Phil Starr

In a circle, the rehearsal is the time to listen to what each other are doing and thinking. We tend to concentrate on arrangement issues, you kind of assume everyone knows the songs before you start, though that isn't always as true as it should be. You need the eye contact and to be able to talk. Every now and again we have either a 'dress rehearsal' where we set up as at the gig or a technical rehearsal where I get a chance to tweek the PA but you need a bigger space for this than our usual practice room.

The primer serves two functions. Wood contains lots of water and air, the primer acts as a barrier between that and the top coat which may not be compatible with water. You might be restricted to using water based top coats now and your emulsion may be porous to water and air and so is not sealed. The second function is to stick the paint to the wood. Your finish is possibly going to peel and will chip more easily than if you used an appropriate primer. Traditional wood primers contain very little pigment because their primary function isn't to colour the wood. In spray based systems the primer is designed to be compatible with both the wood and the paint and if it is a two coat system should be coloured to work with the top coat. If you want a relic'd finish you are probably going to get it very quickly.

It's an interesting technical challenge to implement an 'XLR' feed from a guitar. There are several advantages and you could have some or all of them. Better and locking connector Balanced line for lower noise induced in lead Balanced system throughout with lower noise from the bass Lower impedance and compatibility with mics If you just want a better more secure connector then just removing the jack and putting an XLR is a really simple job for any tech but there will be no change in sound which would probably be better by using a short jack to a DI box. It would also be relatively simple to convert to a balanced line inside the bass by putting a small matching transformer between the controls and the output socket. Effectively the working part of your DI is moved inside the electronics cavity of your bass. These are mass produced as mic matching transformers and cost about £10. This gives you all the electrical noise rejection of balanced line from the bass onwards so you could run absurdly long leads if you wanted. Is this what your tech is doing or is he/she just replacing the socket? This is how you would do it with a passive bass or an active one where you wanted to keep the electronics. If you were designing from scratch you'd do the electronics differently. Wonder how the various makes mentioned achieve a balanced output, if they do. Most humbucking pups could be adapted to have a balanced output. P-pups would be a particular doddle. This would give even better hum and noise rejection and a much cleaner feed to the PA, Again you'd have to adapt the electronics but the loss of noise would be worth it in my opinion. The other difference between a mic feed and a guitar feed is the impedance. 600ohms for a mic and around 8,000ohms for a typical bass, because bass pups have a lot more and bigger turns than a mic' coil. All those turns of wire have inductance that filter out high frequencies. Reducing the number of turns means lower output so amps would need more gain and I doubt a 600ohm balanced bass pup would have enough output to be practical. You don't need to go up to 18,000Hz like a mic but 8kohms is a compromise between output, signal to noise, and gain needed from guitar and bass amps which dates back to the 1940's which we only do because that's the way Leo did it in the first electric basses. I wonder what the ideal impedance would be? Forgive me, I'm such a nerd. In a practical sense find out if your tech is just changing your socket, I'd say no point as you'd be better using jack to DI and running as much balanced line as possible. If they are putting in a matching transformer then that should work well but check the low frequency response of the transformer, one designed for a vocal mic may well roll off at 80Hz ish.

I've used a Hartke Kickback for gigs, with and without DI and for a lot of rehearsals and it does the job and sounds pretty good. the shape control is a rather nice way of dialing up sounds quickly. Whatever you go for the kickback facility is always useful at this sort of power level so I'd not look at something that won't do this unless you want to carry a stand with you.

People have inadvertently answwered the question. If it plays and sounds good then it doesn't matter. At every price point Fenders are very variable and MIA ones are more variable than MIM or Japanese ones. If the pocket is out by 8mm then so is the neck, pickup placement, bridge and everything else. My bugbear is not fishing off fret ends properly. It's not just Fender in the States either, my Gibson TBird had one side of the neck more rounded than the other so the G string tended to slip away from you if you didn't fret spot on. The variation in playing has to be down to poor quality control and a general lack of care. Poorly fitting parts are the symptom of something which does show in the end because all the little things clearly do make a difference or there would be less variability and all Fender MIA would be good ones. Banning Japanese imports from Europe so they don't show up their USA masters is pretty shabby treatment of their customers IMO. Don't get me wrong, I have a Jazz and a P both MIA but it is buyer beware with Fender, great design with indifferent execution far too often. Both mine were bought used and I'd look elsewhere if I was looking for a new high price bass.

