No. 8 Wire

49 minutes ago, martthebass said:

I'd be interested to see figures for difference in strain/stress to failure (tension - as I'd assume the predominant failure mode would be flexural/tension) and MOE between roasted and non-roasted but I'd assume there was a lot of variance as wood is hardly an homogenous or isotropic material.

The papers I skim read were looking at softwoods, seeing as the main push with the research is to get fast growing softwoods to be water and rot resistant and dimensionally stable for cladding and flooring etc.  They were looking at up to 30% loss of MOR but only a few % increase in MOE. 

I've only had a cursory look, but couldn't find anything on Hardrock Maple (some studies on soft maple but obviously not applicable).  I would think because hardrock maple isn't going to be used for construction there won't be research into it.

There are some hardwood studies, but ultimately the process can be so different between suppliers and factoring in the variability of the wood itself... you can only really talk in generalities unless a neck supplier produces pass off tests for wood batches.

One thing I haven't looked at is durability - which you alluded to.  Some papers allude to a reduction in durability, but I haven't read further to know in what context.

It would also be interesting to know if figuring like flame has a more detrimental effect or whether the curing process stabilises the 'imperfections'.

I'm pretty sure these roasted maple necks are serving their purpose though... I have extreme GAS for a stingray 5 with a roasted maple neck and ebony board...

27 minutes ago, Stub Mandrel said:

Who knows this could be next for super strong hollow bodies or reinforcing laminations in necks:

https://www.sciencealert.com/new-super-wood-stronger-than-steel

I read about this a couple of years ago. Haven't kept up with it.

It's interesting, but it's essentially using wood as the base source for creating a polymer, in the same way oil is mostly used at the moment for creating Carbon and plastic.  I guess it's good as it replaces a non renewable source with a renewable one.  Haven't read if it can be recycled or if it is toxic to burn as fuel at end of life.

For musical instruments though, the problem is the end product is not wood any longer and probably won't even look much like wood.  So not a direct replacement.  More like using carbon fibre to make instruments I'd say.

35 minutes ago, drTStingray said:

Weaker and more brittle? Are you sure and if so is this marginal and would it actually have any impact in a musical instrument application? Or even in building structures etc etc.

I would very much doubt it otherwise the likes of Roger Sadowski, Fender, Musicman et al would not be using it for some instruments. From someone who owns and uses regularly three basses with roasted maple necks, they all look great, feel better than any other bass to play than I've experienced in 40 odd years playing, and they all hold their tune more than adequately - in fact I'd say they require the least adjustment by season of any bass I have - so it's all good for me - however I'm one of those people who doesn't buy the vintage hoodoo. I'm a bit like it with cars as well - give me air con, ABS, modern construction tolerances, safety and comfort over 50s/60s chic (including rampant corrosion, vacuum powered wipers which stop when you go uphill etc) for everyday use. 

I think there's a lot of conjecture here and the level of relevant fact and theory being quoted by posters is unclear. 

I'm not a wood expert, but I am an Engineer so I understand the figures.

The wood can lose strength up to 30%, but specific to maple I can't see any figures and it could depend on the process used anyway.  TMW isn't used for structural purposes in construction for this reason according to a couple of papers I skim read.

However, what we are talking about is the ultimate strength (ie breaking point) of the wood, there is no way a bass gets anywhere near that!  On the other hand, some papers say there is a slight increase in resistance to bending in TMW - very desirable in a bass.  So that's where you get the brittleness.  ie The wood is stiffer but will break under less load.  Whether it's good or bad depends on the application.

I would say it's a very good trade off to get less weight and better dimensional stability for a small loss of the breaking strength - seeing as instruments never get close to that unless you jump on them!

A good summary here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/thermal-modification

(Just for the avoidance of doubt, I'm saying 'roasted' maple necks are a good thing!)

I pretty sure what is marketed as 'roasted maple' is Thermally Modified Wood. It's heated under certain conditions - no oxygen, pressure etc for a certain time.  It was developed in Sweden a long time ago so that fast growing cheap woods (pine varieties) could be used in place of hardwoods.  Mainly for cladding I believe.

It's not the same as kiln drying and it doesn't mimic the process of ageing. 

It actually modifies the cellular structure of the wood.  You get benefits like resistance to moisture and rot, but it actually makes the wood weaker and more brittle.  So I guess it's a trade off between weight and aesthetics vs ultimate strength.

As far I as can tell, the main benefits for a bass would be the reduction in weight and resistance to taking up water, thereby being much dimensionally stable - pretty big plusses! But as for mimicking ageing, the process alters the properties of the wood so it will not be the same as aged untreated maple (if anyone cared, but it is often lazily marketed in this way). 

31 minutes ago, drTStingray said:

He's playing some sort of PJ with a front loaded preamp - the front cover is of the Marcus Miller style. It's got a very lively and punchy sound in places - maybe result of the active circuit and a compressor. 

The sound on Give Me What You Got is certainly typical of an SR5 (possibly ceramic). Bear in mind he's a virtuoso player.

