brensabre79

Years ago I was advised to lean a new acoustic against my hi-fi speakers when I was listening rather than playing. The vibrations help with the 'playing in'. But this is the reason I prefer a beaten up, well played guitar over an immaculate one with the tags still on, and it's not just acoustics - although it's considerably more noticable.

Is this the same bass as the one in the buzzz thread? Sounds like someone has re-wired it (badly) to suit their preference. It should be fairly simple to put back to original. And you'll probably find the buzzing stops at the same time (if it's the same bass). It's standard Jazz Bass wiring for VVT with two pickups so there will be countless diagrams out there.

It could be one bad cable, it does happen. - Process of elimination for that one. Get one of your Stagg cables and go along the line swapping your new ones one at a time. If you get to the end of the line with the same issue it ain't the cables. It could be a dodgy contact in a pedal that was fine until you fitted new cable (jack sizes do vary, I have a Fender cable that always causes crackling because the jack is a tiny bit smaller). It could be the power draw of adding one more pedal. (I assume you're using a power supply) - check the current draw of each pedal against the output of your power supply. Some only draw power when activated (True bypass), Some draw power even when they are off (Buffered). It could be the POG being before the compressor is boosting the signal enough to kick in the compressor (depending on how it is set), causing it to reduce the volume...

I play in a band that this might as well be an ad for. It's a great laugh, practices (about 3 a month) are fun and are basically a get together for a jam. We do about that many gigs, we hire venue, promote etc. We generally make a little profit, which usually goes to charity. It's not a function band, and we don't play classic covers stuff, but otherwise the same applies. We've all got other commitments (other bands, families, jobs etc.) so it suits us. For me, it beats going to the pub and watching a football match. I hate footy and drinking takes second place to playing for me. It gets me out of the house and keeps me off the streets I've done my time playing functions and pubs/clubs circuits. Honestly i haven't got the energy for all that these days. I'm sure I'm not alone...

I've never seen one of these. I think they would be a specialist item / custom order. But depending on what you're trying to do, I've had some success with rotary switches and small preset pots - albeit with less than ten positions. I was trying to get the best of both a pickup blend knob and a pickup selector switch. i.e. instant recall but with more options. IN theory, the same could be done for volume / tone.

I think they are just the standard barrel style saddles on those right? So you could possibly get away with the threaded style barrels like Fender use on some basses. BUT... The pickups are designed for the original spacing so you could run in to issues with the outside strings not lining up with the pickup poles meaning they would be quieter.

In theory, yes but not without adding a hole on that bass. Best place in the circuit would be direct from the pickups, before all the switching circuits. Best location for the pot would probably be the plate where the jack socket is and you'd need to put a side jack socket in... But it's not reversible, and those Jags have too many controls already IMO ;-)

<p>http://duhvoodooman.com/Musical/humbucker_mods/humbucker_mods.htm</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>You can do basically any of these mods. Most of which require a switch - either a toggle switch (meaning extra holes) or you can get a volume/tone pot with a pull/push function to preserve the look of your bass.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>In all honesty, on a two pickup bass the only one I would personally add is a switch for both pickups in series (FAT sound), or a switch to coil tap if its a particularly beefy pickup, this will drop the volume but add more treble.&nbsp;With some exceptions, coil tapped humbuckers don&#39;t sound as good as true single coil pickups though.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>The trouble with most of these mods is that can dramatically affect the volume output as well as the tone - so if you&#39;re on a gig it&#39;s not always a simple matter of flicking a switch to get a different sound, you&#39;ll need to play with volume controls too and possibly adjust your amp tone controls.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <div>&nbsp;</div>

I had this on mine. Cured it temporarily on a gig using impact technology on the top. I sent it back and the replacement did the same thing after a week or two. It was the valve seating in the rather delicate socket, I changed the 12ax7 valve as a precaution, but do make sure the preamp valve is seated properly, there's a rather feeble spring to hold it in place, but it's liable to move slightly - causing the crackle/low signal. Edit: I think I've mentioned this in more detail on a thread before so you could do a search on here if you need more info. [b]TURN IT OFF AND UNPLUG BEFORE YOU OPEN IT![/b]

It's probably always been there, but you'll definitely notice it more on headphones. Active preamps almost always introduce some level of noise, the more expensive ones less than the cheaper ones as a rule... Effects pedals tend to introduce [i]and[/i] amplify noise - which is why many people have a noise suppressor on their board. Like Grangur has pointed out, the lead can also affect things, some leads lose a lot of treble from the signal - which is normally seen as a bad thing - in some cases this will remove the hiss generated by noisy preamps/pedals. Which is fine if you don't want lots of treble, but I'll wager that if you're getting lots of hiss because you have the treble turned all the way up, you're looking for more treble... It's worth remembering that on most active treble/bass controls, halfway is normal, all the way up is maximum boost.