I had a good look, some of the stains had soaked deep into the wood and I know from experience the only way to get them out is to sand them out and I didn't want to go that deep, the others had crept under the lacquer and again I did not really want to enlarge the chip to get them out. the neck was sufficiently marked that the only alternatives were to strip it right back or to patch up and make do. It now feels and plays perfectly and the stains can't get any worse whilst not looking too bad. I just love the sound it makes, gig tomorrow night. I can't wait.

You are being a little unfair on BFM and JTUK. there are all sorts of issues about using speakers like these for bass and it is only right to warn people They blew all the time in the 70's and farted out at high levels and unless used carefully still will. they were never designed for bass. It's a shame to blow vintage gear and my instinct would be to trawl eBay for a replacement G12-65 to keep it original. Having said that if you get the sound you want and you are clearly being careful because they are still going then the other issues with mixing the speakers are these. make sure they are all equally loud. Most Celestion 12's are around 97dB/W but they vary between 96 and 100. If there is more than 1dB difference the louder speakers will dominate the sound, If the 12-30's are 30W speakers then your cab will be a 120W cab, less if you use bass boost. the handling of the cab is 4x the lowest powered speaker. The sound won't be the same as before, the two types of speakers will have different frequency peaks which won't line up and the sound will be a blend of the two, less characterful than the 12-65's on their own. To keep as much of the sound as possible use three 12-65's and one replacement. Celestion are very helpful, it might be worth emailing them and asking how compatible the new 12-65's are with the old.

One more for Peavey. I have a 1x15 Black Widow cab in my practice room. Too big and heavy to move often but I look forward to practice and the sound it makes. Immense and rather like drowning in warm chocolate, mmmm.

Only mic up if you are absolutely determined and prepared to spend hours getting it right. You won't only need a decent mic but positioning it will be critical, moving it a few cm will change the sound. If you want post eq then use a DI box in the speaker lead or use the FX out on your amp. It is so much easier and if the audience hear a difference at all it is likely to favour DI over the miked sound. I know guitarists do this all the time but it really isn't the best way of getting a good sound for a bassist. Now you have £150 to spend on something else bass related.

The stew mac video was really helpful [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTVScFJoe24"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTVScFJoe24[/url] . In the end I did the lot with superglue, actually it polishes to a higher shine than the lacquer. The patches show but only because they are not yellowed and because the wood was stained. I could have sanded out the stains before I filled but since I am only interested in playability not cosmetics I decided to leave as much wood and lacquer untouched as possible. I had six cigarette butt sized dings (god knows how he did that) and it took me about two hours to do the lot once I had the technique worked out. You can see all the dings though they are a lot less obvious, you can't feel them at all even when you know they are there.

Don't use scotchbrite or wire wool. You need something flat or you will sand unevenly and end up with something which has bumps in the surface. The idea is to only remove high spots and fill the low ones and you can only do that with a flat surface. Use wet and dry start with 400 grade (careful with this as it removes the lacquer quickly) and then work up through 600 grade 1000 grade and 1500, then T-cut. This restores the shine to new. The sticky surface is either just accumulated filth but more probably someone has tried to oil a lacquered surface or used spray polish on a wax polish. White spirit should clean it off.

OK, not happy with the results yet but here's my take. The nail varnish I've reservations about, it takes ages to go hard and as you have to build it up in layers it is going to take days. Because my bass has a poly finish I think cellulose isn't a good match so I don't think I'd use it again, however I can remove it any time with some nail varnish remover so it is a temporary fix and it does fill the hole. I'm going to leave it in one dink and see how it finishes up once I have finished filling and sanding. The superglue is much quicker, easier to apply and it sets hard rapidly so you can build up several layers in an afternoon. It also cuts back easily using a scraper ready for final sanding. I'm using a Stanley blade with sellotape over each end as a 2 thou spacer and to protect the good areas of lacquer then 400/600/1000 grade wet and dry followed by T-cut to bring the final polish back. The superglue is clearer than the original lacquer which is slightly yellowed as Lawrence has said, so the patch is visible though it feels great already without the final polish. I've a couple of dinks left so i might try some polyurethane varnish to see if I can get a better colour match. In my case the wood has discoloured because the dinks are quite old. If you have to do this repair do it quickly before sticky fingers meet unprotected wood! This isn't going to be an invisible repair but it does already look much better and it has improved the feel so that it plays without me feeling any dinks.

