Sims Super Quad pickups and builders who use them

[Jolltax]

I think the Sims Quad-Sim pickup system looks really cool and as I am considering buying a bass fitted accordingly I was interested in hearing forum members experiences of the pickup system. It seems almost too good to be true if it can do a good impression of precision, jazz and other basses. I found very little on Enfield basses in searching these forums.  I am also curious, if it works as well as it appears, why is it still a niche product? My guess it is that there is some kind of compromise on sound, any thoughts or experiences?

 

I am also really keen to know which builders are recommended for high quality basses which can be supplied with these pickups, I was really disappointed to see that the Enfield line of basses appear to have been discontinued, I particularly like the Enfield Avenger II. I am aware of the Bass Centre Power Basses, do you have any other recommendations?

 

Cheers

 

Jolltax

 

In the unlikely event that any readers are not aware of the pickup system, here is a good video showing how it works

 

 

Edited February 20 by Jolltax
Oops

[Beedster]

I'm selling an Enfield as I'm no longer playing electric bass. The reason you don't see many for sale is because they are THAT good, seriously, people who have them hang onto them. And yes, while pre-amp selection makes a difference, the Quads replicate Jazz, Precision, and Stingray basses perfectly, as well as offering a whole range of other options. Mine's fretless but as a Fender fit instrument you can pretty much put any aftermarket neck on it.

 

I suspect the reason they were discontinued is similar to for example the EBMM US SUB range, combination of the costs of making such good instruments plus competitive market forces etc, so often the case in audio gear. 

[AndyTravis]

Enfield (Sims) have ceased building basses…also stopped refinishing works.

 

They just do pickups and LED installation now.

 

 

[Beedster]

Here's mine BTW 

 

 

Edited February 20 by Beedster

[TheGreek]

I have the system in a custom build. Can't fault them. 

If you are in the Hertfordshire area you are welcome to come and give the bass a try.

 

[Jolltax]

9 minutes ago, Beedster said:

Here's mine BTW 

 

 

 

Looks fab, I have seen your For Sale - surely a bargain, unfortunately fretless not on my RADAR at the moment

[Jolltax]

4 minutes ago, TheGreek said:

I have the system in a custom build. Can't fault them. 

If you are in the Hertfordshire area you are welcome to come and give the bass a try.

 

 

 

 

Looks really nice, very kind offer, thank you but probably a bit far for me

[TheGreek]

You should contact Nick Smith ( @doctor_of_the_bass) who had an endorsement with Enfield and was their chief demonstrator.

Most of the YT videos you'll see are with Nick.

[EBS_freak]

Why aren't they they more popular? Because very few people change the settings on their basses that much.

 

Here's a few considerations.

 

 

A MM pickup cuts through the mix differently to a P... and a J... etc etc. Most bassists will use a bass throughout a whole gig for consistency. Is it really a deal breaker to stick with the same bass? You'll soon pee off the soundman if you are changing pickup configs all the time. And to be honest, most people find "their" sound and stick with it. I do wonder how many of these Simms pickups end up being left in the same mode once the user founds the tone most pleasing to them.

 

If recording, use a J... use a P... use a MM... whilst the Simms pickups will do a good emulation, they aren't 100% authentic... despite what people will say. Why? Pickup positioning, coil spacing (e.g. the offset of the coils in a P pickup is not represented properly) and the major factor, is that even if a coil around magnet is not engaged, the magnetic field still is... and having an influence on the resulting output from the pickup. Again, good enough maybe... and if you are jumping on a plane to a recording session, you may like to have something which gets you in the ball park (and lets face it, studios manipulate the recording sound so much, you could argue any bass in the ballpark of the tone you are hunting for will do. Its similar with coil tapping. You can switch humbuckers to single coil... they kinda single coil... but they never sound like a true single coil. But possibly "good enough" - especially in a live situation as opposed to a recording session for example.

 

It is a swiss army knife - it will do the jobs of many to a good enough standard. It kinda does everything in one package but not necessarily as good as the real McCoy. But good enough and being versatile may swing it your way. 

