Looking to Upgrade the pickups in my EPI Thunderbird Goth

[spud19870]

Hi guys, I have owned one of these for a fair while http://www.dv247.com/guitars/epiphone-thunderbird-iv-goth-bass--37231?gclid=CJKjof-albYCFeXLtAodTEkAIg

I am looking to replace the pick-ups to something better but struggling to find anything, maybe I am looking in the wrong places.

Any Suggestions? I would be running it with an ABM EVOII 500 and my Ampeg HLF410

Cheers

[BigRedX]

The best Thunderbird pickups you can buy are:

[url=http://www.bassdirect.co.uk/bass_guitar_specialists/Lull_pickups.html]Mike Lull T-Bass Pickups[/url]

[url=http://www.thunderbuckerranch.com]Thunderbuckers[/url]

[url=http://www.lollarguitars.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=270]Lollar Thunderbird Pickups[/url]

However even the cheapest set will cost more than the price of the bass...

[spud19870]

I have had the bass quite a long time and can't really afford to buy myself a new bass which is passive. So this is the next best idea

[geoffbyrne]

Might be more effective to put some kind of pre-amp in it.

G.

[BigRedX]

How will putting a pre-amp in make it any better?

The OP already has an amp with fairly sophisticated tone-shaping capabilities. I can't see any pre-amp bettering those.

[chris_b]

If the OP is convinced that a change is essential, I'd suggest it would be better to leave the bass alone and buy an outboard pre amp.

[BigRedX]

I still don't see how adding any kind of pre-amp on-board or external is going to give the OP more than the controls on his amp already do.

[spud19870]

Im just doing a bit of research Haha. Im not against a outboard pre-amp.

Suggestions to either are welcome

[bassmachine2112]

Cheap as chips upgrade time
Behringer bdi21 pre amp-DI box all in one
Get one s/h nice and cheap,if you don,t like it-sell it on
Lots of happy users on here
Works for all basses even active ones.
If you like what it does you can upgrade to hartke vxl,sansamp,line 6 and A N other plenty of choice.

[iiipopes]

EMG makes a reasonably priced passive T-bird replacement pickup in their HZ pickup line. I have a pair of the soapbar 40 HZ pickups in my 5-string, a pickup in the same family of pickups, and in my opinion they are well worth the money with good expanded frequency response and presence.