Pots, Wafers, Wipers, Shafts, Dimples

How do potentiometers actually work, and how are they built?  In preparation for my tutorial on how to make a no-load tone pot, I dissected a couple pots (the same Bourns and CTS pots I’ve been looking at in my other videos).  In this video, I explore the details of pot construction and how they actually work.

Correction: in the video at 6:25, I said that the narrow part of the wafer had less resistance than the wider part.  That’s backwards! For the same length, a thinner wire has more resistance than a thicker wire.  Similarly, at 4:37, when I said “more stuff to go through, more resistance”, it would have been clearer to say “longer length, more resistance”.