Hi,
I'll post a sequence of build photos in this thread.
The kit: Attachment 41869
Printable View
Hi,
I'll post a sequence of build photos in this thread.
The kit: Attachment 41869
Prior to purchasing the kit, I contacted Pitbull. I was interested in a factory-seconds kit, and expressed this concern:
"My concern is that the grain on the back of the neck appears to be off-centre. In my experience this causes it to twist as the seasons change."
They replied that the could not swap necks between kits, so I paid for the full price kit instead.
This is the neck that came with it:
Attachment 41870
:/
Do you think that might be a problem? or will sealing it with finish reduce the issue? I don't have any experience with this so I'm no help I'm afraid!
Yes, I've experienced problems with offset neck grain in the past, in a Samick bass. In that case I had the neck replaced after it warped. In this case, the neck is now glued in so can only cross my fingers.
Progress; Blue jeans blues finish:
Attachment 41871
looks nice!
I've got necks with similar grain patterns to the one you have, and I haven't had any issues. Also remember that the lower part of the heel is an extra glued-on piece, so will have no effect on the overall neck behaviour.
I don't know if you've read any ES-1 build diaries, but the kit is prone to coming with a too shallow neck angle, resulting in the lowest bridge height still being too high to get a good action. As you've already glued the neck on, it's rather too late to fix this at source, but there are some mitigating measures you can take if necessary.
I'd first check out what the state of play is. Get a long straight edge (a 1m metal rule is good for this) and lay it along the neck. I'd firstget the neck as straight as possible using the truss rod and then see what height you have at the bridge position. You should be able to work out the minimum height of the bridge with the posts screwed right down into the inserts, including the height of the insert lips. You can now check the height of the body to ruler gap. Ideally you'd want the straight edge hitting between maybe 1mm below saddle slots, or up to 3mm above. From here, you'll need to raise the bridge to raise the strings off the neck, maybe more, so if the ruler is anywhere between those positions, you'll be able to raise the bridge up to get a good action without it sitting too high off the body.
With the bridge at its minimum height, if the bottom of the ruler hits the bridge too far below the saddle slots, then the strings are likely to sit too far above the fretboard. This means you need to take those mitigating measures.
The first is to get some post insert bushings without a lip that sits on top, but can sit flush. This gains you maybe 1.5mm. You can file down the underside of the bridge at the ends so that the bridge sits lower on the posts. Again, a useful few mm can be gained here.
What I ended up doing on my ES-1 was getting a Göldo Lowrider bridge, which is significantly lower than the normal Nashville TOM style the kits come with.
https://www.goeldo.de/en/guitar-part...er-bridge?c=79
Göldo are the parts division of Dusenberg guitars, so they are good quality products.
That bridge only comes with Gibson-style 4mm post holes, so you'll either need some appropriate 8mm to 4mm post adapters (Göldo do some though they can be obtained elsewhere), but I used some 8mm to 4mm thread adapters I already had, and used the stock Göldo posts.
However you may have to import one from Germany. I had to in the UK, via an eBay seller.
The issue with the grain, is that the timber can have different density and strength at the center compared to the outer rings. When load is applied, one will deform more than the other, causing neck twist. When the neck expands or shrinks with temperature, it will twist. On this neck, the center of the grain is way off to the side, all the way to the headstock.
Combined with your comments on neck angle, I fear I've bought something of very poor quality. If this is an ongoing issue with this model, why haven't they adjusted their jig and fixed the problem?
You're right; the action is some 3mm too high. I did a test fit-together before gluing and failed to notice the issue.
It seems the bridge has to sit all the way down on the deck, or possibly 0.5mm lower, to achieve an acceptable action. Taking some metal off the bridge looks like a quick-fix, especially as this is an easily removed piece. Filing down the saddles also looks like a way to gain a couple of mm.
Attachment 41883
taking a little off the bottom of the bridge does look like it might solve the issue, there looks like there is plenty of material that could be removed to give the action you want.
Bit of delay due to work commitments.
Downloaded and followed the wiring diagram from the Pitbull website. MISTAKE; they fail to draw on the solder required to earth the tab on the volume pots.
I first set myself up to do the wiring on a cardboard jig, protecting the guitar from solder splash:
Attachment 41903
After double-checking I had followed the diagram, I installed all the bits, assembled the remaining parts, strung it up and tested it. FAIL: the volume knobs didn't work and I had the switch installed backwards. I'd also cut the wires too short, which made getting the parts installed even more difficult.
It's tricky as there's no rear cover; the pots, switch and jack and have to go through the f-hole. I used a length of wire to pull them into place. For the jack & tied a knot to pull it along, for the pots I tacked the wire on with superglue.
It's now complete, fully working, with neck and intonation adjusted. Nice low action, plays well.
Total build time, about 6 hours over 5 days. 4 hours sanding, painting & oiling, 2 hours wiring and assembly. The wiring would have been quicker if I didn't have to correct an error.
Attachment 41904
The whole thing was brush painted. I mixed Phalo blue acrylic paint with the Cabothane clear to create a transparent blue fade on the back, a bit like old blue jearns:
Attachment 41905
Similar on the headstock:
Attachment 41906
The back of the headstock and neck are done with Tung Oil; feels nice.
That looks great, just like denims!
Hi Tony - I'm about to use that wiring diagram. Its just the solder on the bent looking tabs on the 2 volume pots that is missing isn't it? I saw that it is shown as soldered in some different diagrams but not for this one, so that was confusing me.
Phil, yes that's correct.
