Beer of the Bass

At least nylon tapewounds will last for a long time - a small consolation with expensive strings. And hey, it's still a cheaper pursuit than finding the right double bass strings. I think my last set were £160, though I should be good for several years with those.

I suspect a standard Fender reverb driver transformer (22K:8ohms) would work acceptably in that circuit, though not identical to the original. Worth a shot, anyway.

I'd say to go straight for the double bass if at all possible. An EUB can be a useful thing to have around but there's a lot about tone production and physical approach that it won't help you to develop. I played EUB for a couple of years before I owned a double bass, and with hindsight I regretted doing it that way around.

The problem with adding a more complex tone stack is that passive treble/bass or treble/mid/bass circuits tend to be more lossy than the simple single knob types. So it may not be a simple matter of adding the tone controls, it may need an additional gain stage too. At that point you're looking at a rebuild of the whole preamp section, which may not seem worthwhile.

You could go with one of the systems using piezo discs on the underside of the bridge plate, like the K&K Pure or the JJB pickups which are similar but cheaper. They're less feedback resistant than soundhole or undersaddle pickups, but do sound good.

Sounds like you're almost there. Slowing down the tremolo speed should just be a matter of increasing the value of those three .02uF capacitors in the tremolo circuit. It may take some trial and error because if you go too large on the value the oscillator can stall and stop working. I'd perhaps try .033uF and see how that goes. The volume control issue may just be a worn out pot. Regarding the reverb, I'd check the DC resistance of the tank itself first - if the amp is the same as the schematic Mr Del Var posted, it should be roughly equivalent to an Accutronics AB type tank - the input coil should measure very low DC resistance (like 1-2 ohms) and the output coil in the hundreds of ohms. If the tank turns out to be OK, I'd then try to isolate the problem to the driver or recovery stage. If you can hear crashing through the amp when the reverb is turned up and the tank is tapped, the recovery stage is OK. If the recovery stage is OK, I'd first check the driver transformer wasn't shorted or open, and check that the cathode resistor in the driver stage is OK (reverb drivers pull quite a lot of current, so can be hard on parts). If all of that is OK, try a new valve in the driver stage.

Have a good sniff of it - celluloid smells like Vick's Vapourub.

I've seen someone use small bulldog clips from a stationery shop, with the handle part removed. It might take some experimentation to find the right size, but they're easy to find at short notice.

[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1509715865' post='3401128'] Shiny green pants were de rigeur at the time. I'm wearing mine now as I type. [/quote] With the matching socks and tie?

The drummer's stage wear is memorable...

[quote name='Deedee' timestamp='1509666319' post='3400791'] Am i the only person who had an Encore P in the early nineties that played fine? Did loads of gigs with it 😳 [/quote] I think Encores have come from a few different factories over the years. An old bandmate had one which was really not bad and played nicely but I've seen others which were horrible.

It's hard to say without hearing what you're hearing, but is it definitely the speaker farting and not the amp distorting? It's only a 15 watt amp, and the speaker would have to either be damaged or very poorly chosen to be running out of steam at that amount of power. It'd be worth checking through another cab before you spend more on it.

Strap buttons! Are those still in the post?

[quote name='DIYjapan' timestamp='1508472340' post='3392405'] What a great looking pair you've got there. Any further word on how they sound on the stage? Looks like they'd fill out most any venue just fine. [/quote] They're doing fine; most of the time one cab raised on a chair does the job and there have only been a couple of occasions where I've used both. I'm sure that the limiter on the GK MB200 kicks in before the cabs start to complain, so I suspect I could use a larger amp if I needed to. I'm pretty happy with the sound of them for electric bass either with the MB200 or my Dynacord valve amp. For double bass they're quite usable but do sound a little coloured.

I'm not too familiar with that amp so I won't comment on any difference in tone between them, but I will say that Allparts prices are not the best. I'd look at somewhere like Karltone or Hot Rox.

I haven't used the TKS cabs themselves, but I have some experience with the driver used in the S112 and S212 and I have an 80 watt Dynacord valve amp I bring out sometimes. I think either the S212 or a pair of S112 would be a nice combination with the Echolette - they should have reasonable efficiency (or about as good as you'll get without going for something huge) and a voicing that works well with an old-school valve amp, but you would need to determine whether they would meet your needs for volume and low end output with the GK.

Sadowsky Black Label flats have fairly discrete silks. They're a light grey that isn't very noticeable against the colour of the string. They're a bit darker and more old-school flatwound sounding than Chromes though.

Are you sure you want 1mm veneer? For the bass I defretted a few years ago 0.6mm veneer was a good fit in the slots.

Given that they have narrow string spacing as a 4-string, the 5-string conversions must take a bit of getting used to. It does look like Rath's conversions are better thought out than RIC's own though.

I'd say this is an example of a nice bass sound on an old OGWT performance, if a little low in the mix. But then it looks like he's using a Fender Showman on some sort of fridge-sized cab and it doesn't sound like the band are playing loud, so that keeps it out of fart territory. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soOiBvbRvsw

Could it be something to do with optimising the track time for vinyl mastering? I remember reading that the average level and quality start to decline over 20-22 minutes per side. I cwn imagine playing with the tape speed to get the master in that range.

I paid £549 new for one around that time.

It's been a few years since I took classical guitar lessons, but I recall playing a couple of pieces in alternate tunings (either dropping the low E to D, or using EADF#BE to replicate early guitar/vihuela tuning). In both of those cases the notes were written at the pitch they sounded, with a note of the tuning at the start of the piece, and more extensive position notes than usual.

They sound quite different to me, using cheap but full-sized Panasonic headphones from an LG tablet. The Streamliner seems deeper and more scooped in those clips - perhaps the earbuds don't show up the low end difference so well.

I've got quotes from both now. Once the VAT is added to Roqsolid's base price there is less than £1 difference between them. So I'll go with Hotcovers, I reckon.