|
|
Post by ssstonelover on May 31, 2023 1:41:58 GMT -5
For the life of me I can't understand why a left handed guitar would have (or any player would want) a knob that would turn CCW to increase (the opposite of a right handed guitar). Steve.I build a lot of left handed guitars compared to most people it seems, and I also play lefty too. Going back to when I bought my first Gibson SG, first Strat, etc., those were all set up with clockwire = up/on, and counterclockwise = down/off rotation on the pots. In other words LH guitars matched right handed instruments in that respect (at least in the 1970's) and also matched all the usual household appliances like radios, TVs, lids on glass jars, faucets, plus virtually everything else. As mentioned, I also build for others and I always quiz lefties on what their pot preference is.... Of the 3 additional LH players, 2 wanted the 'standard' clockwise rotation. One declined and asked for 'reverse' counter-clockwise. The interesting thing about this person is she is right-handed but lost a lot of the digits on her fretting hand (far worse than Tony Iommi) so relearned guitar leftie style, so she expected things to now be 'opposite'. it would seem to me that (many) righties think lefties do things in reverse (or desire that in all aspects), and that mirroring pot direction (not just the neck and body) is going to help. Well, if they lived in a 'hostile' right hand world (as a leftie) they would know lefties are fine with most standards. In fact I am fluent at turning a radio on, plus other electronic gizmos, and I expect pots to work the same way. So when did this problem really gather momentum? The original leftie guitars did not have the issue after all. It is my conjecture that it gathered force with the offshoring of guitar production to China and other countries with little to no leftie consciousness/culture, and was approved by product managers back in the USA who were right handed and had no knowledge of what the true preference would be -- assuming lefties were even involved one tiny bit in the decision-making process. Let's now take a look at the Asian factories. Clearly it is easier to 'mirror' a pattern (example: wiring diagram of a loaded pickguard), rather than redraw it so the pots are respected in the intended way. And this is even crazier as while A250K and A500K pots are common, C250K and C500K pots are quite uncommon... Therefore, no problem, just use B250K and B500K pots and 'reverse wire them to go with the 'mirrored' loaded pickguard I mentioned above... Sigh! No thanks...at least not for me. As you can see from the image below, mirroring (easy to do on a computer) takes care of most left hand transpositions (switches, jack, pups, pickguard), but fails utterly on pots (as they don't need to be mirrored). But hey, who cares, lefties should be happy we are making them a guitar at all, right? In fact what is the factory likely thinking? "We don't have time to redraw the diagram, so just flip the stock image, give them linear pots, wire it in reverse and call it a day, we in the business of making money and production quotas". Happily not all leftie guitars are made that slipshod way, but most are....and by some big companies.  |
|
|
|
Post by stevewf on May 31, 2023 2:01:54 GMT -5
"We don't have time to redraw the diagram, so just flip the stock image, give them linear pots, wire it in reverse and call it a day, we in the business of making money and production quotas". Mass-producing guitars with linear vol pots would indeed suck, lefty or righty. Empathy from a righty. |
|
bluesman13
Meter Reader 1st Class
Posts: 92 
Likes: 5
|
Post by bluesman13 on Jun 11, 2023 12:56:43 GMT -5
For the life of me I can't understand why a left handed guitar would have (or any player would want) a knob that would turn CCW to increase (the opposite of a right handed guitar). Steve.<snipped> Let's now take a look at the Asian factories. Clearly it is easier to 'mirror' a pattern (example: wiring diagram of a loaded pickguard), rather than redraw it so the pots are respected in the intended way. And this is even crazier as while A250K and A500K pots are common, C250K and C500K pots are quite uncommon... Therefore, no problem, just use B250K and B500K pots and 'reverse wire them to go with the 'mirrored' loaded pickguard I mentioned above... Sigh! No thanks...at least not for me. I agree ssstonelover. PRS uses lefty pots in my 24SE Custom (and lefty knobs, bless them), as opposed to most popular manufacturers who just reverse the wiring on their righty pots. As we know, reversing the outer lugs on a pot causes the pot to function as an "on/off" switch, with no sweep.
I've attached a diagram for the wiring I used that has a blender pot that keeps the CW rotation using righty pots with full sweep, which worked for me. As you can see, as opposed to the reversed diagram, I had to reverse the lugs on the vol pot outer lugs.  |
|
|
|
Post by ssstonelover on Jun 17, 2023 3:34:54 GMT -5
Thanks Bluesman13,
Indeed a twisting motion (pot rotation) has nothing to do with hand preference on a fretboard or string plucking (a two handed job). The dominant hand (left or right) can easily turn a knob either way, so the knob should be set up to match normal rotation patterns for similar objects as it is a one handed job after all with zero benefit to doing it 'in reverse' for a lefty.
Quite frankly I can transpose RH wiring in my mind, also RH chord charts, etc, so I don't need to draw out left hand wiring diagrams, chord charts, etc. It's a bit of a struggle at first (internal conversion), maybe like learning a new language, but it freed me from the need for crutches to get by, and made the available printed tools accessible and quick to grasp, as they are just representations anyway, not reality, so ripe for reintegration to another (LH) orientation simply by using the mind. it's a useful survival skill in a world that is 90% the other way.
|
|
