uk_lefty Posted October 13, 2013 Share Posted October 13, 2013 Apologies if this seems like a bit of an amateur question... I have a 90s MIM Fender J Bass. As much as I'd love to have an MIJ or MIA I can't justify the cost, so the MIM has had a few upgrades over the years - BadAss II Bridge, Schaller tuners, copper shielding around the pickups, handmade real bone nut, and for cosmetics a new pickguard and a pickup cover on the neck pickup. I'm now wanting to upgrade the electronics. Being a 90s J Bass both pickups are the same size so most sets of 2x J pickups won't be suitable without routing which I dont want to do... I've found the pickups I want (Fender CS 60s) So the real qestion is can I get away with buying 2x bridge pickups and installing, or will the mis-alignment of the strings and poles at the neck pickup position cause me a problem? Would I better off with a differently desgined pickup such as the Bartolinis? Part II of the question - as the pickups will be going in to a lefty bass will i need to take any other measures? I've heard some lefties needing to extend the wire length but not sure this would always be the case? Thanking you in advance... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spike Vincent Posted October 13, 2013 Share Posted October 13, 2013 I've never changed the pickups on a J but the P bass pick ups I've changed I've had no problems fitting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jimryan Posted October 13, 2013 Share Posted October 13, 2013 I'm having a similar experience with my Jazz, but both of my pickups are neck size. I got in touch with Seymour Duncan support and they've told me using two neck pickups together will work and is quite a popular option. Not sure how/if this'll help, but there ya go. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mcnach Posted October 14, 2013 Share Posted October 14, 2013 [quote name='uk_lefty' timestamp='1381672533' post='2242045'] Apologies if this seems like a bit of an amateur question... I have a 90s MIM Fender J Bass. As much as I'd love to have an MIJ or MIA I can't justify the cost, so the MIM has had a few upgrades over the years - BadAss II Bridge, Schaller tuners, copper shielding around the pickups, handmade real bone nut, and for cosmetics a new pickguard and a pickup cover on the neck pickup. I'm now wanting to upgrade the electronics. Being a 90s J Bass both pickups are the same size so most sets of 2x J pickups won't be suitable without routing which I dont want to do... I've found the pickups I want (Fender CS 60s) So the real qestion is can I get away with buying 2x bridge pickups and installing, or will the mis-alignment of the strings and poles at the neck pickup position cause me a problem? Would I better off with a differently desgined pickup such as the Bartolinis? Part II of the question - as the pickups will be going in to a lefty bass will i need to take any other measures? I've heard some lefties needing to extend the wire length but not sure this would always be the case? Thanking you in advance... [/quote] Two bridge pickups? I am pretty sure that they are both neck sized pickups... I may be wrong, but best to double check. Yes, if you get two neck (or bridge) pickups, it'll be fine. One of my favourite basses is a cheap Squier Jazz, it had two neck-sized pickups. I ended up applying (carefully) a chisel to the bridge pickup routing to expand it so that it could accept standard pickups. It's only a tiny bit extra, and with a sharp chisel and a little bit of care you can get a good result. I got too overconfident once I saw how easy it was, and managed to get a tiny chip in one corner. Barely noticeable unless you look for it, and as the bass was already pretty "reliced" it really did not matter to me. But I could have got a good result, without previous experience, just by being careful and working slowly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
uk_lefty Posted October 17, 2013 Author Share Posted October 17, 2013 Thanks for the replies! I'll take some measurements before laying any money down for new pickups! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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