funkle

So you all likely know my propensity to modify or tweak what I buy. This thread follows my tendency in that... I recent years, I have found that a lot more is about the player than the instrument (to a large degree, anyway), so I might as well buy a cheaper instrument and tweak it to my liking than hack up an expensive bass. Though I do own expensive instruments, increasingly I am getting a lot of joy from cheaper ones. Now. I became quite entranced with the sound of the Stingray in my youth, but always found they sounded worse in my hands than in someone else's. At least, until I spent about 6 months working on my right hand technique a while back. I bought and sold 5-6 Stingrays for this reason. Now, I am happy with how they sound when I play them, but it turns out I really dislike the 3EQ versions, and eventually I realised the sounds I liked best were 'older' Stingrays. I also favour Jazz width necks over Stingray or Precision necks; getting an SLO Special Stingray looks a very expensive affair. Not to be mean, but I happen to think Stingrays are mostly a one trick pony, and I can't face stumping up huge amounts of money for that, much as I like them now. So the goal became getting 'the sound' without forking out for a Stingray Classic or a vintage Stingray. So, in many ways, a Ray4 fit the bill. I bought a Ray4 a year and a half ago - the videos by JuliaPlaysBass on Youtube giving me confidence in doing so. It got about 80-90% of the way to the sound I wanted, and I played it stock for about a year. Good value for money, although I did get the frets levelled and get a new nut installed. (The original nut needed filing down to be properly playable, which I did at home, but a proper fret level by a luthier made the instrument feel just great to play). Eventually, I replaced the tuners with an old set of Hipshot Licensed Ultralites I had lying around, because the original tuners were not that great, and it felt like I was invested in the instrument after a while. That was a nice upgrade. I had to shim the Ultralite tuners to fit the holes, but it was worthwhile. I just used electrical tape, worked fine. I quite like the very practical ethic of not filling the old tuner screw holes, gives a kind of industrial look. So. As I continued to play the instrument, I realised I wouldn't mind putting more into it, as it had taken on something more personal to me. I did a lot of research using Low End Lobsters series on modding his Ray4s (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrGKPGOKp9M and the Mold Smoothie Project https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRkzMzjkD58) and ended up purchasing the John East 2 band MMSR EQ (without plate to make it cheaper) and the Aguilar AG4M. That got me 'the sound' plus a bit more, as the EQ has a slightly bigger range than the original. The install was easy - John's products are brilliant in my opinion - but I got a bit of hum out of the Aguilar, which I did not expect. I ended up shielding the pickup cavity, which seemed to do the trick. I do have a fairly electrically noisy household, so it's good at picking up issues like this. The Aguilar is a 'vintage style' Stingray pickup, so perhaps it wasn't surprising to get some vintage aspects to it, lol. So, now I had the sound. However.....the bridge had been a subtle annoyance to me that I tolerated for a long time, because the instrument was inexpensive, but replacing the bridge felt a bit wasteful to me. It's a perfectly good bridge, and I have never found the magic in a bridge change that many people talk about, though I have swapped plenty in my time. Eventually, I realised that I could try to fit an old Stingray mute set on there, which would allow some flexibility if I desired it, and also look a lot better. Bass Direct sells them for £28 shipped...so, I bought a set. Turns out, the long metal plates of the mutes fit perfectly under the existing Ray4 bridge without having to modify the bridge or bass in any way. Sweet. I spent a long time looking for inserts to put into the wood under the bridge for the mute screws to fit into, but I could not find a supplier here or in the USA for the right size. Strange, but there it is. I bought a few of different sizes just to try them, but the screws never worked right in them - either too small or too large. I dug out old pics of vintage Stingrays with the bridges and hardware removed, and it turned out that it looked like those screws simply went directly into the wood, not an insert. I also messaged Low End Lobster to ask him if that is what he had done with his bass, and he said he simply screwed them directly into the wood as well, and it worked fine. So, one 4mm drill bit and a lot of measuring later, this is how it ended up... It's not perfect - the hole I drilled for the screw through the bridge under the G string was 1mm off where I wanted it to go, even though I used a centre punch - but it looks right, and furthermore, the mutes are totally useable and the sound is very cool. Even with some candle wax to lubricate the screws when I screwed them in to the bass, they are a slow turn, so it's not instant adjustability, but a minute or two will allow me to return it to the 'non-muted' sound. The finished article. I need no more mods. This has been a real labour of love, over a long period of time, and I am really happy with it. It's cheaper than any of the options I might otherwise have had to consider given my requisites, but it's difficult to recommend it if you're not as picky about necks/EQ etc as I am. A secondhand SBMM Ray34 or similar is better value, though those don't have the forearm contour that I think is critical either. But you get the gist. I think I spent around £600 all together, and it looks and sounds great. This is now, finally, my 'Stingray'. Pete

I had thought about a contrast stripe. What a great idea, though, to start with the butt joint and then cover it if needed. I'm waiting on 4 testers of colour swatches now to arrive, so I can figure out which one to use. I'm going to wrap an old Fender HM Bass I picked up in a 3M colour - choice of carbon fibre, gloss deep blue metallic, gloss flip psychedelic, or gloss charcoal metallic. Carbon fibre might be too much of a challenge, but I want to see what it looks like anyway.

Ah, you are a star, thanks for that. That’s about where I planned to try the butt joint. However the belly contour on the upper part of the bass is a challenge. I might opt for the overlap after all.

Where did the overlap land on the back? Beyond the line of the belly contour, or even further in than that?