Good stuff I'm sure you won't be disappointed. You may not need to go with 500k pots if you're putting a single coil PU in there. I'd see how you get on with the pickup first. The usual rule of thumb is 250k for single coil, 500k for humbucker. This is because 500k allows more treble through and humbuckers tend to sound dark. Although you don't have to follow the rules

Hey if it plays nice it should sound nice too. I say do it! If you get fed up of it later on you can always sell the DiMarzios separately.

Sorry to her that. Sounds like you were unlucky, but glad you're getting it sorted. I was going to recommend Hot Rod, so you should be in safe hands there

Re: blend pot. It's normal for the neck pickup to be on full all the way to the centre position, then as you move toward bridge pickup from there the neck pickup should roll off. You're probably noticing it more as your BridgePU seems quiet. It may be coincidence, but as you've tinkered with the BPU and it's now quieter, I'd start with that. You could have just disconnected the earth, or if the bass is shielded (either with copper or black shielding paint) you could be catching the shield with one or more wires. That would be the easy fix. As mentioned, it's incredibly easy to catch the coil windings when you take the cover off, even if you can't see any obvious physical damage there may be some. Unfortunately that is a worst case scenario so it's best to rule it out early... So the first thing to do is get hold of a multimeter (they are about £10 and well worth it!). Check the impedence of both pickups: This is best done without the pickups connected to the preamp Set the multimeter to kΩ and measure using the two wires coming from the pickup. Every pickup will be slightly different, but they should both be in the same ball park (e.g. 8kΩ - 10kΩ... 10 - 12... etc.) Active pickups tend to be much lower than passive ones. Normally it would tend to be slightly higher or the same. If they are about the same, it's a safe bet your pickup is OK. (I hope it is). If your BPU is significantly lower than the NPU then you've probably damaged the coil winding, and depending on the pickup it's a professional repair or replacement in that case. You can also use the multimeter to check the rest of the wiring.

[quote name='DrPAR' timestamp='1476953507' post='3158688'] I'll need to have someone look at it to answer any technical questions. It was bought second-hand and so was set-up to suit the previous owner. [/quote] 4mm sounds quite high, especially if you're doing exercises at the dusty end, and you should be able to easily halve this on most basses by adjusting. You might be OK just lowering the bridge saddles... Or, it may be that you (or the previous owner) have put heavier strings on than the bass is set up for - this will cause the neck to bow forwards and the gap between strings and fretboard will increase. So it might be as simple as changing to lighter strings (Do you know what it has on there?) without making adjustments... I would advise getting it set up properly though - and to your liking. It may not have been to the previous owners liking either. Whenever I buy a bass a setup is the first thing I do. So if you're going to buy a VM (great basses btw) I'd budget for a setup and a new set of strings too...

I think the bronco pickup is a strat size, it certainly looks that way. so a hot (or cool) rail should fit, but the tone difference is entirely down to personal preference, and probably more important for guitar... The main difference for you will be in the output. Hot rails being louder, Cool being not so loud (but not quiet). But both will probably be louder than the stock pickup. For guitar, hotter pickups mean you can get a bit more drive out of the pre-amp stage of your amp, so more distortion [b]basically[/b]... For bass, many people prefer to have a cleaner tone anyway (or use pedals for drive), and an overly hot pickup may be too much for a pre-amp (although most bass amps can take higher volumes due to active basses). So for a cooler pickup, you'll need to turn up the pre-amp more, for a hotter pickup, you'll need to turn the pre-amp down a bit. For now I'd personally go for something cheaper like: http://www.warmanguitars.co.uk/product/twin-loco-single-coil-sized-twin-rail-humbucker/ See what you think... then maybe upgrade to Kent Armstrong (which are really good by the way) if you feel the need: http://www.wdmusic.co.uk/electronics-c17/kent-armstrong-guitar-pickups-c100/kent-armstrong-strat-replacement-guitar-pickups-c187/kent-armstrong-power-blades-rails-mini-humbucker-hot-output-p3991 I believe the Kent Armstrongs come in Hot and Cool too. Either will be fine. EDIT: I should add, if you're swapping a single coil for a humbucker, expect an increase of output but a decrease of treble / attack. you can change the volume and tone potentiometers to overcome this, but that's another thread and depends what you have and what you get

