Treble bleed cap mod question

[Tommy Tourbus]

Have any Teles ever come stock with this wiring?

 

[SimpleOne]

Well, there are different ways of doing this aren't there? Ain't no expert, but which specific way are you querying? On the Squiers I have bought, have found a small cap on the BSB Affinity and also a thinline squier clone. No resistor running parallel on either though. Here's a product called a volume kit...

(link removed)

Is this what you are interested in? Has the resistor also...started soldering again recently and have goofed off with similar things. Some folks here are really awesome at modding and dialing in their tone utilizing different caps and resistors...

Maybe the experts will chime in...and....good luck!!

 

[Tommy Tourbus]

i'm referring to the .001 cap attached to the volume knob method

 

[fullerplast]

Have any Teles ever come stock with this wiring?

Yes, AFAIK .001uF was used on teles at least in the late 60's into the 70's, mainly when they were using 1M pots. There is more of a need for them with larger pots. IMHO, both .001 and 1M pots are too large for a tele.

As for non-Fender teles, Anderson uses a stock cap/resistor pair and I believe Suhr does as well. I put them on my teles, but I use much smaller values than .001uf. I hand tune each by ear, using mostly between 100pF and 500pF caps. 270pF is a good start if you want to try one. When you get the value right, you should not be able to tell it's there and the tone will stay the same as you roll down the vol. You can add a resistor in series with the cap, and/or in parallel to fine tune the bypass.

(I saw your question in the thread I was talking about this on the TGP, but since I was banned I couldn't respond to your question.....hopefully this covers that question as well.)

 

[Tommy Tourbus]

thanks for the reply! what value would you recommend for the mod if i'm using the standard 250k pots? still a 270pf? if I wanted to stay very conservative would you reccomend the 100pf or 500pf? I'm not sure which is smaller

 

[fullerplast]

thanks for the reply! what value would you recommend for the mod if i'm using the standard 250k pots? still a 270pf? if I wanted to stay very conservative would you reccomend the 100pf or 500pf? I'm not sure which is smaller

Conservative would be 100pf. Personally, I'd try 270pf for starters and then go up or down from there, or put a 100K-220K resistor in series with the cap to cut back the bleed a bit.

 

[spankdplank]

I have a 68 with the stock 1meg pots and a .001 treble bleed cap, and found it almost unusable until I put a 220K resistor in parallel with the treble bleed cap. The resistor was a huge improvement. With just the treble bleed cap, when you turn the volume down most of the treble stays but the bass decreases with the volume drop. The effect that you perceive is that the volume is not dropping much but the body or guts of the tone is gone. I found I was having to roll back on the tone everytime I rolled back on the volume in order to compensate. Putting in the resistor solved the problem. YMMV, but 250K pots work really well on teles without a treble bleed cap. I wouldn't bother with it.

 

[fullerplast]

I have a 68 with the stock 1meg pots and a .001 treble bleed cap, and found it almost unusable until I put a 220K resistor in parallel with the treble bleed cap.

A 1M pot is almost always too bright with a single coil, with or without a treble bleed circuit. The treble bleed is completely out of the picture when the vol is maxed, so even the parallel resistor won't have an effect at that point.

YMMV, but 250K pots work really well on teles without a treble bleed cap. I wouldn't bother with it.

It's certainly not needed as much as with larger pot values, but I like my tone to stay constant when I roll the vol down so I usually put something on most of my teles. Every guitar is a bit different because it depends on the pickups, pots, and even the cable you use. It's certainly a YMMV thing. A lot of people get turned off because of bad values being used. When it's right, it's completely transparent.