 

Here's some other thoughts - if you are routing a bass, you are committed to these these pickups... or may be left with some ugly looking routes if you change your mind on the pickups un the future. I would wager this is the true reason that you don't see many for sale second hand. What do you fill the gap with?

 

They aren't really stealth. Those LEDS really do stand out. This is a deal breaker for some - especially if you are type of person where the aesthetics of putting gaffa tape over the light is off limits.

 

But the concept is cool - and works to a certain extent. So if you like it, go with it. Scratch that itch and find out - you'll always be thinking about them if you dont. You may want to try them in a beater bass first though, before routing your prized bass.

 

Edited February 20 by EBS_freak

[Misdee]

Sadowsky offer something similar with their Super P and Super J pickups. The Sadowsky pickups sound very good to me and would be my first choice.

 

I have no idea which came first, the Sims or Sadowsky or how similar they are in reality, and then there's the Fishman Fluence pickups that are also similar in certain respects to these Sims. 

 

However, I am in total agreement that  versatility is of exaggerated importance. Most players just find a good sound from a bass and use it. That's what's so great about a Precision, a Jazz and a Stingray. You can find a sound on any of those basses that will sound good with any combination of fingers, pick or slap playing without having to change any settings while you are playing.

[Aidan63]

1 hour ago, Jolltax said:

 

Looks fab, I have seen your For Sale - surely a bargain, unfortunately fretless not on my RADAR at the moment

Chris will happily put a fretted neck on it for you - if you want to try these pickups this instrument is the obvious choice, if you like them and the bass you are sorted, if you like the pickups but not the instrument then at least you can commission another instrument more to your liking, if you don't like them then sell it on; it is currently a very, very good deal. I'd buy it but I can't cope beyond 30" scale length now, but if I win the lottery anytime soon I'll buy it anyway and lend it out especially to builders and modders

[Beedster]

26 minutes ago, EBS_freak said:

Why aren't they they more popular? Because very few people change the settings on their basses that much.

 

Here's a few considerations.

 

 

A MM pickup cuts through the mix differently to a P... and a J... etc etc. Most bassists will use a bass throughout a whole gig for consistency. Is it really a deal breaker to stick with the same bass? You'll soon pee off the soundman if you are changing pickup configs all the time. And to be honest, most people find "their" sound and stick with it. I do wonder how many of these Simms pickups end up being left in the same mode once the user founds the tone most pleasing to them.

 

If recording, use a J... use a P... use a MM... whilst the Simms pickups will do a good emulation, they aren't 100% authentic... despite what people will say. Why? Pickup positioning, coil spacing (e.g. the offset of the coils in a P pickup is not represented properly) and the major factor, is that even if a coil around magnet is not engaged, the magnetic field still is... and having an influence on the resulting output from the pickup. Again, good enough maybe... and if you are jumping on a plane to a recording session, you may like to have something which gets you in the ball park (and lets face it, studios manipulate the recording sound so much, you could argue any bass in the ballpark of the tone you are hunting for will do. Its similar with coil tapping. You can switch humbuckers to single coil... they kinda single coil... but they never sound like a true single coil. But possibly "good enough" - especially in a live situation as opposed to a recording session for example.

 

It is a swiss army knife - it will do the jobs of many to a good enough standard. It kinda does everything in one package but not necessarily as good as the real McCoy. But good enough and being versatile may swing it your way. 

 

Here's some other thoughts - if you are routing a bass, you are committed to these these pickups... or may be left with some ugly looking routes if you change your mind on the pickups un the future. I would wager this is the true reason that you don't see many for sale second hand. What do you fill the gap with?

 

They aren't really stealth. Those LEDS really do stand out. This is a deal breaker for some - especially if you are type of person where the aesthetics of putting gaffa tape over the light is off limits.

 

But the concept is cool - and works to a certain extent. So if you like it, go with it. Scratch that itch and find out - you'll always be thinking about them if you dont. You may want to try them in a beater bass first though, before routing your prized bass.