Thanks Lawrence, I've pretty much decided to take your advice and I've started a test with one of the smaller dinks using my daughter's nail varnish. I think I might try superglue as well. Can't believe i'm experimenting on a £1000 bass! I'll let you all know how it comes out.

Thanks for the responses, I've been researching a little. Nitro cellulose is an easy repair it seems. If the dinks are just in the finish then you can just build it up with more nitro cellulose lacquer including the right sort of car touch up and clear nail varnish. If the wood is dented but not broken then the fibres can be steamed by applying a damp/wet cloth and then a hot iron. I wish mine was nitro now. Plenty of how to videos on youtube including one by Stuart MacDonald of StuMac. Mine is definitely Poly of some sort, acetone doesn't touch it at all. You can get the poly lacquers easily enough from car parts shops and also Axminster Power Tools which does a good mail order service. The trouble is knowing which poly finish you are dealing with, Some are two part some single part, some solvent based and some water based. I'm guessing polyester polyurethane and acrylic. The other problem is that they vary in solids content and they are shy about this too. Nitro cellulose is good because the lacquer redissolves in the solvent and then cross links with the new lacquer so it is a complete repair. I'm guessing there is no way of cross linking polyurethane with new polyurethane, polyester with polyester or acrylic/acrylic. That is assuming I can find out what finish I have, I guess an email to Fender might tell me. Having said that I've successfully drop filled dinks in furniture with poyurethane varnish, which is slightly yellow due to the alkyd resins in the varnish. Superglue is looking favourite at the moment, though my local tech tells me it is difficult to get a high gloss finish on it. In the end I think I might be happy with just a smooth join that I can't feel when playing, no-one else sees the back of the neck after all and i can get it resprayed professionally if I do get keen at a later date Any more thoughts welcome and thanks for the ideas so far

I've just bought a new Fender P-bass with some small but irritating lacquer chips which I'd like to repair. I'm a competent craftsman generally but have never worked on a musical instrument before. I haven't decided whether to do the repair myself or put it into a local luthier. What type of lacquer do Fender use? Where can I obtain supplies? (It's an American Deluxe with a heavily lacquered maple neck/rosewood fretboard and the chips are on the back of the neck) Any tips on how to go about this welcome. if it was antique furniture i'd be confident but a bass is more important than that.

Our singer wasn't very loud, so I guess we used more gain than most. When you can pay as much for an inductor as you do for a much bigger mains transformer you begin to wonder about the cost, but they are difficult to track down at all, I wondered about winding my own but I found it difficult to track down cores for the higher values. My S112's both had the Delta12A driver [url="http://www.eminence.com/pdf/Delta_12A.pdf"]http://www.eminence.com/pdf/Delta_12A.pdf[/url] I'd rejected these as PA speakers in my home brews because of the peak, The cone break up is pretty uncontrolled it seems and i decided that designing a crossover to tame it was going to be too difficult. Back on track though, any other suggestions for a small but sweet sounding compression driver capable of 120dB?

[quote name='Count Bassy' timestamp='1383758079' post='2268686'] I have two of the Kam Mk1 Par bars and they have worked great in slightly darkened room or stage area, but don't do much if the pub has all its house lights on. The newer ones are more powerful so can only be better. Of course there are better/more powerful ones out there (I've got some of those as well), but the difference between no lights and a couple of ParBars is tremendous. [/quote] I guess the more powerful ones are the 7x3W tri-led lights which seem to be about £100 a set more expensive. Are they worth the difference? One or two reviews suggest they are a bit overpowering on full power, though I don't propose pointing them at anyone's eyes. I'd rather put the £100 towards bass gear but it'd kill me to think I'd bought something inadequate or even just a bit limp for the sake of £100. What do you think? Anyone regretted either purchasing the lower powered ones or wishing they'd not bought the mega ones? thanks for al the responses so far.

