Changing Pots on Tele (1meg)

[ozzynotwood]

In my fender Jazzmaster, I can switch bewtween a 50k tone pot, and a 1meg tone pot. There is a huge change in tone between both of the pots. Can I expect the sound to be much brighter in my MIM Tele if I upgrade my Volume and Tone Pots to 1meg (each) ?

[Mr 9finger]

In short. Yes. By switching to 1meg pots it will allow more signal of your pickups to the output jack.

[ozzynotwood]

cool, so if i want a sound that is closer to my MIJ Jazzmaster, would i meg pots with with really bright pickups be the way too go, or would that result in too much treble and not enough lows and mids?

[Mr 9finger]

I don't have any experience w/ Jazzmasters bro. Dangly would be the guy to ask about that. I do know that tele pickups w/ 1 meg pots does make for a bright tone. There are some of the Fender reissue tele's that come w/ 1 meg pots stock.

[danglybanger]

...here

Jazzmasters traditionally have a fairly mellow sound (for a fender), this is mostly because of the pickups... Despite using 1 meg pots, those pickups are still percieved as mellow.

HOWEVER, Jap JM pickups are basically strat pickups with big bobbins, so they sound brighter. It's not a BAD sound, but it's not quite what most people think of when they think JM (closer to a Jag), and imo it's the only letdown on a Jap JM.

Heh... if you want your tele to sound more like your JM does currently however, 1 meg pots are the way to go I LOVE 1 meg pots in any axe actually. More defined clarity, more twang...

Plus you can always just roll back the tone.

I didn't know that Fender had any current Teles with 1 meg pots... Tele Deluxe RIs SHOULD have them but don't.

And aren't the JM rhythm presets a great thing to have

[uOpt]

A Tele will usually come out too bright if it doesn't have the 250 Kohm load.

The amplitude of the resonance peak from undampened Tele pickups is too high for most people's taste. Exceptions apply, e.g. when the pickups aren't that great or when the wood is way too dark.

[ES350]

Might want to try a 500k first and see if that is what you are looking for...I pulled the 1 meg pots from my Tele after about 10 minutes of screech. It sure didn't sound like a Jazzmaster...

[idsnowdog]

I would try keeping the 250k volume, but changing the tone to a 1 meg and maybe doubling the value of the capacitor. The response of the pickup will stay the same, but the frequency range should open up a bit. Or you could try a no-load pot on the tone/volume.

[James Rock]

With darker pickups or non tele like pickups it may work. I play a jag and with 1 meg pots jag pickups work well but the resonant peak is different in tele pickups and may be way worse with 1 meg pots.