Variax Bass Electronics in a Non Variax Bass

[barlemniscate]

So I've been eyeing the Variax bass for a while now, and, while I love the versatility, I have a jazz bass that I would prefer to keep its spot as my number one.

So, my question is this - how do I get all this into my jazz bass? Could I just get a piezo bridge and do some fancy wiring things - or do I have to suck it up and spend a bunch of money on one just to gut it, and have a luthier do all the routing necessary to install it into my bass? I don't want to spend a whole bunch of money, but I will if I have to.

I also want to be able to switch between the pickups and the Variax system, just so I have a backup in case my battery runs out or something.

Thanks!

 

 

Edited May 10, 2020 by barlemniscate

[therealting]

You’d have to gut both basses and transplant it over. Warmoth actually used to make guitar bodies designed for this, and there were loads of guitarists doing this back in the day. It’s quite the operation to do otherwise.

I’ve actually owned a Strat that had been modified as a Variax transplant.

Edited May 10, 2020 by therealting

[therealting]

Another popular current option is to take a Variax with a Strat-compatible body, and put a neck you like on it. Again I don’t know what the body fit is like.

Personally I think you’re better off having two basses, one a Variax. 

[songofthewind]

James Tyler made Strat types that were hybrid Variax equipped. Might be some stuff on the internet about his implementation.

[Woodinblack]

The only bit you need is the variax bridge and enough room for all the electronics (which won't be small). If you used your own piezo bridge you would need to do your own impedance matching, or need a separate preamp which would be a bit awkward (a friend did it for a Roland gr system)

[Skybone]

And good luck finding a Variax bass (unless you already own one). They weren't very popular at the time, and were discontinued quite quickly.

Why not get a cheap Jazz, like a Squier or some other Jazz-a-like, and do the conversion to that instead of your main Jazz?

Or just get the Variax and use that?

[pete.young]

You can probably find a used Roland V-Bass for about the same money, and a VB99 for not much more. You can attach the Roland pickup to your jazz with some tape so removing it is entirely reversable.

[prowla]

4 hours ago, therealting said:

Another popular current option is to take a Variax with a Strat-compatible body, and put a neck you like on it. Again I don’t know what the body fit is like.

Personally I think you’re better off having two basses, one a Variax. 

I bought a Variax guitar and the seller had replaced the neck with a cheapie because it had warped.

I didn't think much of the replacement neck and I put a Squier one on it (just an Affinity one - they are surprisingly good, for pocket money) and it fitted fine.

I did toy with the idea of transplanting the Variax gubbins to another guitar, but it looked like a lot of effort.

Edited May 10, 2020 by prowla

[NoirBass]

Just to chip in on this as I own both the Variax bass and the VB-99 system:

Firstly, the Youtube video posted above is the most flattering demo I've ever seen of the abilities of the Variax bass. Whilst I don't deny that what you see in the video is possible it'll take a monumental amount of tweaking to get it. Line 6 rather left the Variax bass behind when they went to the POD HD and so you miss out on all the really cool workbench stuff. The Variax bass is a clunky, ungainly instrument too and really heavy!

The VB-99 for me is the better option and has all the customisation you'll ever need. With a GK pickup it would will work nicely with you existing bass and you can blend the direct bass signal. I'd have to agree with the previous posts that for the amount of money you'll end up spending on transplanting a Variax, you could put a GK-KIT-BG3 pickup in your bass and get either a VB-99 (good luck finding one of those!) or an SY-1000.

Either way your in for a fair bit of expense, If you're ever in North London and the lockdown has been lifted your welcome to come and have a try of both systems.

Edited May 10, 2020 by NoirBass

[BigRedX]

Surely the Roland VB system is just as obsolete as the Variax Bass? 

Don't get me wrong I've seriously looked at the VB (and the Variax Bass) several times as a possible answer to one of my band's sonic requirements, but I can't bring myself to invest in some fairly complicated technology that is no longer being supported by the manufacturer.

[NoirBass]

7 minutes ago, BigRedX said:

Surely the Roland VB system is just as obsolete as the Variax Bass? 

I totally agree, but if the original poster wants to go down the instrument modelling route these two are the only options. I'm just saying I think the antiquated Roland system is better than the antiquated Line 6 one. Both are very cumbersome in their own ways.

Everyone will be on about triggering MIDI in a minute 🙂

Edited May 10, 2020 by NoirBass

[Woodinblack]

39 minutes ago, BigRedX said:

Surely the Roland VB system is just as obsolete as the Variax Bass?

Thing is with the VB, you can pick them up cheap and all you need is the gk pickup. If your VB goes badly or you want to upgrade, roland / boss still make (have just released) gk pickup compatible systems. Variax parts are near impossible to get, so if you really like the VB and it works, get yourself the SY1000.

[uk_lefty]

I've always liked the idea of a Variax bass but when a lefty comes up on ebay they go in for silly money and never actually sell but the sellers won't take offers.

The Boss GT10B pedal has some emulators in it to make a rosewood board sound like maple and vice versa and emulate some bass types like music an and I think Rick's... However I've not used these patches so can't comment on whether they're any good! 

[NoirBass]

16 minutes ago, uk_lefty said:

The Boss GT10B pedal has some emulators in it to make a rosewood board sound like maple and vice versa and emulate some bass types like music an and I think Rick's...

These just add eq shapes and don’t really work like the modelling on the Variax and GK bass.

[LukeFRC]

15 minutes ago, NoirBass said:

These just add eq shapes and don’t really work like the modelling on the Variax and GK bass.

How complex is the modelling on them out of interest?