After attaching the vacant tabs on the volume pots to the back of the pots with a short length of wire (earthing them), the guitar seems to have these functions:
- switch up or down; either volume knob adjusts guitar output
- switch in middle; each volume knob adjusts each pickup
- bridge tone knob, cuts some treble
- neck tone knob, no noticeable effect
Compared to a 4-knob bass I have, it seems a superior setup to have bass + treble tone knobs (different value capacitors, wired in series), one volume knob, and a fader to swap/mix the pickups. The switch is then free - it could be a coil-tap switch if the pickups allowed it. Maybe later.
From your description, there seems to be a wiring issue, probably related to the pickup selector switch, With the switch up or down, the each volume pot should only adjust the volume of its respective pickup. In the middle position, you'll get a blend of the pickups in parallel, so the volumes will still have an effect and adjust the overall tone as well as the volume.
The tone controls should be effective and dial out most of the treble and mids from each pickup. If there's a switch or switch wiring issue, than that could be a possible reason for one control not being very effective. The neck tone should work, so check that the capacitor leg that's not soldered to the back of the pot isn't touching the back of the pot.
If you can post a pic of the wiring harness, then we may be able to diagnose some issues. It does mean taking the harness out of the guitar, but it obviously isn't right so needs sorting. It may be that a wire has broken during its insertion into the guitar. It does happen.
The problem with a blend pot instead of a 3-way switch is that with humbuckers (as opposed to single coils), with the available maximum blend pot track resistance being 500k, the effective signal resistance to ground drops off so that you lose a lot of treble and the pickups sound very dull.
I'm having this very issue with my current Jazz Bass build where I'm fitting SD NY4 humbuckers (effectively two JB pickups in one unit). I'm having to fit an active buffer circuit to help mitigate this.
The normal nominal single coil volume pot resistance is 250k, and for humbuckers, 500k, though pots measuring on the higher side of those values are generally deemed to sound better.
Put in a blend pot and a master volume pot, and you end up with the output signal being connected to three resistances to ground in parallel. Even if all three resistances are 500k, the resulting equivalent resistance is 1/3 of that, so 166k. You'll loose a significant amount of treble as a result. Making the volume pot 1meg, you still only get 200k, and only slightly less treble loss. Even with the blend pot fully one way or the other, the output signal resistance path to ground remains the same.
This is the basic control circuit:
https://imagizer.imageshack.com/v2/8...923/3OTmcb.jpg
On single coils on a bass, this is less of an issue as this is closer to the nominal ideal 250k, and JB pickups are used to being heard with less treble than they can actually provide due to the standard circuit designs used.
But on a guitar with two passive humbuckers, the humbucking sound will be very disappointing indeed (unless you just play jazz with a very bassy tone). You could do it with active pickups e.g. EMGs, where the low output impedance of the active circuit isn't loaded by the lower resistance ground. But then you need a battery, which isn't the easiest of things to fit on a 335-style guitar.
Quick response; I have 2 passive Wilkinson humbuckers in a bass with the fade control, and it rocks! Very high output, bright sound that works with slap, fingers or pick. I guess my settings are close to the 10, so pot resistance is near 0. Even so, I don't think your logic on cutting treble is correct; turning the pot to increase resistance will reduce the current / volume, but not affect the frequencies of the signal.
Pic below during installation of the coil-split switches. Bit of chiselling was required to cram those massive pickups into the cheap-ass Haze bass.
Attachment 41936
On the ES-1S, I think is the capacitor value that cuts frequencies above the bassy range coming out of the neck pickup, so the difference is barely noticeable. Going for a higher value capacitor would probably sort it, though I'd change the wiring to a bass + treble control affecting both pickups output, rather than 1 tone each.
You're right though, the way my volume knobs are working is defective. Somehow they're being switched into series, possibly through the earth. I'll get it sorted later.
It's not the pot position, it's the basic way the pots are connected that affects the sound with the volume full up. The pickups have impedance, inductance and a small amount of capacitance. In conjunction with the pickup pot resistance to ground, the amp input impedance and the guitar lead capacitance, they form a resonant low-pass filter. The higher the resistance path to ground, the higher the filter peak frequency is. The lower the resistance value, the lower the filter peak is and the more treble frequencies you lose.
Passive volume controls do affect the frequency output of the signal as you turn the volume control down (especially if wired the 'modern' way with the tone pot connected to the volume pot input rather than output). Again, it's all to do with the resonant filter created by the controls. It's why people often fit treble bleed circuits across the volume controls, to mitigate against the volume loss.
But all this is with passive electronics and though your bass pickups may be passive, from what I can gather online, those Haze bases all look as if they have a battery compartment and an active preamp in them. And active preamps and tone controls are a totally different thing.
Also, those MM style pickups are normally wired in parallel, not series, so are naturally brighter wired that way compared to being wired in series.
Single coils generally have far less inductance than humbuckers, and whilst less inductance means less output, it also means a brighter sound as the resulting filter resonant peak is higher up the frequency scale, with more high frequencies being passes and the resonant peak itself boosting treble frequencies rather than mids.
Guitar humbuckers almost always prefer a higher pot resistance value. As a result, very powerful pickups with lots of winds can benefit from 1 meg pots instead of 500k, but even vintage style/output level humbuckers are generally preferred if the pot value is on the high side of the pots tolerance, in the 520-530k region for best performance for a 500k pot.
A higher value tone capacitor pot means the tone control knocks off even more treble. You need a smaller value capacitor if you want the tone control to roll off less treble. I generally use 0.015uF caps now, on both single coils and humbuckers, as I still get a useable sound (for me) with the tone control turned all the way down. But tone is a personal thing, and others still might find that too bright for them.
That top is a real stunner!Quote:
Originally Posted by tonyquoll