Speed Knob hard to push into CTS pots?

mark1178

Senior Member
Messages
334
Hey folks,

Anyone have problems with the Speed/Barrel knobs being really tight? I'm pushing down on the knobs and it's popping the threaded portion out of the pot housing. I've squeezed the pole pieces together, talked sweet/dirty to it, part of me thinks I need to lubricate it.

Thanks

Yes these are the knobs and CTS pots from Warmoth.
 
The speed knobs have metric holes, and the pots are SAE-sized. Usually, just squeezing the tangs on the pot shaft together will allow you to get the things on because the difference is fairly small, but they'll be tight.
 
:redflag:  Pushing them on to hard, can ruin the pots. Because i've done that  :doh:

Try and hold the pot (from with-in the cavity) with your thumb while pushing it on.

I did sand the knobs (only a very little). Could use some wax too.
Just go slowly.  :icon_thumright:
 
I'd exchange them but I don't wanna. So I'll just talk dirty to them and tell then to relax their muscles.

I bet if I mention this thread to stew Mac they'll have a Knob reamer for 40 bucks in a couple days
 
I would take a drill bit about 2/3 the size of the hole, and mount it in a pin vise? an old, left-over drill chuck? For future reference, you can buy little chucks designed to convert from hex bits to a chuck, like under $10 on Ebay. Very, very handy to hold things. Better stronger chunkier than any pin vise. And then you just treat it like a reamer on the knobs, Keep the sides of the hole as parallel as you can.

In the mean time you could use that actual drill bit to drill through something/anything, just to hang onto it. A wood "bit" handle.. cram it into a BiC pen...? etc. just SOMEthing that lets you apply some brute force.  if the metal in the knob proves to be too hard to make much progress, you can file the pot shaft it's elf. BUT - you DON'T want any shrapnel getting in the pot - curtains, my dear... And if it's already mounted and wired in such a way that you can't take it out to work on, shrapnel on the guitar finish = YIKES!!! You go to the kitchen, snag the roll of plastic film, pull out a piece long enough to cover the whole front (under these circumstances, Saran wrap is CHEAP compared to the agony of scratches you know dang well you could've avoided. :sad1: )

You just poke the one shaft you're working on through the film. In fact, if you're saving any beater towels or T-shirts and such as shop rags, you could poke that hole through one of them too). And then file away, always check berry berry* often often. Regularly, too. If you look at the splines and see how very little material you have to remove, I mean maybe 10 or 15 swipes with a #2-toothed metal file or the same amount with some 320 grit sandpaper wrapped around a popsicle stick may be TOO much. I don't really like bending them because the knob may get crooked and there's nowhere to go with that... in fact if I'm putting the wrong knob on the wrong shaft (no big deal, IMO) I'd put a little spacer in the slot of the shaft to keep it from bending.

Hmmm, a popsicle stick looks about the right thickness...  :hello2:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1U_hRhImaBU
 
I actually used metric speedknobs on my CTS pots by heating the tip up with a lighter or a candle, and then pushing it on so it 'melts' to the right size, works pretty well,
 
justinianus said:
I actually used metric speedknobs on my CTS pots by heating the tip up with a lighter or a candle, and then pushing it on so it 'melts' to the right size, works pretty well,


good idea!  :sign13:
 
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