Jassmaster/Jazzblaster heavy mods help

Talk about modding or building your own guitar from scratch.
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Somnospeed
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Jassmaster/Jazzblaster heavy mods help

Post by Somnospeed » Tue Jan 18, 2022 5:47 pm

Hi folks,
I'm looking to do some more mods to my Jazzblaster (originally a TVL Jazzmaster.) The pic on the left is my Blaster in its current state. I love it to death but it would be so much better with two volume knobs to easily adjust to fine tune the tones of the middle position. What I'm looking to do is add a 2nd volume pot in the space that the pickup selector is currently in, then move the pickup selector to the rhythm circuit selector. Thus, eliminating the entire rhythm circuit. I'm not looking to add a 2nd tone knob, just volume. The pic on the right is what I expect it to look like, roughly.
My questions are... Has this been done that anyone can point me towards or share their experience? I know it can be done, I just don't know how difficult or what may or may not need to be modified to make these mods fit under the hood and somehow still sound decent. lol
What do you think of the idea of buying a Tele Deluxe wiring harness and just eliminating the 2nd tone pot? Would that be easier or just more of the same work without any added benefit?

If a pic is worth a thousand words, my photoshop hack version of what I'm trying to do has to be worth at least a couple hundred. ;D

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hexes
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Re: Jassmaster/Jazzblaster heavy mods help

Post by hexes » Tue Jan 18, 2022 6:26 pm

i did the same thing with an old jaguar with filtertrons. to kinda gretschify it. I will try to dig up my old wiring diagram, but you might get a faster response from the gurus here.

if I find it i’ll post it anyway. very easy if you can solder. you WILL need extra wire though to relocate that pickup selector switch.

The tele deluxe wiring harness is definitely an option, but it’s an expensive one, and the wiring may not be long enough.. you just need a pot, potentially capacitor, and wire.

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timtam
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Re: Jassmaster/Jazzblaster heavy mods help

Post by timtam » Tue Jan 18, 2022 8:20 pm

Your need for a single master tone makes it a little different to a Tele Deluxe. Each of the two tones come off their respective volume pots in the Deluxe. Its toggle switch output goes straight to the output jack. So you could clip out both tone pots from such a harness and re-insert one between the toggle and the output - see below. Might be simpler to modify what wiring you have to that end, or wire it from scratch.

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"I just knew I wanted to make a sound that was the complete opposite of a Les Paul, and that’s pretty much a Jaguar." Rowland S. Howard.

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JSett
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Re: Jassmaster/Jazzblaster heavy mods help

Post by JSett » Tue Jan 18, 2022 10:19 pm

Essentially what you want, from what I can tell, is Tele Deluxe wiring but use a dual pot for the tone so that they're still independently wired but both go down with the same knob. That would be how I'd do it. It's simple and does the job.
Silly Rabbit, don't you know scooped mids are for kids?

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Re: Jassmaster/Jazzblaster heavy mods help

Post by Somnospeed » Wed Jan 19, 2022 7:08 am

Thanks a ton for the help! Just what I needed.

Yes I would like to go the route of “Tele deluxe” style wiring, then using a dual pot for the tone. Wasn’t sure what would work or not but that sounds like my best option. I have limited experience soldering and to any kind of “under the hood” guitar work. I did a two-pickup swap and a loaded pick guard swap and that’s the extent of my electrical work.

I’ll have to do some research on the dual pot setup. I don’t recall seeing any installed before.

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Re: Jassmaster/Jazzblaster heavy mods help

Post by Somnospeed » Wed Jan 19, 2022 8:06 am

I’m wondering if I should just go ahead and drill another hole on the pick guard and add both an additional volume and tone pot. Seems like the overall workload would not change much from installing a dual pot?? No clue, it just seems kn theory, the two options are close to the same work and cost.

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