Post by zpilot on Jan 20, 2019 5:59:50 GMT -7
I'm in the process of rewiring almost all of my guitars to bypass the tone control to the neck pickup. I almost always run the tone controls on those pickups on 10 anyway. I think that not having a tone control at all really opens up a neck pickup. For those who are not electronics savvy, when you have your tone control on 10 you are still diverting some upper frequencies to ground and not to your amp. A long time ago I noticed how this helped clear up high output pickups like a DiMarzio Super Distortion.
It works really well with Tele controls where you normally have to share the tone control with both pickups and you are constantly adjusting it when you switch pickups. On my custom built Strat I also only have two knobs like a Tele. I have wired the tone control to only work with the bridge pickup. The neck AND the middle pick up go straight to the volume control. Kind of strange, I know, since on stock Stratocasters the bridge pickup is the ONLY one that does NOT have a tone control. My Tele with two humbuckers and two knobs got the same re-wire with the same results. The only downside is now I cannot dial in a "woman tone". I rarely used that sound. The trade off on that neck humbucker was more than worth it. My P-90 SG will get the same mod. The Jazzmaster will stay stock since I do use that tone control. Jazzmasters have a 1Meg tone pot if you were not aware.
So I dial in the amp tone controls to optimize the neck pickups. Then I always have the tone control on the bridge pickups to dial down the edge of brightness if I need to. It's easy to attenuate highs with your guitars tone controls but, unless you have active pickups, you cannot ADD high frequencies to a neck pickup. I really like this and think it is a good alternative to active pickups. It has ended my search for a hotter and brighter neck pickup on my Nocaster. That stock pickup sounds wonderful now.
It works really well with Tele controls where you normally have to share the tone control with both pickups and you are constantly adjusting it when you switch pickups. On my custom built Strat I also only have two knobs like a Tele. I have wired the tone control to only work with the bridge pickup. The neck AND the middle pick up go straight to the volume control. Kind of strange, I know, since on stock Stratocasters the bridge pickup is the ONLY one that does NOT have a tone control. My Tele with two humbuckers and two knobs got the same re-wire with the same results. The only downside is now I cannot dial in a "woman tone". I rarely used that sound. The trade off on that neck humbucker was more than worth it. My P-90 SG will get the same mod. The Jazzmaster will stay stock since I do use that tone control. Jazzmasters have a 1Meg tone pot if you were not aware.
So I dial in the amp tone controls to optimize the neck pickups. Then I always have the tone control on the bridge pickups to dial down the edge of brightness if I need to. It's easy to attenuate highs with your guitars tone controls but, unless you have active pickups, you cannot ADD high frequencies to a neck pickup. I really like this and think it is a good alternative to active pickups. It has ended my search for a hotter and brighter neck pickup on my Nocaster. That stock pickup sounds wonderful now.