Hi! Been studying the wiring of Jerry's guitars and I got kinda fascinated with the way he wired his tone. Like most of his solutions it is kinda crazy but I really don't see the benefit. Most guitars that share neck and middle tone just use a jumper on the switch to share a single tone pot and it works. Is his way better? On tiger and wolf it kind makes sense with the 250k/½M but it is peculiar still since he used the humbuckers split so ½M for the neck too would be more uniform. Did he just really like the different value it would be in the middle position? I'm kinda surprised he didn't take it all out at that point and just had 3 tone knobs.
KirstieTheWolf wrote: ↑Sun Feb 07, 2021 7:02 am Hi! Been studying the wiring of Jerry's guitars and I got kinda fascinated with the way he wired his tone. Like most of his solutions it is kinda crazy but I really don't see the benefit. Most guitars that share neck and middle tone just use a jumper on the switch to share a single tone pot and it works. Is his way better? On tiger and wolf it kind makes sense with the 250k/½M but it is peculiar still since he used the humbuckers split so ½M for the neck too would be more uniform. Did he just really like the different value it would be in the middle position? I'm kinda surprised he didn't take it all out at that point and just had 3 tone knobs.Interesting question, and I really don’t have the technical answer. Here is a philosophical one though:
Jerry was very experimental. He experimented in everything he did. Also, the 80s were a very experimental time with gear and electronics in general. New break through a were emerging all the time from experimentation.
Jerry also did some irrational things with his gear like mic a 2,000 watt power amp. In other words he used a super high power power amp even though he was mic’ing the speakers into the mix. Kimock has talked about this on a Gear Page thread somewhere I believe.
Now some have argued that Jerry did not have a say in the design of his guitars. I personally don’t believe that and I have argued that he must have had conversations with Doug about his guitars, but some in this forum will argue that he didn’t have anything to do with the design at all. In that case, it would have been completely up to Doug Irwin how the guitars were wired.
Either way, I would go back to the experimentation thesis. Some stuff from that era makes a lot of sense, but some stuff seems silly to us now because of all the advances we have made since then.