Fender 500K/250K Dual Pot - worth the install? Find out here!

I love playing Stratocasters, but I've always preferred a Hum-Single-Single - or better yet, a Hum-Single pickup configuration instead of the standard Strat Single-Single-Single. Everybody knows SSS gets 250K pots and HH gets 500K pots, but what do you use when you've got an HSS or HS setup? 250K pots make the humbuckers sound muddy and 500K pots make the single-coils sound ice-picky.

The fine folks at Fender came up with a solution - two pots on one shaft, complete with separate lugs! One part is a 250K pot for your single coil pickups; the other part is a 500K pot for your humbucker.

I received the suggestion to try these pots in a well-known online guitar discussion forum straight from Ron Thorn, Principal Master Builder for the Fender Custom Shop. When Ron makes a suggestion, you can bet it's going to be a good one - and it was as you'll see in this video.

Tone test of the Fralins in this guitar and my other HS guitars (Fender and PRS) coming soon!

Pickups: Fralin Modern PAF, Fralin Twangmaster (Yes, I realize I call it a Twangbucker repeatedly in the video. Sorry, Lindy!!)

LINKS!

[tonekilltech]

Glad I'm not the only person that leaves length on the pickup leads. Sure, trimming them down looks nice and tidy on the inside of the guitar where no one can see it, but if you've ever had to deal with short leads on used pickups, you'd appreciate the lead length left intact.

[santosp]

Looking forward to the sound test video. I’m planning to do the same with an old Yamaha guitar. I plan to use two dual pots, one for volume and the other for tone. With a split coil switch for the humbucker. Other alternative is to have two tone knobs and make the humbucker a pull knob for coil splitting.

[davespin]

Love your video. I bought the same Fender stacked volume pot to convert my SSS Mexi Strat to an HSS with a Seymour Duncan Trembucker. I also went to a single volume single tone for 2 knobs to move them away from the high E string because Strat trem arms hit the volume knob on dive bombs, not to mention my hand which is annoying. Problem solved. 2 knobs is better, less crowded too. Thanks for confirming the 250k pot is further from the shaft 👍

[controluce]

Thanks man, i've been trying to find a solution for an HSS strat for a long time... i didn't even know of the existence of stacked pots

[ToneHound]

Greg/Metro does great work. I'm not crazy about the knobs, lol.

[jmntherd]

I'm actually thinking about building an HS Strat. And apparently there's a video for everything. Fender made a Seymour Duncan Pearly Gates HSS in the 90s. I'm wondering what they did in that. I doubt they used something this complicated.

[FingerBlaster]

Man so glad I found this video. Is there any way you can send me a wiring diagram for an H(bridge) & S(neck) pickups using the fender dual pot and a single tone pot with a 3 way toggle switch? It's going in a Les Paul Junior. I would be very grateful! I can't find any diagrams online. I didn't know this dual pot existed.

[andrearavoni]

Can you show us the hss wiring for a strat with the dual pot?

[kenmarold]

Is there a version of this that also has a push/pull function to do series/parallel switch on the humbucker?

[iankinzel]

Hi Moto Chiba, I believe I am now your 700th subscriber. It is an honor. I feel honored. Do you know if it's possible to set up a toggle switch to select between the different halves of the dual pot? Like, toggle in one position & you're in 500k, toggle in the other position and you're in 250k? I got this idea in my diseased mind from thinking about the Jaguar and how the different volume pot values contribute to the of the rhythm circuit. I dunno, just something I've been thinking about. If you see this before Jan 1, 2025, I probably haven't gotten to my project yet. Good luck and godspeed to you, good sir.

[To.Si.Ma.]

Great. - Would you recommend using a dual pot (250/500) for my 335 neck HB (seth lover)?

I play blues and jazz and the lover comes with 500k. Good and bright for blues but for jazz I would like a warmer tone.

Greetings

[Tinylittledancer]

Would you need to change the tone pots as well? I want to put a higher output humbucker in my HSS strat, but I'm curious if I need to change the tone pot for the humbucker to 500k as well

[iusedbfast]

Great video guys! Since you have 2 pickups not 3, can you just add a 470 or 500k resistor from the hot single coil lug on the switch to ground so the single coil 'sees' 250k, and no double load issues?

[tangerinesrock]

Can you use the S-1 to split coil? I have a tele and I want to split the neck wide range humbucker to single coil .

[chrisdecouteau]

I have a Tele that the previous owner installed the Seymour Duncan Humbucker made to fit, but it had a regular neck pup. I bought the SD str2 hot rhythm for the neck. The wiring diagram would be the same as yours then? Just wondering.

[nonamejones]

Do you think that these will work in a Squier contemporary Jaguar HH ST?

[mountainpeakcloud]

How would this work if you have and HSS? Just wondering where you’d connect the 2nd single coil.

[vasilvasilev]

Can we use this for both volume and tone control(single pot)?

[davekiddie]

Can you do the same with a concentric pot, or did I buy the wrong one.

[AceBambam]

should the 2nd tone pot be dual resistance too?