# Ibanez Pot type? (Linear/Audio taper)



## Matt08642 (Oct 31, 2017)

Hey everyone,

Need to replace the volume pot in my RG7620, and was wondering which kind of pots Ibanez uses for Vol/Tone. 

Ibanezrules lists their volume pot as "3VR1J500G" and their tone pot as "3VR1J500D".

I'm not sure what G and D denote, and don't have an ohm-meter to test. Anyone else here replace their stock Ibanez pots and could point me in the right direction?

Thanks


----------



## odibrom (Oct 31, 2017)

Any pot will do the job, Volumes are usually log and tones are linear or reverse log. For humbuckers get 500kOhms and 250kOhms for single coils, use the same value for the tone pot, but with a different tapper. I'm using 1Mohms log pots for volume with my prestige Ibanez guitars (double humbucker) with 500kOhms for tone (originals) and have no regrets. The higher the value, the brighter the tone. You don't have to go with those specific pots from Ibanez. Pot swapping won't kill you guitars resale value in case you're thinking of it.


----------



## Matt08642 (Oct 31, 2017)

odibrom said:


> Any pot will do the job, Volumes are usually log and tones are linear or reverse log. For humbuckers get 500kOhms and 250kOhms for single coils, use the same value for the tone pot, but with a different tapper. I'm using 1Mohms log pots for volume with my prestige Ibanez guitars (double humbucker) with 500kOhms for tone (originals) and have no regrets. The higher the value, the brighter the tone. You don't have to go with those specific pots from Ibanez. Pot swapping won't kill you guitars resale value in case you're thinking of it.



Nope not worried about resale value, just don't want to replace a linear pot with an audio pot or vice versa


----------



## angl2k (Nov 1, 2017)

Volume pots on guitars are (almost) always logarithmic taper (also called audio taper). You won't get smooth volume changes with a linear taper for the volume pot. For tone I like the linear taper but it's not uncommon to use logarithmic taper for that as well.

Actually if you google the part number 3VR1J500G it says 500k 

You'd have to measure the diameter of the pot shaft itself since US and metric pots have different sizes


----------



## Sogradde (Nov 3, 2017)

I always keep mixing it up because I remember it being counter-intuitive. Logarithmic volume pots make your volume go up in a linear fashion because of some physics shenanigans, right? Because I used to have a Schecter which had a smooth transition from 0-100% and my Ibanez goes from 0 to 99% in the first 1/3 turn. I would like to swap them out when my new Pickups arrive so would have to go and grab a logarithmic poti for it?


----------



## bostjan (Nov 3, 2017)

Yeah, dB are logarithms of sound pressure levels, and perceived volume is logarithmic with respect to circuit resistance.

You will definitely want an audio taper pot for volume control on a guitar. The tone might be more a matter of taste.

Say you have a 500 kohm audio taper pot. At full volume, it's 500kohm and at no volume it's ~0 ohms. Same thing with a linear taper pot.

But set to "5" or halfway, the linear pot with be 250 kohm and the audio pot will be 50 kohms. 250 kohms sounds like a 250kohm pot full blast. But there are no 50 kohm pots used as guitar volume pots, to my knowledge, by major manufacturers.


----------

