no sound. at all.

[syr2012]

So, I've purchased a new pot (yet again) and went to the trouble of wiring the bugger in. All is soldered into place properly, and the switches work (I did the screwdriver and got sound from the pickup), but when I put a string on to test it out, I got no sound. All the wiring looks fine (a bit messier than usual, but functional nonetheless). Does anyone have an idea of what happened?

[gingataff]

So, I've purchased a new pot (yet again) and went to the trouble of wiring the bugger in. All is soldered into place properly, and the switches work (I did the screwdriver and got sound from the pickup), but when I put a string on to test it out, I got no sound. All the wiring looks fine (a bit messier than usual, but functional nonetheless). Does anyone have an idea of what happened?

Do you have a picture of the wiring?

[Supernaught]

Its quite likely either a bad pot, or you "cooked" the pot whilst soldering.

If you leave the soldering iron on the pot too long and get it too hot it will stop working.    I found this out the hard way a few years ago and regularly see people posting on forums with the same problem.

Having said that, usually a "cooked" pot will still give SOME sound, albeit incredibly weak and low volume.

[syr2012]

Its quite likely either a bad pot, or you "cooked" the pot whilst soldering.

If you leave the soldering iron on the pot too long and get it too hot it will stop working.    I found this out the hard way a few years ago and regularly see people posting on forums with the same problem.

Having said that, usually a "cooked" pot will still give SOME sound, albeit incredibly weak and low volume.

I'm doubting that I've ruined yet another pot, as I don't keep the iron on for any longer than a couple of seconds at a time, and the sound I do get from the screwdriver isn't weak and is quite responsive to the volume knob. I find it interesting that one can cook the hell out of a cheap pot and it'll still work (I did this a couple of times accidentally with my guitar's stock pot, a rather cheap piece of work), but the expensive ones tend to fry with virtually no effort. Now that I think of it, I'm not so sure that I cooked my last CTS pot, as it gave quite the strong sound until things failed for no known reason.

...unless a pot can turn to bacon long after the iron's been put away.