Yes, you can use rail type guitar pickups in a bass. Although I wouldn't stress too much about strings being exactly in line with poles - depending on how close you have your pickup. Early Rickenbarker basses used a 6 pole guitar pickup, as do some other basses, and most John Birch guitar pickups have 10 pole pieces! I recently swapped out the pickups in my friends Dean semi-acoustic bass for him, the ones that came from the factory were standard guitar humbuckers with a cover over. I replaced them with some Warman Warblades (rail humbuckers).

I too bought some Elixir's from Simon. He was a pleasure to deal with, sent some perfectly packaged strings my way the next day Thanks Simon!

[quote name='geoffbyrne' timestamp='1454060200' post='2965819'] I read that mini humbuckers were designed (by Epiphone) to fit into the hole used by P90's, so, conversely, a P90 in a plastic shell (not dogeared) *ought* to fit straight in. G. [/quote] Yes it's true - Mini humbuckers fit in P-90 holes. As long as you don't use the Dog Ear P-90s they should fit in the hole - but beware that these P-90s have the screw holes through the centre of the pickup, not around the edge like Mini-humbuckers do - so you will make new screw holes in your guitar fitting a P-90 - although they are in the pickup cavity, so won't be seen if you do go back to Mini-humbuckers. Alternatively, you could look at Creamery Pickups or indeed Kent Armstrong (who you already seem to be familiar with), both of whom can make a pickup to suit you for a pretty reasonable price. e.g. a less hot (powerful) mini humbucker. Jaime at Creamery also makes pickups with threaded pole pieces so in theory you could get the best of both worlds by having a mini-humbucker with threaded pole pieces to get the single coil attack but without the hum.

It's never bothered me, as long as you have enough headroom on your amp what's the problem? Although thinking about it, I don't really go past 9 o'clock on my Carvin so if it is ramped the snide way I suppose it would be nice to get a bit more control instead of trying to eek the knob up by thousandths of a millimeter during a half bar stop! But that amp is crazy loud anyway.

Shouldn't be, I have exactly that myself. Love the VM necks EDIT: Just check the shape of the end of the neck against the cavity on the body, they should be the same shape but there were a few variations (on the Fender body side) depending on what you have.

I've tried most types of straplock over the years, and at some point they all fail - usually in a horribly dramatic fashion - in my view the absolute most reliable ones are the little red rubber things you get from a large bottle of beer.

I think the tribute thing started over in Australia a while back because many of the big bands of the time wouldn't go all the way over there to play a couple of shows. So you got the Australian Doors, Pink Floyd etc. etc. Because the people wanted to see these bands play live, but couldn't, the demand was huge for the next best thing. A group of dedicated, and competent musicians playing songs they love. I've never set out to go see a tribute band either, but I have seen a few and I have to say this. I've seen an Abba tribute, a Queen tribute, an Eagles tribute and a Led Zeppelin tribute - they were all very entertaining indeed. Some were shockingly accurate, others just a bit of fun... I couldn't go and see any of these bands today (even if I wanted to) - certainly not in the original line up, which brings me to another point. There's a lot of original bands still going, but with only one (or in some cases none) of the original members left. So where's the difference? I think tribute acts (or fake acts if you insist) are a good thing and I think most of the artists they are a tribute to would agree.

Well i got one, and I have to say it's fantastic! My friend has a custom, costing more than 3x as much and he was seething when I showed it to him and told him how much it was! Leftybassman392 I think your comments are probably about Les Paul's in general. They are not for everyone that's true. I've always thought LPs were good for power chords and screaming solos, but not much else. I have to say though, this one with the P-90s seems a bit more versatile. I also like the stripped back look - but I think regular LPs are a bit bling! The magic tuning thingy on these takes a bit of getting used to (the E A D side works backwards if you tune manually for a start). It takes a couple of strums to get them all in tune, but it's still faster than doing it by hand. The lovely chap on the phone told me they were getting some more of these in January, so if you're tempted, keep an eye on the site, they are £200 more everywhere else!

Bargain!