bloke_zero Posted November 16, 2020 Share Posted November 16, 2020 12 hours ago, customstocker said: Ive made the pickups but with different magnets Please tell us more! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
customstocker Posted December 16, 2020 Share Posted December 16, 2020 On 16/11/2020 at 10:03, bloke_zero said: Please tell us more! the Wal uses alnico 5 ferrous bar magnets which , when inserted across all 4 pole pieces, something funny happens & a layer of distortion is in play...at least in a traditional single coil . I use neodymium magnets which have a clearer output & use 1 magnet per coil = 8 altogether. Iv'e been in touch with an electronics whizz from Portugal & between us, I think we have got pretty close & now have a 1 humbucker per string model making 3 types in total. There is nothing out there like a WAL though, it's a great piece of product design. But if it's the tone you are after......... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marc S Posted December 16, 2020 Share Posted December 16, 2020 11 minutes ago, customstocker said: the Wal uses alnico 5 ferrous bar magnets which , when inserted across all 4 pole pieces, something funny happens & a layer of distortion is in play...at least in a traditional single coil . I use neodymium magnets which have a clearer output & use 1 magnet per coil = 8 altogether. Iv'e been in touch with an electronics whizz from Portugal & between us, I think we have got pretty close & now have a 1 humbucker per string model making 3 types in total. There is nothing out there like a WAL though, it's a great piece of product design. But if it's the tone you are after......... Hmmm, have you ever thought of making these pickups to order? I'm sure there are enough fans of the Wal sound on here to be willing to buy from you.... You could colour me interested for that matter Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bloke_zero Posted December 16, 2020 Share Posted December 16, 2020 14 minutes ago, customstocker said: Iv'e been in touch with an electronics whizz from Portugal LusitHand Devices? He is round the corner from me - I've just put one of his dual NFP's in a bass - sounds great! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dolis Posted December 16, 2020 Share Posted December 16, 2020 I bought My Wal from Leigh Gorman of Bow Wow Wow back in the day... long since sold when i was skint, gutted i do'nt still have that bass 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
4000 Posted December 16, 2020 Share Posted December 16, 2020 (edited) 5 hours ago, Dolis said: I bought My Wal from Leigh Gorman of Bow Wow Wow back in the day... long since sold when i was skint, gutted i do'nt still have that bass Was that the Custom he had? He told me he once had a Custom (seen at the side of the stage on some live footage) but didn’t like it as much as his passive Pro II so sold it; he said he prefers the growl of the passive ones, and of course the Pros sound a little different than the Customs anyway. Leigh’s my favourite Wal player. In fact he’s one of my favourite 3 players full stop. Strange fact, Leigh’s original cherry Wal Pro II was JG1126 IIRC. The cherry Pro II I had, IIRC, was 1162. Edited December 16, 2020 by 4000 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kiwi Posted December 17, 2020 Share Posted December 17, 2020 On 29/09/2020 at 23:27, bloke_zero said: Interesting - so Peavey bought the MIDI/fret system - I wonder what stopped production in 92? Steve never sold the rights, just a license. The license ran out. BTW, a pickup maker in Finland has started offering reproductions of the Wal multicoil design in different configurations to suit a variety of humbucker equipped basses and string spacings (15-19mm): https://www.rautiaguitars.net/multi-coil-bass-pickups.html?fbclid=IwAR1lrAqnXDSXEV9oRuoWwuiYv9dHfBb02OQKQ1GmPSPJ_hAKCqXeBWxkn1s He's been mentioned already but Lustihand Devices offer a Wal/Alembic style filter based preamp as well, low pass with shelving frequency boosts. I'm going to let him know I've posted on here and maybe he can contribute. He only has a FB page at the moment, no website as far as I can tell. Information on the preamps is available from the pickup maker's website, PDFs on some of the products are below: https://www.rautiaguitars.net/uploads/1/0/1/7/10174351/nfp_manual.pdf https://www.rautiaguitars.net/uploads/1/0/1/7/10174351/double_nfp-special_4s_document_text__2_.pdf https://www.rautiaguitars.net/uploads/1/0/1/7/10174351/double_nfp-special_56s_manual.pdf There are sound clips as well. 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dolis Posted December 17, 2020 Share Posted December 17, 2020 13 hours ago, 4000 said: Was that the Custom he had? He told me he once had a Custom (seen at the side of the stage on some live footage) but didn’t like it as much as his passive Pro II so sold it; he said he prefers the growl of the passive ones, and of course the Pros sound a little different than the Customs anyway. Leigh’s my favourite Wal player. In fact he’s one of my favourite 3 players full stop. Strange fact, Leigh’s original cherry Wal Pro II was JG1126 IIRC. The cherry Pro II I had, IIRC, was 1162. That's the one!.. Wal custom active. Met him at a party at Unicorn studios in London and we started talking bass and he said he was selling that one so i had to have it! Wow, that is a great fact :-). His playing was a big influence growing up, along with JJ Burnel., Leigh was / is a top bass player and very underestimated in Bass circles probably because Bow Wow Wow weren't really taken seriously. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
