Passinwind

[quote name='ambient' timestamp='1506715095' post='3380692']
I'm probably going to be the only person to vote 'other' .
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Not a chance. Mine's an electric upright.

[quote name='Jus Lukin' timestamp='1505410166' post='3371757']
Interesting about the voltage step-up used in the US. i didn't know that was done!
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It's quite common for household appliances like water heaters, and as Bill mentioned, for touring grade pro sound applications.

Anybody else here watch the live stream of the recording of her new album? 77 hours from start to finish, with no material worked out in advance. And the topper: only 7,777 physical copies sold, with no digital distribution at all. They've already taken the live stream down and the physical copies sold out yesterday. I love everything about this, really.

We had both the POJT and Dirty Dozen in the 300 seat club I used to mix in. Good times.

[quote name='JimBobTTD' timestamp='1499706681' post='3333049']
Does anyone have experience of importing an instrument with an Indian rosewood fingerboard from the US? I am asking in relation to CITES. Did you need to do anything special? This is assuming that the US seller has already done the necessary for export.
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The Dutch buyer I mentioned in my last post had to get his own import permit on top of the two separate US permits and the physical inspection I had to deal with. The whole process took just under 4 months. And yes, the bass in question has an Indian rosewood fingerboard.

[quote name='Skybone' timestamp='1491037510' post='3269993']
The new CITES regulations are going to make this more and more difficult for buying instruments from overseas. Dealers should be doing something about licences, but where does that leave the private individual???
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I've just gone through the whole CITES permitting process as a US seller to a Dutch buyer. Knowing what I now do, I would have charged a minimum of $500 for all the hassle and out of pocket expense it entailed. Frankly, I probably just wouldn't ever do it again. If the US seller happens to live very near one the of the limited number of CITES inspection stations their experience would be a bit less painful, but the wait time for the main permit would still be 60-90 days, and the potential for unpleasant surprises is pretty great.

[quote name='Bilbo' timestamp='1496689690' post='3313256']
The questions are, can you play anything all the way through on your own without accompaniment and/or what part of this thing called music leaves you wanting?
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I do play a few solo tunes on bass quite often at open mikes, mostly originals with vocals. In the past I gigged with just a drummer and myself very happily as well.

My kryptonite tends to be playing tunes I don't like. No one in their right mind would ask me to play classic rock in a band with them, for instance. I don't hate all of it by any means, but I am pretty much indifferent to whether people dance or not, or whether I cop bass lines authentically in the sense of "like the record."

[quote name='Chienmortbb' timestamp='1496337933' post='3310704']
I got the finished Front panel From Michael at Modulus Amplification today. I am very pleased and now have no reason to prevaricate. Build restarts tomorrow.

An apology to Passinwind, the model number should have read PW7B-500UK as the preamp is basically his design PW7B. The name Cand Heat? I live in Canford Heath near Poole. Having had a business before that used the Canford name (because that is where the business was) and being ferociously pursued by Canford Audio's Rottweilers (Trade Mark Lawyers), I thought two fingers up to them would not go amiss.
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Aww, no need to cite me in any way, but that's plenty close enough in any case. Hope things go smoothly for you from here on out.

[quote name='Beer of the Bass' timestamp='1494449204' post='3296156']
That's not a bad price for a panel from Modulus. Though I've not used their panels, I've found them to be good to deal with when buying valve amp parts.
Regarding input impedance and passive basses, just how low are you considering? I could hear little difference between 1M and 10M, for instance, but when you get down to 100k or so I do hear a difference in the highs.
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FWIW, I've gone as low as 18K on some of my amps and preamps. My passive/high impedance inputs are usually at around 270-330K or so, but they are really just meant as a courtesy for guest players at open mikes and the like. My preamps can make crazy high end up into the ultrasonic range quite gracefully, and a higher input impedance tends to necessitate reining that in, which I prefer to avoid given my own wants and needs. My workaround for unbuffered piezo pickups and the like is to insert an active DI/buffer box inline with the active input. I've also been playing around with discrete FET preamps lately (Tillman/Kruetzer style), and I could see adding one of those boards working well for John if he needs a higher impedance and or a little more gain at the front end. Tradeoffs, always tradeoffs.

[quote name='Chienmortbb' timestamp='1494414832' post='3295727']
Well I was not happy with the last look so i stripped it, sprayed it Silver and tried again. It is still not perfect but I will use it as is to complete the wiring and if I cannot live with it, will do as passinwind suggested and use Front Panel software from [url="https://www.schaeffer-ag.de/en/downloads/front_panel_designer/?no_cache=1"]Schaefer[/url]. Current estimate is about £40 for a really professional front panel but if the amps is as good as I hope, it will be worth it. The alternative is to go for an engraved panel from [url="http://modulusamplification.com/CUSTOM_FACEPLATES-W3.aspx"]Modulus[/url].

