Waz's MMB-4

[robin]

With yours, no doubt those combinations would sound a bit dark and muddy. On my fretless conversion it was done on a P Bass configuration with D'addario Chrome Flat Wounds and it sounds quite good. Maybe the single coil keeps things a bit brighter perhaps?

Oops I said round wounds I meant flat. D'addario Chromes to be exact.

I didn't take much notice but I am pretty sure the pots are 250k so after I hear it this morning I might throw in some 500k's. That should brighten it up a tad.

Loving your headstock design mate.

[Simon Barden]

If they are humbuckers, then yes, I'd go for 500k pots. Anytime you put two coils in series (rather than in parallel), the resonant peak/cutoff point of the pickup circuit becomes a lot lower, so you need a higher resistance in the pots in order to let a bit more of the higher frequencies through.

[robin]

Thanks for that Simon. I tried it out to day through my bass amp and it does sound a bit dull and lifeless. Albeit my rig just has 2x15's in a double J bin so I am sure that was not helping. I will order some 500k pots and try them out.

Cheers
rob

[Simon Barden]

Pots are a nice cheap way of trying for another sound, and you can always re-fit the old ones if you don't like the sound.

[wazkelly]

I haven't ever seen a battery box cavity made using a drill before, that's an interesting way to do it. I kind of want to try that now. I really like the headstock, as well- very MM-ish.

Forgot to mention that I did multiple parallel drill holes all the way through the middle of what was shown in that photo and in the end it came out very easily.

Yeah, head stock design was actually modeled on MM 5 string without the offset tuner. Figured that was the best way to go since it was already drilled for 4 inline tuners.

[wazkelly]

Plenty of other chores that had to be done during daylight hours today and managed to squeeze in a couple of jobs on this build after dinner tonight.

Lined up the Boomerang control plate so that all pots would fit and there was enough timber to screw down into. Even temporarily loaded the pre -amp and realised control cavity was very tight and cramped for the additional space required. Marked up the outline, pre-drilled the mounting screws, and then drilled some more small holes in a line where a chisel was required to trim a bit of meat off the sides....

Next job was to make a new output jack hole....


In the 1st shot everything was going well, except I had to stop every now and then as the timber started smoking from heat & friction. The deeper it went the spade bit was flapping about and didn't realise it was creeping slightly off center. Not too big a drama as the recessed socket fits snugly but saved plenty of sawdust and will use as filler to help re-center the hole which is only out by 2mm at most.

That is all the tricky pre-sanding work done and out of the way. A quick look over the body reveals lots of machine marks in all the usual places and will get stuck into that next weekend. In the meantime will need to wipe it down with metho to see if there are any major glue or filler spots to deal with.

[wazkelly]

Started looking into what was out there in the way of an upgrade PUP and discovered some Kent Armstrong's from USA or UK for about $90 - $100 AUD delivered which sounded pretty good value. They were 13.95k ohms and 9.35 henrys which seemed impressive until I ran the multi meter over stock kit supplied unit and it measured 12.97k ohms? Not sure how you measure henrys but for less than 1% difference in resistance I will keep that $90 in the bank until after trying this one out with the pre amp. Oh, and in split coil mode it measured about 6.5k or thereabouts and will post exact numbers when I get around to wiring it up.

[wazkelly]

Started the sanding process after work this afternoon and here it is after 1.25 hours on 80 grit...

[WeirdBits]

You need a meter than can measure iinductance = henries.

Resistance is essentially coil windings, inductance is coil plus magnet plus black magic. Both impact the 'sound' of the pickup, plus a lot of other stuff.

[Simon Barden]

But to directly compare resistance values, you need to know that the same gauge wire is being used. 42 AWG is pretty normal for pickups, but if one pickup used 44 AWG wire instead, then that could give a similar resistance reading but have less turns of wire and a lower output. Magnet strength also plays its part in determining the output level.