Multi-dedent pot movement called generically?

This curious datasheet from before 1995 (telephone number 4 digit area code)

Surely, the word is detent with a "t", isn't it ?

Arfa

clicky volume pot is all I've heard for them. The last one I saw was in an early 1980s Concept receiver. It was made by Alps and the replacement cost was very high.

They

I've just converted a standard mono sub-min Alpha pot to a "clicky" dedent form ,for a Warwick. The other rotary controls in there have smaller metal knobs so there are normal mono pots on those. Before writing up another tips note, I was after a generic name for them

I thought it was dedent as it involved dents , into which a sprung loaded ball dropped into

Convention does seem to be detent, I always thought it involved dents so dedent. So where does this word detent come from , via detend? as in detending to rotate or tent as in tenterhooks for suspending hides for scraping to parchement etc

It is absolutely trivial to look this up on line. "Detent" comes from an Old French word meaning "to release", which is derived from a Latin word meaning "to stretch".

There are no such English words as "dedend" or "dedent".

The fancy form of such a device is a "stepped attenuator", which switches resistors in and out to produce the desired attenuation. My Lux 5C50 preamp uses one made by Alps. "The Audio Amateur" has published articles on designing stepped attenuators.

The other type is a plain-old pot with a detented knob. These used to be common on car stereos.

See "détente" (a sudden release of pressure), which was directly borrowed into English (minus the accent) to describe Soviet-American cold war negotiations . The meanings are very similar.

I suppose English could use an antonym for that word to apply to current behavior patterns. Retente? It means something different in French, but..

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

Given that the original detente propped up the Soviet Union for another few years, until the Reagan buildup pushed them over the edge, let's hope the current approach works as well as R's. Not likely, given the hands at the tiller just now.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

that's what the Alps ones I saw were. Those old stereos were heavy and had large producing knobs, so it wasn't too hard to break off the shaft of the pots where the slot and splines were cut.

new volume knobs really feel crappy, like plastic slathered in grease, which they are. Tuning knobs with the giant flywheel were great.

Er no. See

Arfa

A single centre detent position is still very common on balance pots on hifi, and on tone controls on all sorts of amps

Arfa

I have an hitachi preamplifier, which has steps, and I think it uses carbon traces on boards to form the resistance, as resistors. From what I have seen looking in. There are discrete attenuation steps, not gradual.

Greg

On Tue, 24 Apr 2012 01:59:50 -0700, "William Sommerwerck" put finger to keyboard and composed:

I beg to differ.

dedent ? v.tr.

to remove a depression in a surface made by pressure or a blow: "The panelbeater dedented my door".

:-)

- Franc Zabkar

I actually dedented a speaker cone yesterday

Just as well I found a work around for making clicky pots as I could only find single detent/dedent pots (balance type) available in the UK. It must have seriously pissed-off musos when a gain or vol pot would turn of its own accord, due to biased resonance with those 4 ounce knobs , from built-in speaker vibration

Or... "The Gypsy offered to dedent my car's fender, but only made things worse." (This actually happened. A policeman stepped in and chased him off.)

In order to be 'good' English, that 'word' should probably be hyphenated as in de-dented ... d:~}

Arfa