shoulderpet

On 04/03/2022 at 19:56, kodiakblair said:

Yet the blurb says different.

 

" adds beef and warmth to the traditional vintage tone."

 

" we came up with a more robust pickup that added output and low end"

 

" but wish it had a fuller, ballsier tone, "

 

Just a thought .

 

Have you considered the effect your hunt for brighter highs will have on the hum ? A single coil P-bass is a hum antenna which no amount of shielding will get rid of completely.

 

Darker tone can divert folks attention from it but I'm thinking super bright highs tone will bring hum front and centre ; probably with a spotlight on it so everyone knows the cause 😆

What are your thoughts on the aftermarket pickups you have tried? The stock pickup is decent but it seems to be a clone of the Duncan Quarter pounder so probably not the most traditional single coil tone, Herrick are probably not either but there promise of a brighter tone with added treble with the Neodymium pickup is intriguing.

13 hours ago, kodiakblair said:

Guitar players will tell you hum is part of the single coil tone 🙂 Personally I don't find it a problem , nobody notices it above the din made by a band 👍

 

You definitely lose something using stacked or split 51 singles . If a normal healthy kid running about full of E numbers is the single coil ; the split/stacked is the same kid after a double dose of Ritalin 🙁

Tbh I have never played a bass where the hum has been an issue, as you say it's usually drowned out by all the other sounds

14 minutes ago, kodiakblair said:

Yet the blurb says different.

 

" adds beef and warmth to the traditional vintage tone."

 

" we came up with a more robust pickup that added output and low end"

 

" but wish it had a fuller, ballsier tone, "

 

Just a thought .

 

Have you considered the effect your hunt for brighter highs will have on the hum ? A single coil P-bass is a hum antenna which no amount of shielding will get rid of completely.

 

Darker tone can divert folks attention from it but I'm thinking super bright highs tone will bring hum front and centre ; probably with a spotlight on it so everyone knows the cause 😆

Yeah that is a bit confusing, I wonder if they got the eq mixed up with the vintage wound scpb1, people usually think of vintage pickups as being bassy but in reality that are often fairly full range and bright.

I haven't had a chance to use the PB-50 in a live setting or rehearsal yet so I think that will be the test for the hum, I know there are stacked coil 51 pickups that are meant to address this but my hunch is that they will change the fundamental character of the 51 pickup

Thanks, that is good to know, funnily enough the Duncan SCPB-2 is one I am interested in, it is a hot pickup but Duncans Eq specs say that this pickup has strong treble response which is something that appeals to me

2 hours ago, shoulderpet said:

Just wondering if anyone has done a pickup swap on a Harley Benton pb-50?

Is the pickup a standard length(will for example a Duncan single coil p pickup fit?) Roswell says it is 84.94mm in length and just looking at Herrick pickups and there single coil p pickup is 87mn in length, my guess is the Roswell is slightly different to standard spec but I could well be wrong

 

Am asking as the pickup route is very tight in terms of space, there is no wiggle room at all

Ok after looking on the Seymour Duncan website it appears there single coil P pickup is also 84.94mm (or 3.344" as it says on the website) so it would appear it is Herrick that is a slightly different size to standard spec

Just wondering if anyone has done a pickup swap on a Harley Benton pb-50?

Is the pickup a standard length(will for example a Duncan single coil p pickup fit?) Roswell says it is 84.94mm in length and just looking at Herrick pickups and there single coil p pickup is 87mn in length, my guess is the Roswell is slightly different to standard spec but I could well be wrong

Am asking as the pickup route is very tight in terms of space, there is no wiggle room at all

11 hours ago, spyder said:

Now I'm not a fan of Ashdown. I really can't get on with their amps core sound so I was not expecting to find such a great bass

 

I share this sentiment regarding there amps,a place that my band uses to rehearse has Ashdown amps and I'm sure some people get great tones out of Ashdown amps but I can never get enough top end out of them, it always seems to sound like the highs are rolled off regardless of how I set the controls on the amp

So looking for some wiring ideas, I found the below diagram which is supposedly for a bass cut, does this look correct?

1 hour ago, Ricky Rioli said:

 

"Do you get much damage to the fingers? 

 

Yeah, the first couple of weeks I get blisters. Then they burst. They're really, really sore for a few days, then they go really hard, and that's it. They stay like that for the rest of the tour.

 

When you play somewhere really, really hot and get really sweaty, your hands go soft, and that completely changes your sound. Your fingers tend to sort of sink into the strings, almost. And there's nothing you can do about that. It's like someone put a muffler over your speakers. So, you just have to add more top-end to try and compensate, but there's not a lot you can do. 

 

With the blisters, have you tried putting stuff on to harden them? 

