Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Mike McDonnell on July 11, 2012 at 3:10am

Your builds confirm you as a craftsman.  Ever check out guitarfetish.com for pickups?  Solid quality.  BTW I'm not associated with them, just a very satisfied customer.

Permalink Reply by Glenn Reither on July 11, 2012 at 5:21am

Too kind. I've since added the cheap p bass humbuckers and it sounds great.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r436LQw5Ma8&list=UUaj91dAbWESE2T...

Permalink Reply by eK on July 24, 2012 at 10:29am

Suggest D-G tuning. That would give a nice useful low D which is always a popular note. Especially in rock. A-D would also work out well for me. But I think the style of music and the preferred keys he plays in should best dictate that. For spacing I'd stick close to standard bass string spacing on a 4 or 5-string. Most bass players have a definite preference about that, so I'd ask what his favorite or main instrument is and copy the string spacing off of that.

Also, the low E string is used as a thumb "anchor point" by many bass players. So put a small hump or rail on the body of the bass about a string space or so away from the low string. This gives him something to hook his thumb on in case he doesn't play with a "floating" hand. Run it between the neck and the bridge becaise many bass players mover their hand up and down the length of the plucking area to get different tones out of their instrument.

Godin used to do this on their A4 basses (see below), and of which I am the proud owner of an earlier fretless version that uses the same design BTW. :-))

For piezo I'd go with a good quality element rather than just any old alarm element type. And put in a decent preamp to control it. Ideally 3-band. Piezos sound really harsh (crappy?) on a bass without a good (and not too red hot) preamp.

They also sound best mixed with a regular mag pup AFAIC. By themselves they sound a little nasal . Even on my Godin, which has a top notch onboard preamp, I find myself wishing it had a regular mag pup I could mix in to get a more versatile sound. Despite playing with a light touch I still have to push the treble almost all the way down, keep the mids just a bit on (about 1) and the bass at about 30-60% - and all that with the preamp volume down around 2 to get a workable sound. Push it up above that and I get honks and thumps and clanks galore. I love the thing. But it's a real challenge at times for me to play it and get a controllable sound.

So do your customer a favor and put a passive mag pup on it too.

Just my tuppence anyway. :-)

Permalink Reply by Glenn Reither on July 24, 2012 at 1:33pm

Thanks for the tips. It's nearly finished. It will have a couple of P Bass humbuckers in it and same piezo/preamp setup as the Book Bass. Although now that I have the magpups in the Book Bass, putting a piezo in seems redundant. He wants it very dubby anyway. Might not put the piezo in.

String spacing is a bit tricky on a 2 string because you don't want the neck so thin it feels like a broomstick. I ended up making the spacing quite wide (16mm). It's fine because he plays double bass too and that is WIDE string spacing. And it's a 29" short scale so it isn't too hard to get around.

He sent me E and A shortscale flatwound strings.

Yeah, I put a rail on (same as Book Bass).

cheers

g

Permalink Reply by eK on July 24, 2012 at 3:09pm

Didn't want to say this earlier since you're the builder, but now that you brought it up I'd suggest dropping the piezo too. IMHO they don't add all that much to the bass sound. Especially during a live performance on stage. And if he ever does need a more "acoustic" sound in the studio, they can always close mike it and mix that signal in with the pickup signal on the board. Again just my 2 cents - and worth exactly that much. :-))

Don't forget to post a video or sound file when it's done. I'm always interested in anything bass.

Best,

-ed

Permalink Reply by Glenn Reither on July 24, 2012 at 4:41pm

Yeah, eK. You can hear the piezo, then the magpups, in action in the Book Bass here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r436LQw5Ma8&list=UUaj91dAbWESE2T...

The piezo isn't too bad. Pretty flat on the preamp, just wound some treble off. But the humbuckers are much better. As you know, playing the piezo sound is very demanding because it picks up so much fret, neck and box noise. This is a disc installed the way I always do them. I tried a rod under the saddle but it didn't sound as good. No blend pot, just a switch. There is really no point in blending them, just select the quirky piezo or the solid magpup sound and there's heaps of variation in your right hand anyway, plus the tone pot and preamp eq.

Permalink Reply by Glenn Reither on July 30, 2012 at 11:18pm

OK, all done. Here's a demo. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64dRbc7Ka9E&list=UUaj91dAbWESE2T...