Im concious that it's rarely worth arguing with other people's opinions, but for me, the Stingray is shown across the board to be a versatile bass - if you want to lay back and groove, there's no better fat bass tone - if you want to step out occasionally, you can do that, if you want to play slap solos then the sound is great, if you want to play solo chordal work you can do that (though a Bongo may be better at that). It's sound could be described as iconic. 

Not sure why anyone would class a bass of that type as over-rated. 

If you prefer a Precision then fine - for my money they're not as versatile and you'll struggle to do some of the things I mentioned well (lots of people don't want to anyway). But none of that makes the Stingray an overrated bass.

You may also notice Stan plays with the bass strung the other way round - I didn't see a problem with him pushing the B off the board - arguably far easier to do, with certain technique variation than the normal arrangement with the G there. 

Preaching to the converted!

I was just saying the bass on that particular studio version, didn't sound the like a ray, and the live videos seem to back that up. Not a comment on the merits of either type of bass.

A Stingray 5 is my favourite 5 string for  the tone of it...apart from a Wal.  However I can never aspire to owning a Wal, but a Stingray 5 is definitely achievable at some point.

59 minutes ago, chris_b said:

Brilliant. Thanks for posting. That's getting closer to the studio sound I posted.

To me, that sounds great (Ray + Ampeg), however not anything like the recording.

Here's a live vid of the first song you posted, he's playing some kind of P bass there, probably with flats to my ear:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6x9gRqdX5I

On 22/02/2019 at 11:15, customstocker said:

you need to rip out the electronics & put an 8coil pickup inside 

 

I like the sound of that.  Although it's really hard to compare from YouTube videos.

What does the 8 coil do that's different from the standard humbucker (when used in the same mode)? Due it give more even string volume? It's each coil tweaked slightly for the different strings? Would like to know more.

20 hours ago, chris_b said:

Stan Sergeant, bass player with Keb Mo, uses an MM SR5. I wish I could have got mine to sound like this.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1CIGcpfJP0&list=OLAK5uy_k_LVk6DSgfbA6hEWe0IILp-Mc-h0nlkMQ&index=1

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Z2YSTEOOI4&list=OLAK5uy_k_LVk6DSgfbA6hEWe0IILp-Mc-h0nlkMQ&index=14

 

Are you sure that's a ray in the recording? It sounds a lot like my p with flats.

I found this live video with the Stingray 5, it sounds very Stingray in this

What an incredible list of bass string endorsees (right word?).   I have to join the choir of Harris fans though. How does he do it?!

Deleted.

Just to round off the topic, I think I'll just solder in a longer cable rather than use an extension.  It's sounding like the most straightforward and reliable option and also the cheapest! That last little bit of info from agedhorse makes the decision easy really.  I only considered an extension because my soldering skill is somewhat sub optimal!

Thanks for everyone's posts and input, very much appreciated.

6 hours ago, agedhorse said:

You can use a 1/4" (6.35mm) female barrel connector and a short 1/4" (6.35mm) cable to extend the existing cable on the WA cabinet. It would be good practice to include an insulating tube over all conductive parts of the shell to prevent noise from ground loops.

This advice is specific to the Walkabout which has a ground referenced speaker output. Some conventional amps and many class D amps use a bridged output topology, so because the shell is energized, the shell MUST be insulated from anything and everything that it might come into contact with. 

Thanks for this info.  Much appreciated!

17 minutes ago, Alec said:

It baffles me why jacks are still being used in amps - other than saving a few pennies and not being new fangled.

I'd go as far as to say that I wouldn't buy and amp/cab that didn't use Speakons

Well, I agree in general, but my walkabout was made in the early to mid 2000s.  Not sure when it became standard procedure to install speakons on everything.

36 minutes ago, Bill Fitzmaurice said:

I haven't come across Neutrik that are suitable for speaker extensions. Apparently they want you to use Speakon. 😏

Not suprising I guess.  I was vaguely thinking of a locking jack socket for extra security, like this: https://www.neutrik.com/en/product/nj3fc6  or are these for instrument cables only?

EDIT:  I found one pre-made - would this do the trick: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Tour-Grade-Van-Damme-SPEAKER-Mono-Jack-Extension-Socket-Lead-AMP-CAB-Cable/152751182825

8 minutes ago, Bill Fitzmaurice said:

You can make a speaker capable extension using Switchcraft 128 in line jack and 184 plug.

Bill, thanks so much for your input.  I take it the neutrik equivalent would be fine also? Also assume there is no problem having an extra male to female connection in the line to the extension cab?

23 minutes ago, Jack said:

I don't understand, you say you've got two combos and then you say don't?

I can see how this would be confusing.

The Walkabout combo is a backpack type combo, you can remove the amp to use as a stand alone head.   I have two of the backpack combo cabinets but only one amp between them.  Check out the crappy image attached to see what I mean.

Also, this ad from bassdirect shows the arrangement at the back of the cab - the speaker cable is only about 8 inches long:

http://www.bassdirect.co.uk/bass_guitar_specialists/Mesa_Boogie_Walkabout_115_combo.html

50 minutes ago, itu said:

If you split the bass signal to two, you could drive both amps and cabs. A stereo chorus maybe...