4000 Posted December 17, 2020 Share Posted December 17, 2020 20 minutes ago, Dolis said: That's the one!.. Wal custom active. Met him at a party at Unicorn studios in London and we started talking bass and he said he was selling that one so i had to have it! Wow, that is a great fact :-). His playing was a big influence growing up, along with JJ Burnel., Leigh was / is a top bass player and very underestimated in Bass circles probably because Bow Wow Wow weren't really taken seriously. He’s been a huge, huge influence on me. However whilst I loved the band from the outset, when I first went to see them live I kind of bought into the “not taking them seriously” thing and didn’t expect them to cut it live. I was sooooo wrong; they were awesome. Here’s some further info Leigh supplied me with that I once posted on Talkbass: He bought his red Wal Pro 2 (passive, not active) in the late 70s from Rhodes Music in Denmark Street. It was used on everything Bow Wow Wow did except "Tv Savage" and "Golly Golly Go Buddy" -he used his backup bass, a Wal Custom (active) on those, but he preferred his red bass and eventually sold the Custom. A while back he got another Wal the same as the red one but in sunburst with a leather scratchplate. He uses Rotosound strings, standard/medium gauge. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
4000 Posted December 17, 2020 Share Posted December 17, 2020 Leigh’s cherry Wal was apparently built for Paul Simonon: http://walbassarchive.blogspot.com/2013/04/archive-stephans-wal-database.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bloke_zero Posted December 17, 2020 Share Posted December 17, 2020 (edited) There is a blurry picture half way down here: https://walbasshistory.blogspot.com/2016/09/jg-special-pt-5-gallery-jg-basses-and.html I'd never seen him with anything but a precision before Edited December 17, 2020 by bloke_zero Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
4000 Posted December 17, 2020 Share Posted December 17, 2020 (edited) Edited December 17, 2020 by 4000 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyjevans Posted October 2 Share Posted October 2 Hi guys, I have a Wal Pro fretless passive with busted volume/tone pots. I need the schematic or at least the pot values and whether log or linear. Can anybody help? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
0175westwood29 Posted October 8 Share Posted October 8 i mean def not a clone but has multi coil turner pickups and a underhill filter preamp 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woodinblack Posted October 9 Share Posted October 9 What are the multicoil pickups like? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
0175westwood29 Posted October 9 Share Posted October 9 1 hour ago, Woodinblack said: What are the multicoil pickups like? Such a crisp top end, and tight low end with the filter pre amp it a great sounding bass Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woodinblack Posted October 9 Share Posted October 9 Sounds good - what are the pickups? I still keep wanting multicoil pickups but never getting round to it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
0175westwood29 Posted October 9 Share Posted October 9 35 minutes ago, Woodinblack said: Sounds good - what are the pickups? I still keep wanting multicoil pickups but never getting round to it! There turner uk voiced pickups 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woodinblack Posted October 9 Share Posted October 9 Sound great - they seem to be priceless on their store though! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
0175westwood29 Posted October 9 Share Posted October 9 1 hour ago, Woodinblack said: Sound great - they seem to be priceless on their store though! believe they built to order, they arent cheap my set were about £470 posted Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woodinblack Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 The preamp you have, is it designed for the 4 inputs? The £235 per pickup doesn't sound bad (especially if you only want one) but then you have to have a preamp that can take those inputs (and maybe adjust their relative levels) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
0175westwood29 Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 25 minutes ago, Woodinblack said: The preamp you have, is it designed for the 4 inputs? The £235 per pickup doesn't sound bad (especially if you only want one) but then you have to have a preamp that can take those inputs (and maybe adjust their relative levels) Yeh underhill do a version for the multi coil pickups and for regular aswell and they do it in modular so you can get what you want for one pick up basses 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bloke_zero Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 Also: https://lusithanddevices.com/product/double-nfp-special/ 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
funkle Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 I had a shot at cloning a Wal. Did a whole series of videos…. Maybe just go to my last one! 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chopthebass Posted October 18 Share Posted October 18 I also had a go at a mk3 clone, but I was more interested in the shape than mimicking the true Wal sound. But saying that, I did use Walbuckers and Lusithand preamp just out of curiosity. It’s a truly powerful bass for sure with lots of tonal variation on tap 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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