So on to wiring! Incidentally the empty holes are from left to right, High/Low switch, Input jack, and Mute.
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Cool. I often do my builds with a temporary front panel, since I always seem to end up wanting a different layout by the time I'm done anyway.

Marco Bass SC prototype, Crescent Moon fretless, BSX Model 2000 EUB.

[quote name='Chienmortbb' timestamp='1494259045' post='3294447']
Applying to the rear of acrylic or polycarbonate sheet in reverse is probably the best idea. That or an engraved panel may be my best step but I am trying one more thing tonight before I give up. More later.[/quote]

I approached the guys who did the UV printing on my last two NAMM stompboxes about doing some amp or preamp panels for me. They were totally game and I was all set to use them until Front Panel Express started offering that as an option to engraving and infilling. I'm tentatively planning on using both technologies on my next build, whenever that happens. Good luck with the decals though, looks like you are very close to nailing it.

[quote name='Phil Starr' timestamp='1493967893' post='3292153']
Hi Charlie, how do the cabs sound in your opinion then?

The design spec i have in my head is a full range cab but suited more to bass, shifting the crossover point away from the 1-4kHz level where our ears are most sensitive to the crossover distortions and not worrying too much about anything above about 12kHz whih will never get past the inductance of the pickup coils even if it was useful for bass.

I'm happy to experiment with non flat cabs for bass use but the sensitivity of these 3" units is in the 88-91dB/W range with 20W handling typically. I want to partner them with bass drivers of 96-99dB/W quoted. Crossing over an octave below 1K would mean a midrange sensitivity down to the 3" units and power handling would become an issue, crossing over low. I'm looking specifically at the 3" units designed for line source designs which have become available and I suspect Duke is using something else to partner the 3012LF. I don't suppose you know what he uses? The advantage of using four drivers is that it also gives you some control of the off axis dispersion of midrange.
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Phil, that 20 watt rating for the Faitals is broadband and goes up drastically when crossed over north of 1.5K, which I'm pretty sure is what Duke does. He likes to leverage the "growl" off the woofer and his crossovers include a switch to enhance or negate that as desired. He rates the 3012LF as more like 94dB real world IIRC. The last time I talked to him he was using the Faitals, for sure, but I will double check today as I need to give him some feedback on the 18 / 6 / 2x3 cab he sent up to our Bass Convention in Seattle last weekend. Whatever he is doing, it works exceptionally well IMO. We are pretty good friends, but that came from professional respect first, FWIW.

I've also spent a little time with Jeff Genzler at NAMM and really liked both the 12-3 array cab and the new 10 inch derivative, which I think Jeff said uses Eminence 2.5" drivers. Being NAMM, I only really heard much of them in slap mode though.

Last weekend we had our annual Seattle area GTG. The organizer chose the brewhouse of a brewpub a bit south of the city proper this year, which suited me well since I live about 4 hours south of Seattle. Unlike many of these events, big amp rigs are welcome and attendees are allowed to play as loud as they care to. We also had more industry reps and endorser/player demos than in years past, which many people seemed to enjoy a lot.

Here I am doing my tech talk on the Passinwind open source onboard preamp:




Early in the day during setup, it got much busier than this for several hours:



I have to mention that the overall caliber of the playing I heard was amazingly high. Time to start organizing my summer one now, I guess.

I've heard the Genzler cabs several times, as well as a few Audiokinesis cabs that use those 3 inch Faital drivers. I also have a pair of the 4" ones in a DIY cab at home. I think they lend themselves very well to out of the box thinking, both literally and figuratively. As an aside, for many peoples' wants and needs I don't feel it's necessary to match sensitivity to the woofer spec, or even desirable in many cases. Duke just uses one 3 paired with a Kappaite 3012LF in his most popular cab, FWIW.

[quote name='Chienmortbb' timestamp='1493383319' post='3287952']
This build is still ongoing. I have been toying with different front panel ideas and decided to stick with the water slide decals I used for the back panel. The front panel is now drilled and sprayed silver. ( pics to follow).

I had only one sheet of clear decal paper left and so really made sure everything was right. Put it into the slot for thicker paper and turned to the PC to select print. I thought I heard the printer start to take the paper through and tried to pull it out. MISTAKE. The paper creased and that caused a paper jam. My last sheet ruined.

So I have ordered another 5 sheets and hope to have the panel finished next week

As with the 1x12 cab build, I have deadline, my next gig is May 13th so you should see progress here's soon.
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Nobody said it would be easy, but you've certainly had more than your share of setbacks. I actually managed to trade my modular version towards a new bass a few weeks ago. It's out of my comfort zone in several ways: single cut, 5 strings, and fretted. The last part is the biggest obstacle right now, since I haven't owned a fretted bass for over 30 years. I've been shedding like crazy on it for a preamp/amp demo I have coming up this Sunday at a Seattle GTG. Feels really good to be stretching myself a bit again.

