Beer of the Bass Posted January 8, 2012 Share Posted January 8, 2012 I've just tried something different with my bass wiring, and I thought I'd start a thread about it. I have a home built 5-string with Jazz pickups. When I put the bass together, I used a push-pull pot to switch the pickups between series and parallel, but found I didn't like the series sound much and never used it. I've just tried re-wiring the switch to put a 4.7nF cap in series with the bridge pickup, like the Rickenbacker "Vintage Tone Control". This cuts all of the bass and most of the mids from the bridge pickup, which is nearly unusable with the bridge pickup soloed, but does really interesting things when blending the pickups. I can run the neck pickup on 10, and as I bring up the bridge pickup, it seems to add extra highs without scooping the low-mids as much as the usual setup. With both controls on 10, it gets really bright and clanky but not thinned out in the mids. It opens up some useful sounds, especially for pick playing, and I like it better than the series/parallel switching. Has anyone else experimented with this? Obviously, anyone with a 4003 will be familiar with the idea, but it was interesting to hear the results on a very different bass. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brensabre79 Posted January 9, 2012 Share Posted January 9, 2012 Sounds interesting.. Does it sound like a Ric? I have the series mod on my Jazz but to be honest I don't use it unless I need a volume boost in a hurry and my Vol is already full - which hardly ever happens! But for a couple of Jam covers getting that Ric sound out of my Jazz would be worthy of a switching position... Do you have a diagram? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beer of the Bass Posted January 9, 2012 Author Share Posted January 9, 2012 It's kind of Ric-flavoured, but that's as far as it goes, as they're otherwise very different basses. It does provide a good snarly pick sound which is quite different from the usual mid-scooped blend sounds on a jazz though. i don't have a diagram, but it should be fairly simple to work out - the cap goes in line with the hot wire from the bridge pickup, using the switch to short across the cap in the "down" position. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rumple Posted January 9, 2012 Share Posted January 9, 2012 Sounds interesting, I had a Varitone on my Jazz 5 build but I didn't like it so I got a mate to wire in standard pots with one switches used for series/parallel, I didn't know what to do with the other switch so it's an on/off at the moment but this might be worth a try. Would different caps give variation on a theme? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beer of the Bass Posted January 9, 2012 Author Share Posted January 9, 2012 Changing the value of the cap would alter where the bass roll-off on the bridge pickup starts. I'm not sure how much useful variation different caps would provide - some experimentation would be needed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.