There's a few reasons why people might think a 4ohm speaker sounds 'better' but in the end there is probably more myth and magic than hard fact. 1.There is an increase in total power, usually a couple of dB's. This is just noticeable and could be the difference between running into distortion or not. Mainly not though, and the difference in volume is tiny. As Bill has said in most cases the limits are just as likely to be the speakers so the amp power is often not the problem. 2. The drivers aren't the same, to get the different impedance the voice coils and sometimes the magnets are changed. This changes the sound and the speakers parameters. If they are put into the same sized cabs the frequency responses won't be the same, neither will the excursion limits. 3. We instinctively like louder sounds (which is why modern recordings are compressed to hell) If you A/B the 4ohm speaker with the 8 it will be louder, if you don't adjust the volume and sound 'nicer'. Adjust the volumes to be the same and the preference disappears. 4. People aren't very objective, which is why we need double blind tests. If all the experts tell you that (for example) oxygen free copper wire sounds better then it isn't long before everyone hears a difference that can't be measured. So there may be a grain of truth, 4 and 8 ohm speakers may sound different and 50% of the time you might prefer the 4's but the differences are mainly slight and I doubt anyone would notice if you did the listening test whilst the amp sat next to a drummer, never mind a guitarists half stack. It's not a sensible way to choose a speaker cab.

Mine are IV's too but they have the same drivers as the S112V's I used to borrow before I bought them, They sound the same too. For a long time I liked the mid-range peak as it punched the vocals right forward, and they by no means sounded bad in practice, a bit harsh when the room was empty but vocal articulation came over well when the room was packed. The trouble came when I added subs and started putting the whole mix through, the guitars always sounded harsh. We always had limited gain before feedback too because of the peaky response. It is standard practice in hi-fi cabs with 2nd order crossovers to reverse the tweeter because of the phase shift in the crossover, so I tried it and yes it sounds better both in an A/B comparison and in a live performance. What did you do about inductors? I found them hard to source and expensive and in the end had them wound by IPLacoustics.

PS don't you think it is shocking that you and I (and any number of others on here) could design a better crossover than Yamaha in a design that must have sold in tens of thousands?

Thanks for this Lawrence, one I hadn't looked at. It has quite a droop in the upper frequencies but that could help in a monitor. You are happy with the sound and clean mids are what a decent monitor needs more than extreme highs. The only downside for me is that I was looking for something to drop into my existing cabs without needing a new baffle, the upside is that you seem to be suggesting a pretty decent result with something that in my case started as a cheap and cheerful solution to a problem using bits left from other projects. I've used Yamaha S112V and S115's as monitors, the 12's are far too mid biased due to the horrible peak in the EM delta's and lack of intelligent crossover design. The S115's are much better but just too big for the small stages we play. I've had some experiences with matching drivers to horns and experienced exactly what you describe. I bought a bunch of cheap plastic moulded horns and tried them with the horn drivers I was using with really quite dramatic differences in the subjective results. Most of them have flat sides with sharp angles in the flare which I understand you might need to do if you were forming them from sheet materials but which seems crazy in a moulded component. Did you see my post about the yamahas? I've reversed the polarity of my horn drivers in my S112's which has knocked the nasty mid peak back a bit, really cleaned up the vocals and tamed some of the feedback problems.

I'm after upgrading our stage monitors by replacing the compression units in our horns. They don't need to create more than 120db so the drivers I usually use are overkill, too big and heavy and a waste to have something capable of 130dB padded right back. The thing is to find something that sounds as good as possible and without any nasties which would make the monitors feedback prone. Crossover frequency isn't a problem as I'll design and build my own. 1" screw on preferred as then I can use the existing horns Any recommendations?

OK, we too have to take the plunge into lighting. We want to keep it simple, just to liven up our visuals without adding to the set up time or the already cluttered stage area so the four Led cans on a controller/ParBar type lights will suit us just fine. One question is what level of light to go for. They don't all quote light output so it is hard to compare but the choice seems to be between the 3x3W tri-leds (PowerBar and equivalent) and the ones with 10mm leds (ParBar). I saw a band recently using the ParBars and they seemed bright enough. Would the more powerful lights give greater intensity of colour? Would they prove too bright in a usually restricted stage area. I know I could get a proper controller to dim them but to be honest I want to plug, forget and play. If i can get away with a ParBar then that's great, more to spend on bass gear. What are your experiences?

If you want little, and more than adequate for a pub then you have to try the AER amp one unless the cost is too great. It's a one off that you need to eliminate from your enquiries, tiny, manageable and sounds fabulous.

I've had problems with my 3500. The problem seems to be mainly with all the smoothing caps in the power supply that are not securely mounted and heavy enough to move when the amp is carried around. I bought a complete new set of caps and meant to replace them and mount them properly at the same time, but of course since then the amp has behaved perfectly and I can't be troubled to open it all up again.