Question Rewire Stingray guitar to use concentric pot

[mcro2430]

I’m looking to mod my Stingray Guitar to have a concentric pot instead to get the volume knob out of the way. The issue is the stingray has a circuit board probably to make it easier to wire up during production. I've replaced pickups before, but the circuit board in this guitar throws me for a loop.

Looking to emulate this setup (without moving the switch since EBMM doesn't sell the alternate control plate and I don't feel like paying someone to fabricate one..yet):

As we can see, the pots are soldered directly to the PCB.

I would like to minimize my work and changes to the guitar, so my idea is to solder new wires to each of the PCB leads, and attach those to the new stacked pot.

Looking to get input here if this would work, or if anyone has any advice before I take my Stingray apart. Thank you!

 

[TripHazard]

I’m no help on this, but it just reminded me the guy whose guitar is in the picture posted something recently about a limited release of the stingray in his sig style. Just for info in case ya fancy buying another

 

[mcro2430]

I’m no help on this, but it just reminded me the guy whose guitar is in the picture posted something recently about a limited release of the stingray in his sig style. Just for info in case ya fancy buying another

Thank you. I'm looking forward to see what options are available on those ones!

This mod is just for my convenience since my hand hits the volume knob when I strum, and I feel like it will work out really well if I do it right!

 

[TripHazard]

If you manage to get the mod done, let me know. It’s something I’d be interested in when I get a Stingray.

 

[GWDavis28]

You know when I first saw the one off with the mod I thought that's brilliant!!!! I had hoped they'd make it the norm, I doubt it, but it I think it's a good evolution myself.

Have you contacted CS to see if what your doing will work?

Good luck with the mod, let us know how things go.

Glenn |B)

 

[PeteDuBaldo]

I’m looking to mod my Stingray Guitar to have a concentric pot instead to get the volume knob out of the way. The issue is the stingray has a circuit board probably to make it easier to wire up during production. I've replaced pickups before, but the circuit board in this guitar throws me for a loop.

Looking to emulate this setup (without moving the switch since EBMM doesn't sell the alternate control plate and I don't feel like paying someone to fabricate one..yet):

As we can see, the pots are soldered directly to the PCB.

I would like to minimize my work and changes to the guitar, so my idea is to solder new wires to each of the PCB leads, and attach those to the new stacked pot.

Looking to get input here if this would work, or if anyone has any advice before I take my Stingray apart. Thank you!

That looks like it would work (are they the same value?), but I would probably add a separate ground to the stacked pot just in case the original pots on the pcb were grounded through being mounted on the pcb.

If you don't remove the old pots from the pcb then make sure they are turned "up"

 

[mcro2430]

That looks like it would work (are they the same value?), but I would probably add a separate ground to the stacked pot just in case the original pots on the pcb were grounded through being mounted on the pcb.

If you don't remove the old pots from the pcb then make sure they are turned "up"

Great point on the grounding, thank you. Both the stock pots and the concentric pot are 500k/500k. I was hoping to remove the stock pots from the board, but I'll see what that looks like when I take it completely apart.

 

[mcro2430]

You know when I first saw the one off with the mod I thought that's brilliant!!!! I had hoped they'd make it the norm, I doubt it, but it I think it's a good evolution myself.

Have you contacted CS to see if what your doing will work?

Good luck with the mod, let us know how things go.

Glenn |B)

I agree! I love the stingray but the way I strum (wildly and without precision) means I need to take the volume knob off the guitar so I don't hit my hand. It seems like a few artists mod the stingray the same way (remove the knob or stack it).

CS provided me the schematic for the guitar and couldn't provide specifics about how they wire Dustin's guitar, since that is done through the Artist relations department. They didn't warn me about anything, for what that's worth!

 

[GWDavis28]

I agree! I love the stingray but the way I strum (wildly and without precision) means I need to take the volume knob off the guitar so I don't hit my hand. It seems like a few artists mod the stingray the same way (remove the knob or stack it).

Yah I can understand that.

CS provided me the schematic for the guitar and couldn't provide specifics about how they wire Dustin's guitar, since that is done through the Artist relations department. They didn't warn me about anything, for what that's worth!

Well you contacted them, they sent you some info and didn't say yes, but didn't say don't do that either, which I would take as a good sign.

 

[mcro2430]

Update

Just an update: It works! For future generations I'll document what I did. Please note I am not qualified in any way to do this kind of work. I’m just adventurous and had an idea and it worked out so far. I’m not responsible for any damage you may do to your expensive guitar. I’m sure the best way to do this is to just rewire the guitar and I’m sure there is a much nicer way of doing this. It was a fun project though.

Points of note:

• There is a significant hum until you ground the back of the pot. So the PCB does provide grounding on the tone pot.
• Some of the solder joints on the PCB were a little sketchy. Be very careful moving the PCB around, my neck pickup leads fell off the board pretty easily and needed to be put back.
• I recommend getting comfortable removing solder from small spaces. I ultimately clipped the pots off the board with wire clippers and scraped up my PCB a little bit in the process because I didn’t have a way to remove the existing solder and I’m stubborn.
• I didn’t get any sound (just a humming white noise) from the pickups until I soldered a small cable from the neck pickup lead (’N’ on the PCB) to the point labeled ‘3’ in the diagram. I was able to use the tone and volume knobs to manipulate the white noise, so I knew I was heading in the right direction.

Parts used:

• CTS 500k/500k concentric potentiometer
• Steel 3/8" plug from your local hardware store
• Stacked knob that fits CTS concentric pots (make sure you check compatibility)

Final Diagram:

Pictures

 

[PeteDuBaldo]

Nicely done! Those metal plugs make for a nice & clean looking modification

 

[TripHazard]

Nice work there mate. That looks brilliant! The metal plug looks nice and clean

 

[GWDavis28]

Wow man, great job!!! Looks fantastic!!!

Glenn |B)

 

[jones4tone]

Very nice!

For anyone else thinking they might take on projects like this, solder removal can be a pain, as mentioned, but go to amazon or somewhere and search for a "solder sucker." They make it pretty trivial to melt a soldered joint and then suck it right up off the board or component. Very much worth the $5-10 you'll spend if you're going to be working with solder with any frequency.

 

[mcro2430]

Very nice!

For anyone else thinking they might take on projects like this, solder removal can be a pain, as mentioned, but go to amazon or somewhere and search for a "solder sucker." They make it pretty trivial to melt a soldered joint and then suck it right up off the board or component. Very much worth the $5-10 you'll spend if you're going to be working with solder with any frequency.

Definitely going to invest in one. I'm going back into the guitar and cleaning up the mess I made at some point.