 

 

I get it, and a lot of that is true. But for some folks that versatility is important, not just within a single set or recording, but more commonly between them, it's bloody useful to have a single bass that can do multiple classic tones at the flick of a switch (and you can turn the lights off BTW) 👍

[Beedster]

1 minute ago, Aidan63 said:

Chris will happily put a fretted neck on it for you - if you want to try these pickups this instrument is the obvious choice, if you like them and the bass you are sorted, if you like the pickups but not the instrument then at least you can commission another instrument more to your liking, if you don't like them then sell it on; it is currently a very, very good deal. I'd buy it but I can't cope beyond 30" scale length now, but if I win the lottery anytime soon I'll buy it anyway and lend it out especially to builders and modders

Thank you @Aidan63 👍

 

Yes, I;d also happily sell the body and neck separately, both are very nice   

[EBS_freak]

4 minutes ago, Beedster said:

 

I get it, and a lot of that is true. But for some folks that versatility is important, not just within a single set or recording, but more commonly between them, it's bloody useful to have a single bass that can do multiple classic tones at the flick of a switch (and you can turn the lights off BTW) 👍

100% versatility in one bass is undoubtably the selling point.

[Cato]

I've never heard anything but high praise for Enfield basses.

 

You sometimes see them at absolute bargain prices too, presumably because Enfield are a fairly low profile boutique maker.

 

As for the Quad system?

 

I'm sure that the pickups are excellent in all configurations but a fairly large chunk of tone comes from pickup position rather than pickup type.

 

So switching from a split P configuration to a full fat Music Man type humbucker while the pickup remains in the same position probably isn't going to produce the massive difference in tone which you might expect.

 

Having said that I don't doubt that with the Quad pickups placed in the correct position they will do a spot on P/J/Ray impression on a single instrument.

 

 

[Dazed]

I’ve been tempted by these sims quad pickups for years now, the price is a bit of a hurdle but also as Cato mentioned, placement is as big a factor in the sound

they put out and having watched videos of them im not convinced enough to shell out on them. Maybe one day. 
 

To briefly touch on the stealthy-ness, I believe I read some time ago that the battery was purely for the leds and can be left unconnected, it doesn’t affect the pickup sonically. 

Edited February 20 by Dazed

[Beedster]

25 minutes ago, Dazed said:

I’ve been tempted by these sims quad pickups for years now, the price is a bit of a hurdle but also as Cato mentioned, placement is as big a factor in the sound

they put out and having watched videos of them im not convinced enough to shell out on them. Maybe one day. 
 

To briefly touch on the stealthy-ness, I believe I read some time ago that the battery was purely for the leds and can be left unconnected, it doesn’t affect the pickup sonically. 

Yep, I'm no fan of the PUP LEDs so have disconnected them as well as the neck LEDs (i.e., removed the battery), and yes, the pickups themselves are passive so require no power 

[Baloney Balderdash]

While they do look cool on paper, as other have pointed out the reason why they are not more popular is that it's niche product, basically, few people really need to be able to replicate that many different tones, plus then of course then the price, how badly do you need a single bass to be able to sound like whatever.

 

When I first started out playing bass it was all about how many pickups and switches, how many different tone I could possibly get out of a single instrument, but also by the same deduction that surely more would be better, I would end up turning everything on at once and leave it there, regardless if that actually gave me the best possible tone for what I was doing,  since I had absolutely no clue anyway.

 

Now that I know about tone, and know what I want, I try to make every instrument sound the optimal it can to me, and leave it there, not any switching around, and my favorite bass is a one single reverse P pickup configuration wired directly to the output jack socket, not even any volume or tone control.

 

Now I do realize that the amount of beginners opting for this pickup probably is limited, out of reach both in terms of general availability/exposure and because of the price, which basically limits the target audience to any bass player who does know what they are doing and who does truly want/need their instrument to be a jack of all trades, which I would think would be rather a minority.

 

I don't doubt that these pickups do actually sound killer, but they are just not what most bass players would be looking for.

 

Edited February 21 by Baloney Balderdash

[jonsebass]

This is a very interesting topic. I'm about to pull the trigger on a Bass Collection Powerhouse bass that have these pickups fitted as standard.

 

I've seen lots of demo videos of the pickups themselves (although nothing in a Bass Collection bass) and most notably Mark J Smith of Talking Bass has an Enfield with them fitted, and interestingly he DOES use the different configurations in his videos.

