I have been working on minor rewiring of a Washburn guitar over the past two years. I am comfortable with soldering and wiring, but have run into problems with my capacitors. The Washburn's sound in particular relied heavily upon the capacitor. Unfortunately when I replaced its humbuckers I did not make a schematic of the capacitor wiring before removing the parts. I successfully rewired after several configurations between the tone and volume pots and the capacitor; however I did not make a schematic of the wiring again, and have removed the components so I can refinish the guitar.
I find it difficult to understand how the wiring works in the first place - if the volume pot reduces volume, why doesn't the tone pot also reduce the volume? They are both the same type of pots. I am fairly certain the volume pot reduces amplitude, while the tone pot changes the frequency of the signal. If I wire the volume pot before the tone pot, I can reduce the volume, but won't the tone pot also reduce the already lowered signal? This makes me think the tone pot should be wired first. I have looked at many, many schematics doing this wiring differently. I have tried many of them and most leave me with only the volume pot changing the signal. I have also seen wiring where there are two live leads from the tone to the volume pot, one with the capacitor and one without, but recombining the signal reduces the effect of the tone reduction. Can someone provide me a link or clear advice to how I should handle this wiring dilemma?
MattSA