treble bleed vs. switching out tone circuit

[asmith9509]

Greetings all. I am an avid tweaker of my LP, and have put a lot of time and effort into getting the tone that I like. Here's my basic setup:
- 1980 LP Custom
- WB VTP (PAF-style) pickups
- 50's wiring
- RS guitarworks 500k volume pots
- CTS 500k audio taper tone pots
- Vitamin Q caps; .022ufd bridge, .015ufd neck

I really like where I'm at with this project EXCEPT the dreaded treble loss with volume adjustment on the neck pickup. If I run it at anything other than 10, it gets muddy quickly. The 50's wiring higher value pots, and lower value tone cap helped some, but not enough.

So- I've considered adding a treble bleed network. However, it seems like a very contrived solution to me; using another conjunctive filter to offset the disadvantages of the first? Before I get a bunch of caps/resistors, I want to try a different approach.

I'm thinking about installing a SPST switch under the pickguard to disconnect the tone circuit from the neck pickup entirely. That way, when switched out, the volume pot would no longer be a variable resistor in a low pass filter, and should pass a full bandwidth signal to the output. I think I can live without using the tone control at lower volumes.

I really like the way that this guy installed his switch:
Treble Bleed Circuits Explained!

Has anyone tried this? I plan to de-solder the tone cap tomorrow night, just to see if it helps. I'll report back.

 

[Tonyd]

I'd e-mail Jonesy. Why not try .047 caps?

http://www.mylespaul.com/forums/tonefreaks/9683-capacitor-thread.html

Good Cap thread, I think his e-mail is in post 23.

 

[eddie_bowers]

With no caps at all your still going to have treble loss when you turn down. Just use a treble bleed.
You may not want to modify your RS guitarworks Pots, but if you want a no-load pot to take your cap out at will, you can make one easily:
Project Guitar :: Checking DC resistance on your potentiometers

-Eddie

 

[mrpesca]

I've got one of Jonesy's treble bleed kits and it works. Contrived or not, the volume and tone controls actually work now.

 

[asmith9509]

First of all- thank you all for your responses.

I plan to try several treble bleed values in addition to lifting the tone cap to see how they compare. I will probably video the results so I have an objective comparison- if it turns out to be worth anything, I'll post to Youtube.

The idea of a no-load tone pot rather than a switch is a good one. I am having a hard time understanding why the circuit would shunt off high frequencies to ground even with the tone pot at 10- in theory blocking the action of the tone cap if the resistance were infinite. At this point, all that would be left in the circuit would be the volume pot which would act as a resistor, and would work independent of frequency. The only thing I can think of is the perception of loudness at different frequencies- i.e. Fletcher-Munson stuff. If anyone has a better explanation please let me know.

 

[eddie_bowers]

I'm not sure why it shunts off high frequencies faster, but there is capacitance and inductance in the pickups and cable without actual caps present, so maybe thats a factor. I don't think it's a perception of loudness because if you turn down your guitar volume and turn up your amp volume you still loose treble (at least in my limited experience).