 

The reason for me; I'm fed up of chasing "the sound" - is it a P, a J, a P/J, MM, a J/MM or whatever of the 15 configurations the pickups offer. I must have spent (not that much money, Mrs J....) on basses to fit a sound, a genre, a feeling (GAS, you know what I mean) and well, it's been said, these don't come up for 2nd hand sale often because, it must be, of how good they are.

 

I've always played guitars at around the 2-400 mark and been happy, yeah sure, but I've never touched anything above that, even in guitar shops, and have never played a Fender, Ric, "proper" Stingray, Warwick etc. because the guitars I've had have done a job.... and yet I still chase "the sound". I'm looking to settle on a Bass, and dropping the best part of £1,000 on one, I sort of do want one that does it all, not just to save my bank account.....and my marriage, but also because of their seeming scarcity.

 

I think this thread has spurred me on through the purchase of it, and I'd be happy to provide pictures of whatever when it arrives!

[Jolltax]

2 minutes ago, jonsebass said:

This is a very interesting topic. I'm about to pull the trigger on a Bass Collection Powerhouse bass that have these pickups fitted as standard.

...

I think this thread has spurred me on through the purchase of it, and I'd be happy to provide pictures of whatever when it arrives!

 

Would love to see pictures get your feedback, perhaps a NBD thread incoming?  I too am looking at these basses as with the cessation of Enfield production they seem the only vendor currently producing basses specced with them (?), although I think I saw Robin use one in one of his custom builds  @Manton Customs

I am seeing him on Saturday and I might ask him about them then as I am sure that would also be a good option!

 

Regards

 

J

[White Cloud]

I owned an Enfield Lionheart and it was a superb instrument. Very 'Walesque' by design, although I much preferred it to my Wal playability wise. 

 

The pickup system is extremely effective and very clever indeed. That said, as has been said, I only settled on a couple of settings/tones, whilst the other gazillion went to waste. 

[Chris2112]

The Sims Super Quad pickups sort of reminded me of this video:

 

 

 

This Lakland video has always stuck in my mind because I thought it was a brave move for the brand to break away from their longstanding relationship with Bartolini to develop their own pickups and preamp. However, whilst I could see the utility in having one bass that can mimic the sound of a few classics, it doesn't do any of the sounds as well as the basses it seems to emulate (with the exception of the P bass, but really that's neither here nor there, I don't much care for the sound of a Precision anyway).

 

When I heard the Sims pickups I didn't think they sounded like anything particularly special or great. I would tend to agree with the speculation that most players will tend to find a couple of sounds they like from a bass and settle with them. Certainly for a live situation, I can't imagine many soundmen wanting a bass tone and EQ that is constantly changing at the player-side, as they'll probably just try to squash out the changes at the board if they're at all paying attention. When Mark at Talking Bass moved to his Enfield with the Super Quads in it I was struck at how much more I preferred the sound of the Ibanez SR he used to use. I tend to be a player that wants a bass to do one or two sounds really well and I use each instrument in specific situations where it'll perform well. 

 

In my own semi-related experience, I used to have an ACG with the absolutely amazing ACG EQ-01 preamp in it. The tones it could produce were just astounding but I was forever fiddling with it. A lot of the time I should have been practicing was just spent noodling and faffing around with the tone controls! These days I value something I can just plug in and get a great sound from immediately. 

 

 

[EBS_freak]

I remember those pickups - Hanson (I seem to recall from the very bowels of my memory) were the makers? In fact, I seem to recall it may have been them who even bought out Lakland!

[Eldon Tyrell]

Rudy Sarzo used to have a Spector Euro 4LX signature bass with the SimS Super Quad pickups:

 

https://www.spectorbass.com/product/euro4-lx-rudy-sarzo/ 

 

Bass Direct have a used one in stock (disclaimer: not my bass):

https://www.bassdirect.co.uk/product/spector-euro-4-lx-rudy-sarzo-blue-stain-gloss-2022-pre-owned/ 

 

 

[AndyTravis]

@Chris2112 I think Mark has since shoved the sims in his Ibanez too 😳😆