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J/P/MM Pickup positioning


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I've been pondering my own custom bass for a while, and I'd always thought that I wanted to mix a P-bass pickup with a Stingray pickup. With never being able to compare a Precision and StingRay side-by-side, I have no idea whether the pickups overlap at all.

So does anybody have any diagrams at all that compares the different pickup spacing - i.e. Jazz vs Precision vs StingRay? I just want to understand what the art of the possible is!

Cheers

Mark

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I've not got any diagrams, but I think there are some previous threads on here.

In short, if you put a MM pickup where it is on a Stingray and a P pickup where it is on a Precision they will overlap.

On MM / P hybrids like the Sandbergs the MM pickup is nearer the bridge than on a Stingray, which does affect the sound IMO.

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There's a link to a thread on Talkbass, one of many, about doing just this.
Some have got around it by routing the p bass pickup out in reverse if you know what I mean, like it is on a Yamaha BB bass

[url="http://www.talkbass.com/forum/f8/anyone-have-warmoth-p-bass-mm-pickup-sweet-spot-511322/"]http://www.talkbass.com/forum/f8/anyone-have-warmoth-p-bass-mm-pickup-sweet-spot-511322/[/url]

There's also ths link, with pics!, from these very pages. This includes the lovely Pingray from Ou7shined

[url="http://basschat.co.uk/topic/173421-fender-precision-with-musicman-pickup-modification/"]http://basschat.co.uk/topic/173421-fender-precision-with-musicman-pickup-modification/[/url]

good luck with your project and keep us all posted

Harry

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A single coil early '50's P-bass is in the 5th harmonic position. A J-bass neck pickup is between the 5th and 6th harmonic position. The E-A segment of a dual P-bass pickup is in the 6th harmonic position. the D-G segment of a dual P-bass pickup is in the 7th harmonic position. A Rickenbacker neck pickup in the "1/2" inch position (right next to the neck, old 4001) is just north of the 2nd harmonic position. A Rickenbacker neck pickup on a 4003 in the "1-inch" position is in the 2nd harmonic position. A Rickenbacker bridge pickup is in the 8th harmonic position. A 60's J-bass bridge pickup is 1/16 scale length harmonic position. A '70's J-bass is just a hair towards the bridge from the same position. A Stingray pickup is so broad, the poles traverse between several harmonic positions, kind of like if it was nestled between J-bass pickups. A Gibson EB-3 bridge pickup is shoved up against the neck north of the 2nd harmonic position. (I don't know where the bridge pickup is, proportionally).

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Ever seen the Fender Breadboard bass? It's just that... A neck and bridge screwed to a flat rectangle of wood (right scale length, of course) Pick -ups were then screwed or nailed into place to see how they worked in various locations. Once they were right, the measurements were transferred to the production prototypes..
Might be worth a go if you want to experiment...

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