kristo

So the bass is now done; custom Kent Armstrong floating pickup fitted and sounding awesome. Very pleased with how it’s turned out.

I only left them on one night. 😂 Was too worried about the tension and put the Labella Black Nylon 60-115 back on which don’t feel like they are pulling as much.

I’ve been experimenting with strings on my Epiphone De Luxe Century bass and have found my preference is for Labella Flats 49-109. I’m now wondering if these might be too high a tension for the trapeze tailpiece. The bass comes stock with D’addario tapewounds which are pretty low tension, and I’m worried the tailpiece might snap at some point. Does anybody have an experience with heavy strings on an archtop bass with trapeze tailpiece that could pass on any advice please? I also play resonator guitars and have seen old Nationals with broken tailpieces so guess my concern comes from there. Cheers.

I play in an old time blues/jazz band and wanted to get a close approximation of the upright sound without having to use one. I also think an acoustic looking instrument fits better with the bands overall stage look. I've had a few over the years but settled on an acoustic guitar converted to bass by Brandoni. I liked these so much I got another when I saw one for sale. These, when fitted with decent nylon strings, give a lovely woody and thumpy tone via a magnetic pickup in the soundhole. I much preferred these to any piezo I tried, even those in Ubasses which a lot of people love. Then Epiphone released the Masterbilt Century archtop basses and my head was turned. I tried a couple in a shop, both fed back terribly and one the G string had no output. The piezos in them were awful but they played really well. Recently I picked one up after speaking to Aaron Armstrong who said he has could wind me a custom floating pickup. I've now got the pickup fitted and it's working out really well, so much so I've sold one Brandoni and the other is in the classifieds. Neither have much acoustic volume due to the nylon strings, but plugged in I get the acoustic tone I was looking for.

Just to update I now have the custom pickup from Aaron and am getting it fitted next week. Looking forward to seeing how this plays out.

That does look great. I've been speaking to UK pickup winder Aaron Armstrong who's going to put together a 'Johnny Smith' style floating pickup for me.....

There is actually quite a bit of space between the top and the strings, so the Lace might be too far away without some kind of riser.....

I would love that, but don’t really want to cut into the top.

Thanks for that. The picture at the top is deceptive, as these basses come with black nylon strings. I’m not planning to use bronze strings so the Lace might be ideal. I’ve also had contact from a pickup maker who might be able to make a floating neck pickup, which would be ace.

Thanks. I've sent them an email so will see what they say...…….. The Lace looks good. Any idea if it works with tapewound or flatwound strings, or is it designed specifically for bronze ones?