Very cool wraps guys! @Adee is that wrap front and back?

Oh, and I think a gloss pattern is both cheapest and easiest to get hold of. 3M looks like a clear winner in this arena. Can get 1m x 1.5m for £25-£30. So much cheaper than a refinish...

Great answer! Thank you. I was going to use knifeless tape to create a butt joint along the sides of the instrument. Hopefully not a high wear area. There’s a great video on how to do a good butt joint with 3 line knifeless tape - probably use this technique to get a perfect butt joint. It would be easy enough to lay another 3 line tape to mask off the butt joint, remove the centre filament and tape, and then use nail varnish in that perfect line to seal it.

Is it possible to do a non-overlapping seam along the side, using e.g. 3M knifeless tape? Or does there always have to be an overlap to prevent peeling at the edges if there is a seam at the side? I've seen some impressive butt joints using vinyl but wasn't sure if the butt joint then had to be covered over.

I’m contemplating trying this technique on a bass with 3M vinyl wrap. I plan to either make a butt joint at the sides of the bass, or overlap the front slightly on to the back after doing the rear of the bass first. Does anyone know...if I create a butt joint on the side of the bass using the 3M knife less tape, can I leave the join uncovered, or is it better or have an overlap?

Thanks @PlungerModerno for linking to my thread. My investigations are obviously ongoing, lol. Reverse P sounds quite different to me at the bridge position. I tried it ‘usual orientation’ there first and did not like what it did to the D/G strings. So I had to modify. Reverse P sounds quite different to me at neck position as well, though my goal for the project bass I’m working on is currently to keep the ‘usual’ orientation at the neck position. In have other PJ basses I have taken detailed measurements from in that thread as well. I am reasonably convinced that pickup positioning is absolutely critical, in addition to the orientation, pickup type, etc.

Ooh, very interesting, yes, if that is the SPB-3, I had been waiting for one of those to pop up secondhand to see if it worked at the bridge. I’ll PM you

Ok, long time since last post, but I’ve been doing a reasonable amount of experimenting. First thing to say, I definitely prefer a reversed bridge P pickup. It’s not quite as pretty as it was to start off with, but this set-up lets me flip the pickups back around should I wish to. So far, I don’t wish to. I contemplated shifting the bridge pickup up further towards the neck one, but it eats into the pickguard. I have had a lot of learnings from this project, and I will share them, so others do not make my mistakes. I ended up not liking the DiMarzios for this. I am still experimenting with pickups as I slowly accumulate secondhand stuff from the marketplace, but so far I really like the Seymour Duncan SPB-1 at the front, and a Kent Armstrong Hot Precision PBE-1 ceramic (enclosed) at the rear position. Similar pickup resistances and easy to balance outputs. I will see what else comes up in the marketplace and continue my footering, for now. Main takeaway is that the mid scoop/bass boost that comes with both pickups fully on, changes quite drastically with the pickups installed. Not surprising. It really it not terribly predictable, though, and it seems to me the best bet is to try and at least get pickups with similar resistances/outputs. Or look for people who report combinations that do well together for them already. Another lesson. A solderless loom has been absolutely invaluable. Worth paying for and no doubt about it. It just makes the process so much easier. However, I did make errors here. My mistakes here were two fold. One, the dual V/T setup is largely pointless. Either tone affects both pickups when the pickups are fully on, fun but not necessary. V/V/T is cheaper and simpler and would still give me exactly what I want. Two, having 4 x 250k pots in a passive circuit dulls the high end, absolutely no doubt, and you can’t EQ it back in. I would go for a V/V/T, possibly 500k, if I were to buy again, though one less potentiometer would brighten up the circuit and I could probably get away with 250k in that circumstance. Another thought. The series/parallel switch is nice but not essential. It’s a very fun ‘voice’ to play with on the bass though. I’m waiting to see if another Seymour Duncan SPB-1 comes up secondhand in the classifieds. Might snag it and experiment if it does. I’ll have to have a Precision bass pickup clear out in not too long. It is now clear to me why Precision basses with dual pickups (P-J, P-MM, P-P) often move the front pickup to another location. Yes, even a few mm seems to me to be a key change.....A single P pickup bass in the classic spot gives a really beautifully rounded and complete sound. It is really easy to subtract too much away from that sound with a second pickup and the midrange phase cancellation that goes with that. It’s really hard to get the dual P setup right, the results are just difficult to predict. Knowing what I know now, I’m not sure I would undertake this experiment again, although it has been fun and I am continuing it. I would probably just stick to a PJ bass, or any multi-pickup P bass where someone else had done the research and built it already. It’s a very tricky business to do it right.

Just bought a Seymour Duncan SPB1 pickup from Ash. Easy transaction, arrived quickly, good communications. Installed already and sounds great. Brilliant! Thanks. Pete

Just sold Andy some Hipshot Tuners, the transaction was painless and good communications throughout. A pleasure. Deal with in good confidence! Pete

I think you do suffer faster fret wear. But if I can keep a bass that long, I’ll pay up for the refret.

Sold some EMG pickups to Chris - painless transaction. I have no problem in recommending dealing with him! Pete

The biggest problem I’m looking at now is I have 8 basses and might want steels on all of them 😂 Anyone have a good supplier for D’Addario?

I never realised how much I didn’t like the mids on nickels. How odd. I mean, they have a place, but, I really do prefer the sound of these steels. D’Addario wins my favourite string brand as well.