[NoirBass]

1 hour ago, LukeFRC said:

How complex is the modelling on them out of interest?

The piezo pickup on each string allows a profile of various instruments to be superimposed. This works really nicely with very little latency and keeping a lot of the dynamics and resonance of the modelled guitar. It all hinges on how well the profiles are taken, for example the Stingray and Rickenbacker models on the VB-99 pretty close,  you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference blindfolded. However for me the P basses on both units are a long way off.

Where the VB system really shines is that you can assign 2 separate signal paths (with 2 different modelled basses, synths, upright or "guitar"). You can then independently pitch shift or add effects to either path. The poly effects in the VB allow you to assign different effects to each string! Add to that the amount of assigns you can attach to either a footpedal or the controllers on the unit and it becomes a very powerful tool. It's a really well thought out and incredibly deep system once you start to delve, but not without its faults.

Edited May 10, 2020 by NoirBass

[LukeFRC]

11 minutes ago, NoirBass said:

The piezo pickup on each string allows a profile of various instruments to be superimposed. This works really nicely with very little latency and keeping a lot of the dynamics and resonance of the modelled guitar. It all hinges on how well the profiles are taken, for example the Stingray and Rickenbacker models on the VB-99 pretty close,  you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference blindfolded. However for me the P basses on both units are a long way off.

Where the VB system really shines is that you can assign 2 separate signal paths (with 2 different modelled basses, synths, upright or "guitar"). You can then independently pitch shift or add effects to either path. The poly effects in the VB allow you to assign different effects to each string! Add to that the amount of assigns you can attach to either a footpedal or the controllers on the unit and it becomes a very powerful tool. It's a really well thought out and incredibly deep system once you start to delve, but not without its faults.

I was wondering - you couldn’t do different effects per string but a piezo equipped bass though eq, multi band compression and/or an IR - I wonder how close you could get

[NoirBass]

Pretty close I recon, but you’d need to find instrument ir’s?

[bnt]

The Boss SY-1000 is the latest iteration of the VG/VB concept, with guitar and bass support in one box now. I would go for that rather than dig up a VB-99, if it was up to me. I’m considering one in conjunction with a 6-string bass, but not this year at least. It’s a synthesiser too:
 

 

Edited May 10, 2020 by bnt

[Owen]

I have always fancied messing with the Variax thing. I believe that in theory I could get a Variax guitar and tune the software so that the strings sound like a 5 string bass (or even add a bottom F# for extra juice). If I get hefty low frequency action I could happily live with playing a ........ guitar (snigger).

Has anyone actually done this? My GAS life is littered with great ideas which turned out not to work.

[Maude]

14 minutes ago, owen said:

I have always fancied messing with the Variax thing. I believe that in theory I could get a Variax guitar and tune the software so that the strings sound like a 5 string bass (or even add a bottom F# for extra juice). If I get hefty low frequency action I could happily live with playing a ........ guitar (snigger).

Has anyone actually done this? My GAS life is littered with great ideas which turned out not to work.

If it were possible, I think it would sound very synthetic to be honest. A guitar with an octave pedal doesn't sound like a bass, in the same way a piccolo bass doesn't sound like a guitar. Although the signal is digitally processed in a Variax, a massive amount of the core sound is retained. Changing strings makes a big difference and doesn't just get overridden by the digital processor. 

[Maude]

The above bit about piccolo bass makes no sense. 😁 A guitar with an octave down and a bass with an octave up would be the comparison. The point I was trying to make is that bass and string construction must play a big part as although a picollo bass is tuned the same pitch as a guitar, it doesn't sound like a guitar. 

[NoirBass]

Yeah, I’ve tried what was suggested above and no, it doesn’t work. You can detune a Variax guitar by about a maximum of a fourth down (Or up) on each string, any more and it just gets really warbly. Even tuning down a forth you’re going to want a good bit of drive on it to mask the pitch shifting.

[Owen]

21 minutes ago, NoirBass said:

Yeah, I’ve tried what was suggested above and no, it doesn’t work. You can detune a Variax guitar by about a maximum of a fourth down (Or up) on each string, any more and it just gets really warbly. Even tuning down a forth you’re going to want a good bit of drive on it to mask the pitch shifting.

Thanks That was the info I needed.

Like the rest of my cunning GAS plans, it was exciting while it lasted.

[EMG456]

5 hours ago, NoirBass said:

These just add eq shapes and don’t really work like the modelling on the Variax and GK bass.

 

4 hours ago, NoirBass said:

The piezo pickup on each string allows a profile of various instruments to be superimposed. This works really nicely with very little latency and keeping a lot of the dynamics and resonance of the modelled guitar. It all hinges on how well the profiles are taken, for example the Stingray and Rickenbacker models on the VB-99 pretty close,  you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference blindfolded. However for me the P basses on both units are a long way off.

Where do you get your info on suprimposed profiles @NoirBass? 

As far as I can ascertain, it *is* just eq shapes - albeit very nuanced and particular ones- applied to the output of the GK hex pickup. The modelling aspect is really the clever way that they can persuade you that you're using say a bridge pickup or a neck pickup by simply varying the eq being applied so that you hear something similar to what you might expect.

It can't supply the subtle nuances like the difference in tone when you actually pick over the pole pieces of a pickup as opposed to vaguely in that area or changing harmonic nodes on each string as you move up the fingerboard because it's all being sensed from the same spot on the string, just next to the bridge.

I like the Vbass system but I think you'd have to be quite unfussy to imagine that it could exactly replicate all the instruments it claims to.