Gents,
Liking the new Strat a lot
but still addressing some gremlins and wonder if I could seek you're expert council again?
When I select position 2, I get a noticeable thud, rather like a short restablishing connection
It's inconsistent, but tends to happen when I've been playing in positions 3-5 for a bit
The Strat is wired with the Bridge having its own tone pot and both tones have separate caps, so I assume different values too.
This Strat still has the tones after the volume, plus the treble bleed, but I was getting this when it was stock too
Dodgy contact? ..some sort of capacitance thingamy?
Baz
The answer was never 42 - it's 1/137 (..ish)
Comments
..none of this has made any difference
I spoke to Fender, they suggested I simply hand back the guitar I've spent 3 years finding and they'll 'just swap it for another one' - FFS!
it's a problem and sufficiently noticeable that my other half (who has cloth ears) has called it out
The flat "wiper" parts the sprung leaf metal contacts as it passes between them. It is possible that one part is butting up too firmly with the edge of another, causing the unwanted sound.
If your switch is the modern, unsprung, "wheel and bumps" type, the motion of the wheel across the notch bumps physically displaces the contact wiper during its travel. This alone may explain the make and break noises. Try greasing the bump track.
As BloodEagle says, the issue does plague an large number of Stratocasters. Indeed, on some famous recordings, it makes it possible to tell when the artiste has changed to a new pickup selection.
It's only an issue in one position - I just want this one to behave like the other 4 do :-)
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
It's just complexity for the sake of it in my opinion - dressed up in the same sort of marketing guff as they've been doing since the TBX control.
The only change that's really worth doing to Leo's original tone control scheme is to make the middle pickup control work on the bridge pickup as well, if you prefer that.
(A treble-pass cap/resistor is also useful, but that's a slightly different issue.)
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
I've gone with a super switch to give me the option to split the tone caps at a later point (and stand a better chance of being thud free if I experiment with that.)
I also went with a '280k RS superpot' as much out of curiosity as anything, as I had it lying around.
It has a great taper - before the change, all the action with between 10-7, but now I have very little volume drop until I hit 5, but a really nice gradual clean up across that range
I currently have a 0.1 cap shared between the Neck + Middle & Bridge tones, which has done wonders for the Bridge (which was a separate 0.05 cap with greasbucket type circuit, but no resistor, as per the schematics I've seen.)
I was going to put a base plate on the Bridge, but putting on a regular tone has addressed the lack of punch and I don't think it's necessary now.
Interestingly, the bridge tone solder joint was on the verge of failing and it separated when I lifted the pots out - not great QC
My only issue now is that the lever of the super switch seems overly 'sticky-outy' - might need to trim it a little for purely aesthetic reasons
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein