New tone discovery!!!!!

[Allen Garrow]

Holy shit my friends! This may be old news to some but eitherway it is totally worth sharing! As some of you may know I have 2 RG1527CB's. One has Tonezone7 and airnorton and the other has Blaze and blaze custom. I've heard the following maybe here or the jemsite, but never gave it much thought until today.

I was talking with one of our Electronics guru's at work and we were discussing what is shit electronics and what is good, and what things make a difference and what things don't. Well he mentioned that he never understood the why Ibanez even puts the tone knobs on most of their guitars. He told me that he had owned a few Ibz's in the past and after replacing stock pickups he always disconnected the tone knob. He said the results for him where added clarity and brightness. It was like removing a blanket.

Of course this got me thinking for the rest of the day. I figured come on! It's just one wire, and if I screw it up somehow, I work with some of the brightest guitars techs in Nashville that are all my bro's and would certainly help me out. Besides I never use the tone knob anyway,,,I've tried to embrace it but haven't found any use for it, it stays all the way on all the time. Anyway, I decided to operate on my Tonezone7 guitar mostly because since getting the Blaze custom the Tonezone seemed a little muffled.

This is where the holy shit business comes in. What a freakin' difference that made! Clear, and brighter. But not to bright, the pickup still has it's tonezone feel, it's reminds me more of a Tonezone for 6 string. Very harmonical rich, beefy as hell yet still not as sharp as the Blaze custom. Sharp may not even be a good comparison. The tonezone has a more bassy growl to it, where as the blaze is slight Mid. None the less the Tone zone and air norton have come to life now. One freakin wire made all that difference!

I would suggest anyone that hasn't tried this to give it a try. It's pretty easy to A/B the difference you can touch the wire back to the tone pot or tape it on. I may do the same to my Blaze guitar, but that things sounds so damn sweet right now I don't really want to mess with it. My 7321 will be getting new pickups after taxes come back so that damn thing should be a complete ass kickin' monster.

Thanks for listening.... gotta go play...

~A

 

[Digital Black]

Perhaps replaceing the tonepot with something more " quality?

 

[Kagami]

Tone pots are for n00bs.

 

[guitarjitsumaster]

I very much agree. I dont know the electronic explanation. More resistance on the pickup from the tone pot???. I dont know but I do know that every guitar I have I bypass that tone Knob and I get much more clarity and transparency. I have varying quality guitars that i own and all have had the same result. So its hard to believe its a tone pot quality issue. Though I havent tried or a/b-ed different tone pots. I know there are many well known guitar players who avoid the tone pot for this very reason.

 

[Elysian]

i totally agree with this, i disconnect all my tone pots... on my universe when i moved to 1 pickup wired in serial with only a volume knob, the tone on the blaze totally changed, and its almost acceptable, but not quite where i want it to be yet.

 

[eaeolian]

Even when 100% "open", the pot still colors the sound - and the cap can bleed, as well. Try replacing your volume pot with a 1Meg, and wire the tone back up with a 500K pot, and I'll bet the tone is similar to what you get with it disconnected.

Or just leave it off. Me, I like the little bit of high that's cut out, but the added brightness can be cool...

 

[JJ Rodriguez]

I disconnected the tone and volume pot on my A-7 and put in a push pull pot for a kill switch since I didn't want to drill a hole for added electronics. Sounds way better, but I think there's a grounding issue with the kill switch, as you can hear the guitar just a little bit when you kill it. Grounding issue? I got a friend to do it since he's way better at soldering, so I'm not too sure of how he's killing it, whether he just cut the circuit, or if he's bleeding the signal out to ground when the switch is activated.

 

[Emperoff]

I disconnected my tone pot and I can't be more happy with the results, I really suggest U people trying out a Tonezone with the tone pot disconnected, sounds niiiiiice

 

[nitelightboy]

Thanks for the advice, I'd never actually thought of disconnecting my tone pots before, even though I never use them. I tried it with my 7321 with the BC/AN7 combo and loved it, now I wanna try out a ToneZOne, since that's the added brightness it was missing!!

 

[NegaTiveXero]

I did it with my RG7620 with a stock New 7(b) and a PAF7(n), it made the New 7 sound quite a bit better. The PAF7 didn't change too much.

 

[Drew]

Tone pots are for n00bs.

Tone pots rock. Mine stays open most of the time, but you can do SO much to shade your tone by varying it up a bit.

That said, it might be worth looking into some sort of a way to bypass the tone pot out of the signal entirely - say, with a push/pull pot - or try some different resistor values. The later should be a fairly easy mod, especially, and would be pretty reversable... Worth a shot, I guess, as I love the Blaze Bridge but wouldn't mind a touch more crispness...

 

[Mastodon]

Dang you guys sure do hate your tone pots.

Personally, I would hate not to have it.

 

[Allen Garrow]

This may not be for all to try, but in my experience the Tonezone and Airnorton combo came to life with the slight modification. I may try the same thing to my blaze and blaze custom tonight, just to hear the difference. However I'm totally happy with the way that set up sounds now. However if it better,,, man I won't be able to sleep. As it was, I was up at 3 a.m. playing because I just could'nt go back to sleep. I'm paying for it now cuz I'm at work and tired as hell, happy, but very tired.

~A

 

[Dumple Stilzkin]

Going to do this tonight, I will post the results, rg7620 with TZ and AN.

 

[Leon]

Even when 100% "open", the pot still colors the sound - and the cap can bleed, as well. Try replacing your volume pot with a 1Meg, and wire the tone back up with a 500K pot, and I'll bet the tone is similar to what you get with it disconnected.

Or just leave it off. Me, I like the little bit of high that's cut out, but the added brightness can be cool...

i upgraded the volume pot in my RG7621 to a 500K from a 250K, and it sounded better. when i wire it up again, i may try the 1M pot.

 

[eaeolian]

i upgraded the volume pot in my RG7621 to a 500K from a 250K, and it sounded better. when i wire it up again, i may try the 1M pot.

They put 250s in there? The "New 7s" must be awful bright, since the "Industry Standard" is 250K pots for single coils, 500K pots for humbuckers - the lower the ohm rating, the more high end gets cut. (Obviously, that doesn't count for EMGs and other low-impedence systems...)

 

[Leon]

well, i figure it was custom put in there by the previous owner. he had the wiring as a whole royally jacked

 

[jim777]

Vox has introduced a limited edition AC-30 at NAMM, called the Brian May Signature Edition. It has a single volume knob, and that's it. I think some of you, if you listen closely for a second, can hear it calling your names.....

 

[Naren]

Geez, how can you guys live without your tone pots? I couldn't get by without my tone pot or my volume pot. In fact, I find it hard to get by with just 2. I wish I had 4 or 6 so that I had more control over my sound and the individual pickups... 0 tone pots = generic unchanging sound...

 

[ephrion]

Naren - With many amps today getting 3, 4, or more channels, that's not as true as it used to be

On my Edwards Forest, there's a killswitch that removes the volume and tone pots from the signal chain. I almost always have it on and use it as a mute switch. Sometimes though I use it to switch between a really warm, muffled jazz tone and my distortion tone. A very good idea in my opinion.