shoulderpet

One of those massive bridges that are used on the old Mustang basses might work as those bridges are huge and there alway seems to be a lot of room to move the saddles forward

Ok so after having a number of issues with the Artec preamp and there being a brightness to the stock preamp that I have been unable to dial out I have decidstock.i have decided to go completely passive. I now have the Duncan SPB-2 p pickup with the stock j pickup 2 volumes,1 tone and a switch that switches the p pickup from series to parallel, I didn't go with both pickups in series as the SPB-2 is a very hot pickup so both in series would likely be very muddy sounding. I have to say after disliking the stock preamp this is a 100% improvement, the excessive brightness is gone, the pickups sound full and balanced, the p pickup on its own sounds super fat and due to the heavy wind of the p pickup it doesn't sound thin in parallel mode like most p pickups anh both pickups in parallel mode and both on it sounds quite jazz bass-esq

What you could do if you like the strings otherwise is get a set of the 110-50 Roto flats and a single Rotosound 0.35 flat, discard the 110 and string the bass 95-35

Ok so got it back and it seems the person I spoke to was not the person that worked on it and the mid frequency sweep is not working, the mid boost/cut also seems woefully underpowered, they have had a look and they reckon the preamp is faulty. I have decided that after not liking the stock preamp and having issues with the Artec that I will go passive for now with vol, vol, tone, series/parallel , the P pickup I have in there at the moment is very heavily overwound (22k) so I am going to go for a series/parallel that converts the P pickup to parallel mode as I think putting a super hot pickup is series with the J pickup is just going to end up with unusable mud

Some Sure basses have 20mm spacing, I know the short scale Marcus Miller bass has, might be worth seeing what they use and seeing if you can score one , maybe used

And after speaking to the supplier of the preamp and sending them a photo of the wiring they think that the tech has wired it up wrong, I have forwarded a diagram to the tech, tech has had a look at it and has said that this is fixed now so fingers crossed

Ok so I have got the bass back from the tech and the Artec preamp is faulty bass and treble function as you would expect, the mid pot has no sweep at all and full on sounds very bright, rolled back at all is like a dub bass tone, like a really extreme treble cut, very dissapointed to be out not only the cost of the preamp but also the cost of the labour in fitting what is a faulty preamp Seriously considering going passive with volume,blend, tone, tone setup

Have been on the lookout for somewhere that I can get a Mezzo pickguard from but no joy so far, would like to swap my existing pickguard for a black one, anyone know any place that sells them?

I have been half considering doing the same thing, if I went ahead I would probably go with Seymour Duncan as I remember seeing one that looked quite mid focused. The other thing I was half considering was adding a 2nd bridge pickup and wiring it in series with the existing bridge pickup

Some people have mentioned triggers broom but I say that if you got yourself a decent bass for a modest amount of cash then good for you, most of those people are probably the same ones that will buy a £200 Squier and spend another £200 modding it. Got to say, I love the bridge on that bass

Wow that is nice, very tempting at that price

I would buy 2 or 3 different sets used and try them and sell on the set that you don't use. Another option is a series/parallel switch, that should get you some extra mids

I have tried the Rotosound medium scale strings but they are not very good, lots of strange overtones and really odd gauges, I use the long scale Rotos now and cut them down, works fine

The feedback on the preamps seems to be solid and looking forward to having a midrange control, the stock Ibanez preamp seems to have a big scoop in the low mids and a huge boost in the treble so will be good to have a 3 band preamp

And I have an Artec se3pa 3 band eq on the way,seesm to be regarded favourably and , I figured that it certainly can't be any worse than the stock preamp with its ear piercing treble

Anyone else here find the treble eq on their Mezzo somewhat excessive? I have a Duncan SPB-2 in mine and I still have the treble rolled off

Thats actually a pretty good idea , after all if you have a customer scratchplate done you can always keep the old scratchplate and return it to its stock pickup configuration if you change your mind or decide to sell

I kind of like that more forward placement of the J pickup, is in a position where you could probably add a big fat MM style pickup and get a half decent tone from it, I agree that it is underpowered though, I am thinking of swapping it out for a Duncan SJB-2 to try and counter that P/J both pickups on scoop and add a bit more balls, was thinking of adding the SJB-2 and doing series/parallel but the SPB-2 I have in there is already 22k and the SJB-2 is around 16k so would probably be mud city with both in series

Yeah I was half considering that myself as I pretty much always find bridge J pickups a bit weak sounding and when mixed with a neck pickup they are usually a bit too scooped at would be nice to have a pickup in that position that I can solo that doesn't sound really weedy

Imo the two things that benefit from upgrading on this bass are the preamp and the J pickup, the J pickup is kind of pingy sounding to me, I have heard it is wound to only about 4k DC resistance which is probably why, I have upgraded the P pickup and the J will probably be my next upgrade. Worth noting though that I am not typically a fan of bridge pickups on pj basses

Aaaaand I spoke too soon, seems the new string zing lasts longer than most strings, then poof the high mids and treble dissapear, nevermind

I cant help you with any in depth technical info but on the 2 pickup Hofner's the bass On position switches off the bridge pickup but also engages a capacitor that rolls off the treble, the Treble slider in the On position switches off the neck pickup and engage a bass cut capacitor, I imagine on the one pickup basses it engages the above capacitors just without switching off pickup(s)

Funny enough I have switched to Rotosound swing bass nickels, I wanted a bit more mids so switched to nickel but honestly these are just great strings, really surprised just how much I like these, lots of midrange growl, quite aggressive sounding

Yep

What about practice at home? If I can't use a bass for home practice then it's not much use to me