Rewiring a 345 with varitone switch

[David King]

A friend has asked me to rewire a customer's 345. I got the usual 6 position, 4 pole switch from Allparts and I'm astounded that they can't come up with a better switch. This thing wouldn't even fit a 345 without serious modification because it's too damn tall. I removed two of the poles and sawed the screws and shaft down to size but the switch is physically about 1/2 the size of the original and cramming all 12 resistors and 10 capacitors on the back is a serious challenge even with 1/8th watt 1% Rs and tantalum caps for the .22MFDs.

Is there an off-the-shelf solution that I didn't know about? Gibshun won't even sell them unless it's a warrantee replacement and then it's $150 a pop.

Has anyone had to deal with this or are the varitones just too stupid to bother rehashing.

[David King]

I should point out that the Allparts switch is Make-Before-Break and the Gibson original was Break-before-make so it's possible the 10 1-megohm resistors across each position are superfluous?

[RickyD]

Try here:

http://www.bigdguitars.com/index.htm

[David Schwab]

David, I had to do that to a switch once... it was too tall so I cut the spacers down.

Have you checked out the StewMac switch? It doesn't look too tall.

The resistors are to discharge the caps so they don't pop when you switch them into the circuit. I'm not sure the make-before-break, or break-before-make makes a difference, but it might.

Personally I like Varitones. I had one in my Les Paul, and found it quite useful.

[David King]

Thanks, I knew about the BigD Varitones but didn't think they were "stereo" (2 poles, two sets of caps one for each pickup) switches. No pics of the damn thing on his site either. Well hopefully that's the last one I ever see.

I got a brand New Squire P bass with busted truss in exchange. Well that's a whole 'nother impossible repair. ƒender wouldn't even send the kid a new neck -they sent him a whole new guitar instead and told the authorized service center to destroy the first one -that's where I come in

[David Schwab]

Thanks, I knew about the BigD Varitones but didn't think they were "stereo" (2 poles, two sets of caps one for each pickup) switches. No pics of the damn thing on his site either. Well hopefully that's the last one I ever see.

They aren't stereo. He has two wires coming off the switch. One goes to ground, and the other to the hot connection on the jack, so it's obviously mono.

The pictures are here.

I guess it's not a bad price for a Varitone if you can't make one yourself.

One thing that turns me off about his site is the constant Gibson bad mouthing. He points out stuff like "Thats it, no mess, no extra wires, no floating choke or inductor. Ever see the Gibson inductor? It looks like a half pack of cigarettes." and doesn't mention that the Gibson inductor is hum canceling. Sure you don't need it to be (I've used small transformers) but it's a nice touch.

He also says "They also use a much larger choke then the one that I use, the use of the larger choke is needed because they add a resistor to stop the popping sound from discharging capacitors, when the knob is turned."

That's just plain wrong. He goes on to say: "Their switch is break-before-make which means the connection is broken then made the the new cap. My switch is made so that its make-before-break, with only a small tick sound when you switch between the positions."

I've made the Gibson style with resistors, and I never got a tick when I switch the switch. It's ok to take the cap out of the circuit, and in fact you should. The resistor is needed either way to drain the charge it holds.

But hey, more power to him.

[David King]

Thanks Dave, that's the same switch Allparts is selling and I just used. It can be hooked up in stereo but apparently Gibsons don't all have stereo outputs. It doesn't look like BigD's switch would fit in the 346 either unless he pulled off the rear poles and commutator. The photo is pretty bad, actually his whole website could use some work.

[Borsanova]

This is a certainly no answer to your quest and probably not what your friend is looking for, but it might be an interesting alternative to the classic varitone switch. Lots of different sounds on this one, including broadbucker configuration which combines the trebles from the bridge pickup alone with full power bass and mids from both pickups in series.

[David Schwab]

This is a certainly no answer to your quest and probably not what your friend is looking for, but it might be an interesting alternative to the classic varitone switch...

That's not a Varitone, that's a pickup selector kind of like on an L6-S.

A Varitone is a midrange notch filter. I think having both would be pretty cool!

David, the 2-pole 6-position StewMac sells should fit in a 345. It's not a very tall switch.

[Magoo817]

varitone switches

HAS Sound has a good selection of Varitone switches in various configurations, very interesting.