Why buy from Big D Guitars?
Tone, price, and quality. I spent a lot of hours testing capacitors: you will not find another switch that sounds this good. If you search the web others offer varitone switches, but not at my price. My quality is second to none, each assembled component is wrapped in electrical tape to protect it from grounding out. After building each switch I test it and make sure it sounds great, if not, I make another one. If you are not satisfied I offer a full refund.
About refunds: Send the switch back and I will get you a brand new one. Switch returns to me, then you get new one... too many scammers out there who want free switches.
My Switch is a condensed version of the Gibson switch, and only has two wires, plus the inductor is wired in already! Nothing else to mess around with.
The ceramic capacitor add a reverb type of sound so the switch has a great tone.
Fender uses ceramic chip capacitors in all of their old amps. Other companies use mylar capacitors, the sound is more generic, flatter.
My switches are usually made with capacitors that follow this range, due to manufacture discontinue this varies but tries to follows the same incremental change:
C1 = .001 micro farads
C2 = .01 mf
C3 = .022 mf
C4 = .047 mf
C5 = .22 mf
Switch works in this format:
Position 1 = Bypass - True bypass switch is pulled from the system, will not ruin your original tone!
Position 2 = C1 - softer than bypass
Position 3 = C2 - deeper tone than bypass, better response
Position 4 = C3 - jazz box full
Position 5 = C4 - jazz box mellow
Position 6 = C5 -almost woman-ish tone
The difference
Ok a lot of you have asked what the difference is between the Gibson switch and my switch here it is. The gibson switch uses smaller punch-roll type capacitors (can't tell if they are mylar or ceramic chip) that are placed into a half plastic setup that holds them in place. Then that plastic setup has open wires that connect it to the switch output. Then from there they hide a large choke inside the guitar cavity. They also use a much larger choke then the one that I use, the use of the larger choke is needed because they add a resistor to stop the popping sound from discharging capacitors, when the knob is turned. Their switch is break-before-make which means the connection is broken then made the the new cap. My switch is made so that its make-before-break, with only a small tick sound when you switch between the positions. This switch was designed to minimize the footprint of it, so that it could fit into any guitar type.
My switch is made by myself: everything from wrapping the final switch to, buying the parts. No middle men, and no crap Chinese manufacturing. I get my dial plates from electro-switch in NC, my parts from various suppliers in the USA.
Dial plate
Its a black base plate with silver numbers. Right now this is a setup up with numbers 1-5, and the bypass position would be off the dial. See pictures below.
Bass Varitone Switch:
After a couple of customers asking for this switch again I have decided to start making this switch again. I have essentially doubled the cap values and I am using orange drop caps. You can purchase on the how to buy page.
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