250k or 500k what's the difference?

[mr. j]

So Tom,
vintage voicing aside, on a regular run of the mill strat what's the difference on the volume AND tone controls from a 250k to a 500k pot?
Reason being, I have a loaded pickguard that a guy has 500k pots on both tones and the volume but I know Fender and most use 250 on both tone controls and volumes, right? It's a hum-single-hum configuration.
What would you use on a hum-single-single on a regular strat or other?
Can you run a 500k on the volume and 250k's on the tones or vice versa?
What's 'best' or maybe give me some opinions all...

thanks!

[tom]

there are not really rights and wrongs, but normally people prefer the sound of 250k with single coils and 500k with humbuckers. here's what they do. a lower value pot will"load" the pickup, reducing the high end response of the pickup. most of us like that on single coils. since humbuckers make less high end response, we like the way 500k pots let the the highs come through. if you run a single coil with 500k pots, you will notice extra high end than if it had 250k pots. we solve the mixing of different styles of pickups by using 500k pots then adding a loading resister when the singles are on. the best of both worlds, but it does require fancier switching to add the resister to only certain switch positions.

[mr. j]

what about on the tone controls? Same? Less load and a 500k let's more highs through?

[tom]

they are both part of the equation. we use 500k everywhere and load with a resister to compensate. the volume has a greater affect, but the tone still does load.