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Active Onboard Preamp / Signal Booster help


NorthSands
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Hi all - bought a Gibson RD artist recently - the Moog board is long gone but in its place what appears to be some kind of preamp signal booster - the bass is still active on a 9V battery. Anyway, the bridge pickup isn't outputting the same volume as the neck (which sounds great) - only way I can hear it is to crank the amp right up - which obviously puts it out of whack with the other pickup and it sounds really thin.

Few questions then.

1. Can anyone identify this preamp booster? No markings on other than what you can see in the image below.

2. Any thoughts as to why only one of the pickups is outputting at a reasonable volume? Wiring all seems to be intact - see below.

3. Any recommendations to another preamp/signal booster that would be suitable for this bass should I need to replace it?

Cheers, Andy

[url="http://i.imgur.com/OGaJNOt.jpg"]http://i.imgur.com/OGaJNOt.jpg[/url]

[url="http://i.imgur.com/UFI7wha.jpg"]http://i.imgur.com/UFI7wha.jpg[/url]

[url="http://i.imgur.com/rWBGAwp.jpg"]http://i.imgur.com/rWBGAwp.jpg[/url]

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Ok I have had another look and it looks like you gave a 2 PUP bass with separate VT controls for each PUP.

I cannot see any wiring to the switch closest to the Jack socket but I would guess the other switch is a PUP selector, probably Neck, Neck/Bridge, Bridge.

That leads me to suspect the the pre-amp is just that. A simple pre amp. There also appears to be a switch built into the preamp. This may have some tone presets or more likely is a stepped gain control.

Hope that helps.

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Possible issues if you're sure the wiring is all complete and intact - worst case scenario is that the bridge pickup is faulty. DC resistance of an RD Artist pickup should be around 6.5kOhm according to Fly Guitars.

It could be the selector switch not making great contact in the bridge position - look to see if the contacts are being pushed together nicely by the switch arm and maybe give them a [u]little[/u] rub with fine wet n dry to brighten them up a bit.

You could fit damn near any tone shaping preamp in there you like, there's plenty room ;) You have tonnes of flexibility to use whatever pot/switch configuration you like with 6 holes to choose from...

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  • 2 months later...

Sorry for the late reply on this - bit of confusion over a double post. Thanks for the replies! Managed to source a NOS Moog board, got it cheap enough so going to have a go at refitting it. Beyond figuring out the wiring (and shorter pot shafts - it's a guitar board, so I'll have to be creative with that) I think the key is finding the right connector types to attach to the PCB. Any thoughts welcome...

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