Z-90 Question - cap value?

[hangten]

I just had the great experience of getting a pair of harmonic design Z-90s put in my 18 year old warmoth parts-o-caster. they sound great! wired like tele - 1 vol, 1 tone, 3 way switch.

only problem: I ride the volume knob all the time to go between clean and dirty tones - this works great on my main guitar (a 62RI tele with HD vintage+ pickups) which stays clear with the vol down, but when I turn the vol down on the strat it gets dark and muddy. Anyone have experience with specific cap values for the Z-90s to avoid this problem?


btw, these pickups sound so great - nice and snarly!
:dude
thanks!

[Mike9]

I built a Tele with a Z-90 in the neck position and a Peter Florence Voodoo in the bridge. I opted for a .033uF Vitamin Q for that guitar and liked the results.

[hangten]

Thanks Mike - so you were able to keep the highs with the volume rolled down?

Aram

[RvChevron]

The highend roll off has little to nothing to do with the cap value of the tone control pot.

Try from 180pf to 1000pf cap and solder both ends across the input and output of the volume pots. The higher the value, the brigther the sound when turning down the pot. 180pf works great in most cases.

The loading effect (rolling off highs) has to do with the high impedance nature of the guitar circuit.

Either a treble bypass or a buffer will work to retain highend when turning down the pot.

[hangten]

Thanks for the info!