Why /when did Fender stop using stack knobs on their basses

[Jim Carr]

It's just getting to be so much work turning the right knobs. Jeez, my Sadowsky P/J has 3 knobs, a switch, and a stack pot. The stack pot is the MOST important control on the bass, and the switch is a pull pot "passive" switch on SOME knob—er...which one, oh right!

My Valenti fretless 5er has 5 knobs and three pull pots. Fortunately, I took the 2-week CUNY seminar Nino gave last year at Brooklyn College on aquilar obp-3 operation/sys admin with coil-splits and 2 mid-band choices.

My Valenti 35" scale fretted 5er has the same controls as my NYC P/J, but my stock '03 Lakland 55-01 has five knobs like the Valenti fretless, but only 1 pull pot.

The CS stack pot Jazz seems simple enough by comparison to those: do anything you want with either volume pot, but only use one tone control. If you do use the second, it isn't really a problem, because it will have essentially no effect, unless you change the other one to full on! In which case, it will still sound pretty much the same!!! No Prob-Lame-O.

That is way easier than anything except my old MTD kingston MM passive 5-er, which has only V and T, like a P-bass (not the pizza shop ), which is fine. Playing upright with ZERO knobs is 1000x harder—and oops, yes, heck, I have a ParaDI as a pre for the Gage piezo which has 6 knobs, 3 (or 4?) switches, and 4 (or 5?) connectors.

 

[Iridescentone]

Like I said before; not so much a matter of turning the wrong knob, as it is of turning them both, whether you want to or not. Which will happen, if they're not adjusted just right on the shafts. That's not too hard to do; it's keeping them that way that can be a problem.

That's not all that hard to believe. I've met people who can't operate a screwdriver. An allen wrench must look like alien technology to them. God help them if they ever tinker with a power tool.

 

[Tom Howland]

I love the look of a stack-knob Jazz.
My first good Jazz was a early 1962-Dakoda Red-Slab board. With stack-knobs.
Best Jazz bass I've ever owned.

 

[fakeneckplate'65]

My '13 Fender American Deluxe PRECISION does & I think they're great!

 

[Turnaround]

I've never played one, but I suspect it was due to excessive interaction between the two tone controls, but that's just a guess.

There's a point to this. In a passive wiring scheme, two tone controls (one for each pickup) have an effect on the circuit that is not intuitive. Let's say you want to get a fat, tubby tone from the neck pickup with a sharp edge delivered by the bridge pickup. So you roll the tone pot on the neck back to zero, and the tone on the bridge pup to full-on. You won't get what you were expecting. The reason is that the capacitor from the neck pickup is in the circuit, and it's function when the tone controlled is rolled down is to shunt the high frequencies to ground, taking them out of the signal delivered to the amp. It will do that regardless of any other capacitor in the circuit. You can't gain back what has been removed from the signal, so the higher frequencies you wanted from the bridge pickup will not be there. If you take the neck pickup ( and more importantly it's controls) out of the circuit, you will get back the brightness from the bridge pickup, filtered of course by the setting of the tone control on that part of the circuit.

The best way to consider this on a passive system is that the control with the most roll-off of the higher frequencies wins. It's not quite the whole equation, but in real life this is a good approximation.

So, I think for Fender the consideration was based on the overall effectiveness of VTVT and the cost of providing it. Leo was a practical engineer and I think he decided the additional cost did not warrant the dubious (if any) gains of VTVT.

FWIW, I converted one of my basses to VTVT. But I had a pickup selector switch as well. What I wanted was the ability to have one setting with both pickups on, blended by their individual volume controls, and a separate tone setting for soloing on the bridge-only pickup. Worked well.

 

[MobileHolmes]

There are all sorts of stacked knob setups used today, from a host of different guitar manufacturers and after-market preamp suppliers. How lame is it when someone can't figure out how to "turn the right knob"?

Yeah, I've got a couple stacked knobs on my audere. I can't always remember what does what (it's too many flippin knobs) but I've never had two move at once or anything like that

 

[grrg63]

I think the VVT controls are more practical (easier to use).
And look cooler with the smaller tone knob.

 

[Korladis]

I think the VVT controls are more practical (easier to use).
And look cooler with the smaller tone knob.

Never been a fan of VVT due to the lack of a pickup switch, honestly. If I got a jazz bass, I'd probably rewire it the same as my T-bird: volume, volume and push/pull series/parallel switch, and three position rotary pickup switch.

 

[Tom Howland]

I have been led to believe the change occurred in December '61, but early '62 stacked knobs exist because Fender wasted nothing and used the existing inventory!

This is right on. I had an early Dakota Red 1962-Jazz that was stack-knob. Best Jazz I ever owned. Sold it in 1994 for a down payment on my house. I love the house, but still miss that bass.