[quote name='Phil Starr' timestamp='1493279135' post='3287027']
It's a shame in a way that there has been a little more heat than light so far. I think there is a general trend towards lightweight single driver cabs in bass amplification and lots of people fear that the cabs generally won';t have enough oomph. There's a lot of advertising hype from manufacturers too and unless you have a technical mind it's difficult to separate the fluff from the genuine claim. I hope it helps when those of us who do understand the technical side of things and who aren't selling anything pitch in.

<snipped useful discussion>
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Yep, well said Phil. Although in theory I am now a commercial poster of sorts on the bass oriented forums, I still have nothing but freelance design work to sell and speaker cabs are not currently on my radar at all. What anyone else prefers to use is all good by me. If they ask for help, or just want to know how I roll, I try to answer as best I can. Rock on, Nancy Johnson!

[quote name='Bigwan' timestamp='1493193012' post='3286297']
I don't know much about Monique. Do you know what topology Jule uses for the midrange control? Similarly I'm clueless about his sensitivity control. I'd assumed it was just a simple gain, but reading between the lines there seems to be something else going on there.

What topology did you use for your midrange control? Is it similar to this: [url="http://www.angelfire.com/electronic/funwithtubes/images/Amp-Tone-7-A-A.gif"]http://www.angelfire...-Tone-7-A-A.gif[/url]

I can't see any pics from early in that thread unfortunately, although I've read it at some point in the dim and distant!
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I'm planning on going to Jule's shop sometime this summer. He's never given away a whole lot about the nitty gritty of how his preamps work.

My mid control and active feedback schemes are a bit different than the one in that link, but the general idea is more or less the same. My experience is that there are too many compromises once you go beyond two bands using that topology. I do a passive treble control later in the signal chain, and in the SS builds it comes after the parametric EQ. The idea is that any extraneous noise doesn't get reamplified by a bunch of subsequent stages. It also gives a means of toning down down high end harshness if you drive the midrange or PEQ sections hard. Sorry about the pics, but the early ones are just of the Aikido line driver anyway. Here's a gut shot of the second build, which had new production 6SN7s fitted for testing (two left tubes, the one on the right is 6SL7) rather than the NOS ones I ended up using:

[quote name='Phil Starr' timestamp='1493222213' post='3286684']
That's not fair, you didn't tell us that bit.

If you're lending it to other bass players it can't be big enough.
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True that, but this thread isn't about Nancy's Johnson's needs and wants, it's about how the rest of us make it work with one small cab. Or at least the part I answered is.

There's an old Talkbass thread on a couple of my 6SL7/6SN7 builds: https://www.talkbass.com/threads/a-diy-tube-preamp-line-driver-by-passinwind.345415/#post-4388452

Some of the pics have gone missing in the thread due to the TB software changeover after I posted them but I can probably scare them up if anyone is interested. JGR is a good friend of mine and it's well worth gleaning what you can from his posts over there too. I opted for an active bass and mid format, closer to the Jule Monique's approach than the Ampeg thing.

[quote name='Phil Starr' timestamp='1493128608' post='3285856']
FWIW I thought NJ's original post was a perfectly sensible start to a discussion we've had a hundred times before.
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Agreed, and my answer was absolutely given in that spirit.

[quote name='NancyJohnson' timestamp='1492964710' post='3284448']
I always seem to break a little smile when I see posts showing 'my gig rig tonight', where there's a little class-D head stop of a tiny Barefaced Compact (or similar). I suppose after years of doing this, I just feel more comfortable with something big behind me.

All you guys who just use tiny cabinets (1x10 or 1x12), yes, you know who you are, how the hell do you manage?

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By never playing excessively loud rock music, for starters. Next question?

Is she hot?

[b] 2017; a good year for gear?[/b]


Yes indeed. I've been methodically ridding myself of anything more than a decade or so old and fully expect to continue that trend. I'm soon going to be down to one fretless, one mostly expendable EUB just in case I get a few sub calls for jazz stuff, and one recently acquired 5 string fretted bass just as a test case. Then one cab, and a few different homemade amps. Nothing from the past that I'd ever want to revisit, and I've finally worked out a way to offload my older DIY builds so I can make some new and better ones. My main bloat control mechanism is that if I want it I pretty much have to build it from here on out.

Edit: should also mention that I went to NAMM this year and the only GAS I developed at all was for a hypothetical bass from the luthier I went with. And lo and behold, a couple of months later I happened to see something in his shop that was up for grabs and that he was happy to trade for some of my DIY amp gear.

This proves that a complex interaction of factors defines the result, and maybe talking about a single feature does not have much sense.

Yep, and although neither one of us may like it that much, "just depends" just may start to look like the most reasonable answer.

BTW, another reason that Andy and I might come off as sounding similar at times these days is because we both have to work under non-disclosure agreements, and giving away too many specifics is just bad business. When I was "just" a DIY'er I was probably a lot more informative, but so it goes.