Luxe Bumble Bee caps & calibrated pots

[breadfan]

Hi guys,

First post here but I've been reading the forum for a month or so now & there's some excellent information on here!

I'm hoping to get some advice.

I'm going to put a set of Mules in my Les Paul standard but before I do I want to replace the electronics, to see what difference that'll make first.

I'm thinking about buying a prewired harness from crazyparts.de

http://www.crazyparts.de/00000099561085602/0000009b9311a1b02/index.php

It has Luxe Bumble Bee Caps (http://www.crazyparts.de/00000098e9083ff04/index.php). Has anyone tried these? Are they just wrapped versions of the N.O.S Paper in Oil Capacitors that Tim sells or are they an improvement?

The pots in the harness are calibrated CTS Custombuilds. Is it benificial to have calibrated pots? I want to try 50s wiring, if that makes any difference.

Thanks in advance

[gingataff]

AFAIK Luxe PIO caps (including the bumblebees and also Fender style Cornell Dubilier repros) are just wax coated NOS caps as you say, so the only difference would be the looks. But they do look cool ;)

[FELINEGUITARS]

The ones Tim (and Feline too) sells are excellant

A combination of 55k pots and the NOS caps works a treat

[PhilKing]

The ones Tim (and Feline too) sells are excellant

A combination of 55k pots and the NOS caps works a treat

550K perhaps :?

[Denim n Leather]

breadfan, your screen name is pure win. I have nothing to add to this thread, Phil is the master in all things component-based.

[breadfan]

Thanks for the replies.

There's not much difference price wise between the harness & buying the parts separately form the BK store.

However the pots in the harness are calibrated.

What is the benefit of this?

Is it more useful than having the 550k pots that Tim sells, which allow for the 10% tolerance? (crazyparts pots are 500k, also with a 10% tolerance)

& yes gingataff, the Luxe caps do look damn cool!

[PhilKing]

I've used both the BK & Luxe caps and pots from BK, RS Guitarworks and regular Stew Mac & Allparts in lots of guitars.  If the soldering might be a problem, then the harness could be the best way to go.  I would get paper in oil, I'm not sure the extra for the Bumble Bees is worth 20 euros more!  I've tried Hovland, Bumble Bees (originals), Orange Drop, Luxe and NOS Paper in oil, and I like the paper in oil best.

[breadfan]

Thanks Phil.

The soldering hopefully shouldn't be a problem. I know, €20 is a bit steep for some fancy wrapping paper!

But would it be worth it for the calibrated pots?

[phlip]

I have the modern pre wired kit from crazyparts in my LP with Rebel Yells. I can't comment on the bumblebee caps, however I was taken aback by the difference in clarity the kit made over the stock wiring in my LP (89 Studio) The kit is very well put together and the soldering is top notch. Worth the money to me in time saving alone.

[FELINEGUITARS]

The ones Tim (and Feline too) sells are excellant

A combination of 55k pots and the NOS caps works a treat

550K perhaps :?

Yes - a missing zero made quite a difference!

[Dmoney]

I assume a 550K pot is a bit brighter than 500K, and the taper is only going to be noticed if you're the kind of person who likes to ride the volume rather than leave it at 10?

[BigB]

Hi breadfan

wrt/ the "calibrated pots" stuff, the point is that components have a tolerance wrt/ their official value. For pots, the canonical tolerance is 10% IIRC, so a 500K pot could range from 450 to 550k, which indeed makes a difference. Having calibrated pots means that your four pots will (well... should) have the same effectivue value, so you get a more evn response from them.

Now whether it's worth the price or not is up to you. For the record, you can get 4 "ordinary" CTS  500K audio taper pots and 2 NOS pio caps here for about 43€ (postage not included). Aslo, having "uncalibrated" pots can be fine too - if for example you want a bit more hi-end from your neck pup, test your pots with a multimeter and use the ones with the highest values for the neck.

My 2 cents...

[Gizmo]

When I got my BKP's installed in my les paul, Black Dog & Mule, the shop (Charlie Chandlers) recommended a bumblebee lux caps. I can't compare with or without it as they installed all of it at once, but the sound now is great. As others say very clear but the pickups will obviously have had some part in that. The guy said it'll make it more like a proper 1960 ish les paul authentic sound. for £30 it was worth it.

[HTH AMPS]

I just fit some of Tim's CTS custom-taper pots to a SG and they were very nice, good tolerance too - all four were in the 520k - 560k range.

I really wouldn't waste your cash on those pre-wired harnesses, they're a total ripoff.  The repro bumblebee caps and such are just repackaged so they 'look' right.

Get yourself on ebay and buy up these old Sprague ones (these ARE bumblebee caps, the real deal, just later spec when they decided to print on the actual value rather than use the old colour-coded system).  These are what I use in my guitars and they do make a difference... http://cgi.ebay.com/4-X-SPRAGUE-BLACK-BEAUTY-0-022uF-600V-TONE-CAPACITOR-/290429898163?cmd=ViewItem&pt=Vintage_Electronics_R2&hash=item439ef88db3#ht_1054wt_1025

[breadfan]

Cheers for all the replies guys.

I've splashed out on a second LP, so one is getting a pre-wired kit I bought from crazyparts, & the other is getting 550K pots & NOS caps from BK!

The pre-wired kit is 50s style & the other LP will be wired modern style, but I'll post my opinions on both when I have them installed.

On a side note, do you guys usually replace the switch to a Switchcraft, or similar, when you replace the pots? Any problems connecting the old switch to the new pots - the originals are pcb mounted?