New guy with some build advice

[Peatbog]

Good morning,

I've been a lurker for a while, and thought I'd sign up to ask a bit of advice. Hope that's okay?

Long story short, I'm having a crack at building my own 5-string. I got a peavey neck, and got the body made on a CNC machine.
The body is beech, which I gather isn't a typical choice...but there was a lot of it at work and I could get it for free.
My lovely wife gifted me a 5-string hipshop bridge, and a pair of Kent Armstrong Claymore pickups.

I'm at the point where it's all together for testing, before I gut it and think about prettying it up, and I've got a couple of questions about the electronics.
I've gone for a 2 Volume, 1 tone, passive setup. Wired the pups in series (or tried to).
This is my first real soldering job, so I've probably a couple of things wrong:

1. Whilst I really like the tone of the bass when it's plugged in, I can't hear any difference (apart from a volume difference, depending on the pot position) between the two pickups. I'm wondering if it's a wiring mistake, or if I've just positioned the pickups badly. Though one is specified neck and the other bridge, so I would expect (perhaps wrongly?) a different sound from them even in the same position.

2. No matter how far I turn the volume pots down I am always getting a signal through.

I apologise for my crap soldering. I know it's probably offensive to look at

Cheers for your time,

Pete.

[attachment=228182:bass.JPG]
[attachment=228184:bass6.JPG]
[attachment=228187:bass9.JPG]
[attachment=228186:bass8.JPG]

[ahpook]

Firstly, welcome to the forum !

Good choice on the Claymores, Kent Armstrong do make rather good pickups. I put Claymore in a friend's bass and it sounded great.

The two problems you're having sound related. May I suggest you gently tap the top of the pickup covers with something metallic with the bass plugged in and see if you can hear the tapping on both or just one pickup, and see if the controls make any difference at all.

I like the body shape btw

Edited September 18, 2016 by ahpook

[HowieBass]

I don't know what schematic/instructions you've followed for your wiring but you should only have a capacitor on the tone pot. Have a look at this


Are you planning on fitting pickup surrounds to hide the gaps between rout and pickup? Probably worth using conductive paint or copper shielding tape in all the body cavities too.

[Peatbog]

Cheers for the welcome, and the fast replies.

@ahpook - Tapping on the pickups with various metallic items (keys, screwdrivers etc.) seems to cause more of a sound from the bridge pickup, specifically at the B string end of the pickup. I'll be honest though, I'm not dead certain what I'm listening for. The body shape is just a jazz really. Expanded at the pocket to fit the five-string neck, and then biggered a little bit all round, but thanks.

@HowieBass - I wired this up a while ago, and can't find the material I worked from. What I do remember is that I used a few sources - probably too many. Your diagram looks much cleaner than what I recall. And yes, the plan is to make some nice veneer surrounds for the pickups at work (probably also a bit of veneer decor beneath the bridge to hide the "oh sh*t I can't get the intonation right with the bridge there" holes) and to shield the cavities. I've been holding off on such jobs thus far, as I've been expecting to make a terminal mistake and have to make a whole new body.

It's been a fun learning experience, and I figure if it all goes wrong then I can reuse the pickups and the bridge in another project.

Edited September 18, 2016 by Peatbog

[HowieBass]

What that Jazz bass wiring schematic doesn't include is your toggle switch - were you intending to use it to switch between pickups as neck/neck+bridge/bridge? You obviously don't need a toggle selector with a VVT passive design.

[Peatbog]

Yes that was my intent with the switch. This was because I've got two other passive VVT basses, one with a switch and one without, and I prefer the switched one.

I understand that you could call the switch redundant...I guess I'm just used to having it there.

Edit: Also, apologies for the typo in the topic title. I only just noticed it, and it's perhaps misleading. My bad.

Edited September 18, 2016 by Peatbog

[Norris]

Hi and welcome. Nice bass!

How did you find the beech to work with and what's the weight like? As you say it's an uncommon wood to use for guitars, but you can't complain at the price!

[Peatbog]

Beech tends to be fairly co-operative in being worked...for a hardwood of relatively low cost.

It is definitely heavier than I'd like, though. Gonna need a big fat strap.