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Passive bass question.


jonnythenotes
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After recently going back to using a passive bass again, there is one thing I am still not sure of... All posts I read about passive pickups and there relationship with the Tone control state that you can only ' take away' signal or frequency, where as with an active bass you can 'add' to the sound of the signal..mid, top, bass etc. My bass is the Yamaha BB 2024, and the controls are a pickup select switch, volume, and a tone knob. The tone knob is graduated from 1 to 10, with 1 being low tone and 10 being high frequency.... So the question is, at what number is the start point at which you 'take away' from the tone. Is 1 the start point, or 10, which would seem logical as you are removing, or 'taking away' the higher frequencies as you move towards 1. Sorry for my ignorance, but hopefully someone will understand what I am trying to ask... Cheers

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A passive tone control is best understood as a treble cut - fully open in your example is 10, so all the frequencies make it through. As you wind it back to lower values you progressively take out the higher frequencies leaving only the lower frequencies - it's what's known as a low pass filter. The value of the capacitor that's connected to the tone pot is important as that makes a big difference to how much treble you subtract as you close the tone control.

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[url="http://www.bestbassgear.com/ebass/repair/passive-tone-controls-explained.html"]http://www.bestbassgear.com/ebass/repair/passive-tone-controls-explained.html[/url]

Does this help?

Tone control turned fully clockwise is effectively 'off' with the full treble frequencies getting to the amp. as you wind the knob anticlockwise more high frequencies are bled to ground giving a more bassy sound.

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