 

Yeah [dismissively], tried that. Doesn't work. I tried that Nu Skin stuff, when I've had a blister that's come open, when you're through to the skin underneath, that's really sore. But once you get out playing, get the adrenaline going, you tend to be alright anyway. It hurts a bit, but sometimes the pain—you just grit your teeth and get on with it."

Jesus, why not just use lighter strings

Apparently he plays really softly so most of the pressure would be on his fretting hand, still an incredible amount of string tension though

31 minutes ago, kodiakblair said:

Aye , you'd be scunnered finding this on your MIA Fender 🤣

 

Haha yes, I have owned a few Fenders and even if the routing was done via a panel on the back of the bass you still couldn't take off the scratchplate because of those bloody locating holes they punch into them

58 minutes ago, kodiakblair said:

?

 

After the factory change in 2018, some owners reported the hook up wire from the single coil being visible under the scratchplate. The channel was formed by drilling from the top , one hole angled into the pickup cavity while another went towards the control cavity.

 

PB-50 FR belongs to friend, burst is one of mine.

 

 

Interesting, I am glad I am lucky to get some without the hole under the scratchplate although at this price it is by no means a deal breaker

Am liking mine so far, is good to go out of the box, nice bright tone, only grumble is the bit of fret buzz on the first couple frets but at this price you can't expect the frets to be perfect and I have seen worse fret work on much more expensive and honestly I have played much more expensive basses that been worse basses

Ok so have received the bass, overall I am pretty happy so far, some shortcomings but that is exactly what you would expect at this price and they are all things that can be sorted in one way or another

The nut is a cheapo, I may replace it but I love the fact that it is cream coloured, that is awesome so I am thinking maybe I will get some fine sandpaper and just smooth the edges a bit on it instead, some fret tarnish which is not a big deal and some T-Cut will sort that out, the pickguard is super cheap looking but not a big deal as I was looking to replace that anyway. The pickup has some tarnish on the pickup poles, anyway to remove or cover this without damaging the magnets?(from what I have heard this pickup is alnico5)

I lowered the action to Fender spec and there is some fret buzz on frets 1 and 2 on the E string but not anywhere else on the neck so I am thinking that the frets probably need dressing,  I might just slap a heavier E string on there to reduce the string excursion until I have the cash to get the frets dressed.

Looking forward to giving the neck the Kiwi polish treatment, what colour do people usually use? Also is it limited to just Kiwi shoe polish? I have seen this which if it works looks like it might actually be a better colour Cherry Blossom shoe polish - light tan

I read somewhere about some of the PB-50's having the ground wire under the pickguard, thankfully on mine it is under the control plate, looks really good with the pickguard off so I might just have a see through pickguard made for the sake of having something to put the pickguard screws into to hide the screw holes where the white pickguard was

I was looking at no load pots and found that it has been suggested that they don't work as volume pots only as tone pots so I have instead ordered some 1meg pots for some extra brightness, am hoping my soldering has improved enough to not bodge it up

On 23/02/2022 at 16:44, mcnach said:

 

It definitely isn't. Now that I've seen the stock pickup in my bass I can confirm it's the same pickup that they sent me.

I guess the seller just bought a few to sell on and copied the description based on what he thought he had. He didn't contest, I just printed the return label and will be posted tomorrow.

 

Meanwhile I ordered another Artec from a different place, but it's going to take 3-4 weeks.

 

I have to say that since I put a set of nylon tapewounds it sounds a lot better. 

 

 

 

 

Its a good thing you had a multi-meter to test it with otherwise you might not have known, personally I was not a fan of the stock Epiphone EB0 pickup as the low dc resistance makes it sound kind of weak, I found that tapes and flats made it sound a tonne better

4 hours ago, shoulderpet said:

Oddly enough I am one of the few that finds flats work better at home, I find most bass amps and rigs have more than enough low end (too much on a lot of them) and then when you throw in guitars and a drummer I find it gets hard to hear what is going on

Just to add to my post, really,

Really oddly the tone I got from flatwounds that cut through the mix best was on a Hofner contemporary club bass, both pickups on full, slight boost in the upper mids and treble, cut through no problem but for some reason a P bass with flats just doesnt with me

Sadly I stopped using the Hofner as the 14mm string spacing made it really awkward to switch to other basses

23 minutes ago, NT1991 said:

I get what you mean they can be difficult in some settings, however I think Steve Harris of Iron Maiden uses flats and his tone really suits rock/metal which I always find weird. Although he may well just change them a lot more regularly, and I suppose tone is still in the fingers...