Although i don't have 2 walkabout heads, if I did I would use them in a master-slave arrangement.  Ie with one preamp driving 2 poweramps through the effect return of the slave amp. Would be a killer rig.

2 minutes ago, itu said:

No.

(There are no quality jacks to transfer that much energy from amp to the cab. Speakon is far better an alternative. But this is my very subjective point of view.)

If you split the bass signal to two, you could drive both amps and cabs. A stereo chorus maybe...

Just to clarify, there's only 1 amp, the second combo cab will just act as an extension cab.  The walkabout head doesn't have speakon connections unfortunately.

Sounds like I'll be getting my soldering iron out though from your answer...

Hi All,

Just after some advice, I have 2 walkabout combo cabs, but I want to use one as an external cab.  However, these just come with a short cable to link to the amp inside the combo housing.  To get it to the back of the amp in the top combo i need a 2 ft extension.

I know the ideal would be to replace the existing cable with a hard wired longer one, but is there any harm in using a male to female 2ft extension with quality jacks?

I feeling a bit happier today, i still haven't got the tone I wanted but I'm on the way and can now see it's possible.  To cut a long story short I needed to set the EQ controls on the VMTD flat and set the boost to off on the B3K, also the grunt setting onto thin from Raw, at least for now.  That gets me in the ballpark but I've got some work to do yet.  Be a while before I report back on this - I haven't even had time to swap the order yet!

17 hours ago, dave_bass5 said:

The Q/strip is a lovely EQ, very versatile, but that's all it really is. Its not ideal as a speaker sim, it just attenuates the top end. When i had mine i found my BDDI to be a much more capable 'amp sim' for recording and used at the end of the chain.

Live it worked much better but at the start of the chain, and then i let my various pedals shape the tone as it passed through the system.

 

Understood on the cab sim limitations.  I was just using the cab sim settings with a few tweaks from the manual, to be honest I just liked the tone, how it corresponded to an actual cab I'm not sure!  I will try it out at the front of the chain over the weekend.  Live is a whole other thing, I've no prospect of playing live again for some time, so I won't consider that yet.

12 hours ago, Cuzzie said:

Let us now how you go, of course the other option is to really roll the tone off your bass, you will get the drive, may just attenuate the fuzz, and could give an almost ‘tube’ type tone 

With the stacked DG boxes I'm really after a quite defined tone, along the lines of Nolly Getgood but with a little more bottom end.  So the high part of the fizz needs to be there, just not too fizzy!

I had a play last night and running the Q last I just can't get a tone I'm happy with, however, with the Q bypassed the tone is also a hollow fizzy crap fest!  So, it seems that the magic happens when driving the Walkabout preamp and the VMTD and B3K settings won't read across.  So tonight I'll start from everything flat or zeroed on all three pedals (after noting the current settings) and go from there.  I'll also swap the order if that fails time permitting.

Cheers all for the input!

36 minutes ago, Cuzzie said:

Had the B3k and the VMT and they are fizzy, Q Strip being a pre-amp to all intensive purposes will hammer the signal signal up and increase what fizz you have.

Are you stacking the B3K and the VMT as always on? 

You do have a lot of signal push there, what was normally unity gain, may now be too much.

Other option is that if you like your tone with the Q strip, place that up front to tone shape and  then distort

 

Essentially, yes the B3K and VMTD are always on and stacked for driven mode.  They are set for unity gain (well, equal volume compared with clean to the ears) to the Walkabout.

I like your advice there, I'll try dropping the level into the Q strip and see what happens, both in terms of volume change and tone. If that fails I'll try running into the Q strip first.  For recording purposes that could be quite neat as I could get a clean and dirty signal from the Q Di and the VMTD Di - blend later in the DAW.  I'll try those options tonight.

On 05/01/2019 at 21:55, Dood said:

Thank you  I really appreciate that. it's been a week from hell, so this was a nice lift.

You're review of the Q Strip was superb, really helpful and informative as well as a critique of the product - and great playing to boot!

Hi All,

Just bought one of these, so thought I'd add to this thread rather than start a new one.

I have got some great sounds out of this just running a P bass (4 and 5 with flats and rounds) into it with nothing else.  Really impressed.

However, running my full signal chain into it, it sounds like fizzy crap.  Effect order Tuner - Spectracomp - DG B3K - DG VMTD - Q Strip - Focusrite 2i2. (Bass 5 string jag PJ in passive mode).

Running into my amp, my pedal settings sound great (Mesa Walkabout set flat).  Been trying to use the Q as a cab sim with recommended setting it the book, but sounds rough.  I was expecting to be able to fine tune the distortion sounds from the 2 dark glass pedals, but it just isn't happening.  Any ideas for a start point setting wise? Otherwise I'm back to starting flat tonight and endless tweaks!

Cheers, Dan

PS. Any other user settings for different sounds you guys want to share would be great too.