I have a naive question about tone and treble loss. About a year and a half ago, I built my own Strat from really high quality parts (see attached photos). There’s a thread about the build somewhere that I posted at the time.
I put in Tonerider Classic Blues pickups, having had a great experience with Tonerider Alnico 2 Blues pickups in my Squier tele.
The Classic Blues are described as their hottest “vintage style” and are Alnico 5.
The pickups sound great with the volume and tone turned up full but a lot of treble is lost very quickly as you turn down the volume. I know that it’s normal to lose treble as the volume is turned down, but in the case of my Strat, it’s much more noticeable than any of my other guitars (Squire tele with Alnico 2 single coils and an Ibanez AR420 with humbuckers).
I was wondering why this might be? I don’t think that it’s anything to do specifically with the pots I put in this build. They are good quality pots. Also, I had to change the pots from the original build - not because of any tone issues - but because they turned too easily and it was very easy to accidentally change the volume. The treble loss is the same.
I understand why treble is lost as you turn down the volume. But I was wondering why it happens in this guitar, more than my other guitars? Is it possible that more treble is lost with certain pickups more than in others?
I know the fix is easy & very cheap - a treble bleed circuit (see photo), my question is just out of curiosity to learn more.
what you describe is not what you should expect. I think it better see why you get treble rolling off with volume before you try to bandage it.
The treble should remain relative to the bass and mid without the treble bleed. Since you put this guitar together, it is best to see if the wiring is correct. I suspect that something is not hooked up properly and the volume is part of the tone somehow.
If you have a picture or drawing of what you wanted to do, compare that to what you really have. Draw it out is my approach, and try to NOT be influenced by expectation. Draw what you see, not what you think.
If you can share those drawing here, maybe we can spot the problem.
I have read that as you turn down a volume pot the resistance allows higher frequencies to go more easily to the ground than mid or low frequencies. All my guitars do this to some extent; just a bit more with my Strat. I presume the taper on the pot will affect how quickly this happens. The taper could be very different from my other guitars - I don’t know.
I very much doubt I have made a mistake with the wiring, although I would never rule it out completely. It’s a very standard Strat wiring. One volume pot, one tone pot for the neck pickup and one pot for the middle pickup and no tone pot for the bridge pickup. This is quite standard Strat wiring and a very simple circuit. Nothing fancy. None of the pots are push/pull. Having worked in laboratories as a scientist for nearly 40 years, I’m really used to meticulously following diagrams, protocols and instructions. Also, most wiring errors lead to no sound from one of the pickups or buzzing, which is not the case.
This should be ALL frequencies. The tone pot is the one that is shunting the high frequency to the common.
Taper is about how it feels to you as you rotate it. if the change is sluggish or too fast, then taper is the culprit. It does not change the tone as you described in the initial post.
I made a whopping mistake at work last week while claiming the same basic comment
Best to check when you are seeing a weird problem.
gonna get nerdy on you here:
The frequency response remains the same when the circuit is correct and the volume pot is rotated. Just the output level at the guitar jack is changing:
Not sure why the peaking falls and comes back. The peaking is common in a single coil due to the parasitic C in the coil windings. I suppose it is simply the response gets overdamped and returns back to under in the middle of the tone pot range. Looks like that and seems plausible.
My Les Paul came with a treble bleed circuit installed from the factory.
Here’s a little discussion with some description about different values for the resistor and cap depending on the pickups. Also a reference to the type of wiring making some difference. As such, I imagine that the pickups quite possibly do matter (specifically the output of the pickups).
I have a couple of the stew mac treble bleed circuits just in case I decide I want it on the guitar and the uke that I’m building. I’m wiring everything up without them at first, will play them for a bit, and then do the clip-on test to see if I prefer the result.
I traced out the wiring and do not see anything wrong - yay! the blade switch is typically set up so you can install it either direction and it will work the same - yay! So, that stuff checks out fine.
So, whatelse might be unexpected? The load on the guitar. If you have a particularly high capacitance on the cable (bad/cheap cables), then you might see issues with volume also changing the tone. Is your cable particularly low budget, or extra long?
The other thing is the gear you plug into. We can look into that if it seems the last thing. A capacitive input on the gear you are using could respond with some rolloff. Do you plug into the same thing all the time? Do you have an option to try something else?
Also, do you have the same rolloff problems on all pickup switch positions?
