have is because the market is swamped with very low quality ones.

Funkfingers

EMG and Seymour Duncan active pickups are supplied with small diameter pots but of high quality.

The stacked/layered pots found inside German-made Warwick bass guitars are of even smaller diameter but still high quality.

OilCityPickups

Funkfingers said:

EMG and Seymour Duncan active pickups are supplied with small diameter pots but of high quality.

The stacked/layered pots found inside German-made Warwick bass guitars are of even smaller diameter but still high quality.

Exactly ... the problem is that we are used to the horrible mini pots that came, and in some cases still come fitted to cheaper Far Eastern guitars ... and they are just of very low quality, size not coming into it. You could upgrade a guitar fitted with those junk mini pots by fitting top quality mini pots ... it's just that there are fewer of those readily available compared to full size ones. Of course there is also the usual snobbery with 'full size pots like the classic US instruments use'. 
In truth there is no real reason to replace good mini pots ... especially with dubious quality full size ones! 

ICBM

Exactly that. The problems with mini pots - poor tapers, often abrupt start/end points well away from the physical stops, high internal capacitance and crudely-cast shafts which don't fit the knobs properly - are problems of low quality, not physical size. It's just that the traditional full-size USA-made pots were much higher quality than the typical far-east-made minis - but that's no longer so true, if at all... and the gap is closing from both directions!

thermionic

Why do manufacturers make smaller pots? Is it because they think they’re cuter? I would wager that it’s because they cost less to make because they use less raw materials, especially when economies of scale come into it. I’m sure that you can find high quality mini pots, but I think people associate mini pots (rightly or wrongly) with a lower quality but cheaper product.

ICBM

thermionic said:

Why do manufacturers make smaller pots? Is it because they think they’re cuter? I would wager that it’s because they cost less to make because they use less raw materials, especially when economies of scale come into it.

And because you can fit them into smaller spaces, or closer together. The trend in most non-guitar things is for making them smaller, so smaller pots help with that.