Steve Harris changes them for every gig and every recording session, fresh flatwounds can be pretty aggressive however for most of us they are just too expensive for us to be able to afford to do this

Oddly enough I am one of the few that finds flats work better at home, I find most bass amps and rigs have more than enough low end (too much on a lot of them) and then when you throw in guitars and a drummer I find it gets hard to hear what is going on

On 10/02/2022 at 11:46, jackreacher193 said:

No wouldn't be going that low. Want something substantially better than what I've got now. So looking around £400.

 

I would look at used, someone on here said the other day that a £500 bass is essentially a £200 bass with slightly better quality control and a little more labour time and I really agree with that assessment, I have played (and returned) a number of £400-500 basses and I am always struck by how marginal the improvements are vs basses that I own that are in the £200-250 price range

On 10/02/2022 at 11:43, lownote said:

 I have had an Affinity and it was OK, it's just that the bass world's offering has changed a lot in say the last five years, both with new players in the field and a ramp up in quality across the board.

This is true, Affinity used to be pretty good value for money but now looking at the Affinity series you can nowadays get a better bass than an Affinity for less

On 21/02/2022 at 16:37, shoulderpet said:

Yeah, I will wait for the bass to be delivered and assuming all is well I have some mods I want to do 

 

No load pots

Kiwi shoe polish neck tint mod

New pickguard (white always looks awful imo)

Brass saddles (purely aesthetic)

 

I would love to reshape the headstock to look like a 51 p bass but I have neither the tools or the know sadly

Ok so as I never actually use tone controls I am thinking of just having a volume control, I will reach out to one of the companies that does custom pickguards and see if they will make me a control plate shape with one hole for the volume control to replace the original control plate

23 hours ago, mcnach said:

Not happy.

 

My multimeter had ran out of batteries, and I only just managed to get today the MN21 type it requires.

 

I checked the pickup and it's 1.2 KOhm, not 29-30 as advertised.

 

To cut the story short, I received exactly the same pickup it's already on the Epiphone: 

- slightly narrower polepiece spacing than the Artec should be, and identical to the stock one down to the marks on the magnets.

- 2 magnets rather than 4 (it may not make much difference, but it's evidence of it not being the pickup advertised

- 2 wires rather than 4 (I don't really care as I will only use series, but... again it looks like the stock pickup)

- no sticker with the model number, which the Artecs have

 

It's going back.

That's a real shame, sounds like they sent you the wrong pickup, from the above or doesn't sound at all like it is the Artec

23 hours ago, mcnach said:

Not happy.

 

My multimeter had ran out of batteries, and I only just managed to get today the MN21 type it requires.

 

I checked the pickup and it's 1.2 KOhm, not 29-30 as advertised.

 

To cut the story short, I received exactly the same pickup it's already on the Epiphone: 

- slightly narrower polepiece spacing than the Artec should be, and identical to the stock one down to the marks on the magnets.

- 2 magnets rather than 4 (it may not make much difference, but it's evidence of it not being the pickup advertised

- 2 wires rather than 4 (I don't really care as I will only use series, but... again it looks like the stock pickup)

- no sticker with the model number, which the Artecs have

 

It's going back.

That's a real shame, sounds like they sent you the wrong pickup, from the above or doesn't sound at all like it is the Artec

17 hours ago, Geek99 said:

Yes i am that person

 

I have those in my p bass - there’s a very slight tactile “click” (not audible) as the pots go full on at 10 and come off the track - sounds amazing 

 

Much better answer than a blank plate - good idea 

Yeah, I will wait for the bass to be delivered and assuming all is well I have some mods I want to do 

No load pots

Kiwi shoe polish neck tint mod

New pickguard (white always looks awful imo)

Brass saddles (purely aesthetic)

I would love to reshape the headstock to look like a 51 p bass but I have neither the tools or the know sadly

3 hours ago, uk_lefty said:

In theory a PJ bass should be everything I want. I loved my P bass, I've enjoyed every J bass I've had. I've not got on with my Warwick PJ, or the Hohner PJ before that. I've made a PJ Bitsa and put DiMarzios in it. The pups sound great individually, but together I've just never found a way to get the sound I want from PJ basses. I think it's just me, maybe my expectations are wrong or its the way I attack the strings.... Anyone else got this quandary?

Im not a massive fan of P/J basses, I had a Fender Mustang that sounded good in P/J mode but all the other basses I have tried have all been Meh in P/J mode, you lost a lot of the beef in the tone as soon as you roll in that J pickup, Also things get a little bit brighter but you lose some of the snarl from the P pickup along with a good chunk of mids

Something has just occurred to me as a possibility, hoping someone with more know how than me can weigh in.

If I used no load pots for both the volume and tone when both pots are on full would that then essentially be the same in terms of tone and output as going direct to the output Jack?