Unwanted custom bass for me. MMB-5

[Andyxlh]

Oh no! What's the fix plan?

[ozzbike]

Oh no! What's the fix plan?

Andy....for a start to not throw the neck across the room.

Luckily it is a bolt on....so I can continue with pickup install and bridge placement etc.

I think I will have to remove that close tuner....may try tape to pull the rest off....a little fine wet sand....a couple of coats of TRU-OIL as a base....leave for a week and then reapply the decal....wait 24hrs....and ten more light coats of TRU-OIL.

Oh well.....it will have a BEE on it....it will...really.

[wazkelly]

Bummer. Doesn't take much wet sanding to strip lots of layers of finish off and it may have been thinner than expected in that spot.

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[ozzbike]

Bummer. Doesn't take much wet sanding to strip lots of layers of finish off and it may have been thinner than expected in that spot.

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Waz,

You would not know the wiring info for the stock musicman pickup would you?

Seymour Duncan website has White, Green and Bare soldered together and going to earth unless you split. The red and the black soldered together and going to the hot connection.

The PBG musicman pickup has black on its own.....red and white soldered together...and green and bare soldered together. Can I assume that the black is earth......which is hot?.....and what do I do with the other two??? I have a preamp and I do not intend to split the pickup.....so I need to know which ones go to earth...and which ones to the hot side of the bridge pickup connection on the blend pot? Any ideas you have will be pounced upon...thanks.

I might skim your builds....I am certain somewhere...the wiring for the chinese pickups was mentioned.

[wazkelly]

Hi Ozzie, under 'wiring pickups' section on possibly 2nd or 3rd page you will find my post on how to coil split the stock humbuckers.
Black is hot, bare & green already paired are ground, with red & white also paired being the bit you disconnect for coil splitting.
To wire up just in series best to heat shrink over the exposed ends of red & white.
On the pre amp blend pot you should be able to see the earth as a wire will be running from a lug to base of the pot. There will be another connection going back to master volume and that is the hot. With 2 pickups i believe hot wires go to centre lugs on opposing sides of the blend pot and same goes for grounds.
I have something on usb with me here at work and shall send by email.
Cheers, Waz

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[ozzbike]

Hi Ozzie, under 'wiring pickups' section on possibly 2nd or 3rd page you will find my post on how to coil split the stock humbuckers.
Black is hot, bare & green already paired are ground, with red & white also paired being the bit you disconnect for coil splitting.
To wire up just in series best to heat shrink over the exposed ends of red & white.
On the pre amp blend pot you should be able to see the earth as a wire will be running from a lug to base of the pot. There will be another connection going back to master volume and that is the hot. With 2 pickups i believe hot wires go to centre lugs on opposing sides of the blend pot and same goes for grounds.
I have something on usb with me here at work and shall send by email.
Cheers, Waz

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I got your email thank you.

I wired it up using this page on PBG....

https://www.pitbullguitars.com/wp-co.../pdf/FVB-4.pdf

But I think I have put the earths to the same lug....should that matter....earth is earth?

I will have a look at that again. The blend pot has a series of lugs....and it appears that either side of the pot connects an earth to its own side.....I might do that with the pickups.....one side for the bridge pickup...and the neck on the other.

Not much movement from the centre on the blend pot to get change in sound. The pots are not smooth....and three out of four needed a spray out...scratchy.

Back to work on Monday....lots of stuff to do now.....may do intonation...neck relief and nut and bridge height over the weekend.

Have a good weekend yourself.

Very different sound. I have wired her up...fitted most things...strings are up and had a little blat.

More work to come...gotta fix my BEE.

Thanks for your help.

[wazkelly]

Looking good.
Best to have earths going to the same side of blend as the hot for that pickup rather than common point, just in case it does something weird and funky.
For example, neck hot to middle lug on top row with neck earth to pre wired earth lug on that row.
Bridge hot to middle lug on bottom row bridge earth to pre wired earth lug on that same row.

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[wazkelly]

Keen to hear how it sounds and tend to agree that just a fly spec either side of centre detent on the blend pot takes away the opposite pickup almost acting like a 3 way switch would.
Hope you get a chance to enjoy your weekend too.

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[ozzbike]

Not a huge fan....pain in the butt to fit and does not make that much difference.

I have to go to work on monday for 7 days.....so I think I will think about it whilst I am away.

But...I think a Real Parts order may be on the cards.

I am thinking of fitting a push pull volume pot to the musicman bridge pickup....it comes ready to be split.

The neck jazz bass pickup is really strong....the bridge has a great musicman punch...but the bass and treble controls of the preamp are terrible...and the blend pot is horrible....when both are on I get echo....whaaaatttt????

The headstock string tree goes on easy and looks great. I levelled and polished the frets and the neck moved into good relief easily.

I had no issue with intonation and I get no buzz at all with a 4/64 string height at 17th fret....wow.

The neck is quite wide and I keep finding the B string when I look for the E....even doing a scale.

Love the mahogany body...and the Tru Oil feels so glossy and like a mirror.

Gotta have my BEE....fix number one.

Gotta build a passive wiring harness...with push pull split.....fix number two.

Gotta think about moving the bridge back a little.....the measurements for the intonation were good....but more reflect my experience with Fender style bridges.....this loooooong black thing can go back a good 5 to 10 mm.....the string spread then may give that little better pickup coverage.....presently cannot get all pickup magnets under a string at the same time....strings need to move a little.

[wazkelly]

Agree that the blend pot is next to useless on these pre amps. I would suggest replacing the blend pot with a traditional 3 way switch to select neck, both, or bridge PUP's and swap the volume pot for a push/pull to do the coil split if you really think it is necessary. The Bass & Treble boosts are ok and i am still playing around with mine to find best sound settings.
The sound demo of my Mmb4 gives you an idea of what it may sound like on split coil but push/pull will only give you one option, not both. I found the front/neck coil sounded a bit deeper which was better than rear coil.
If you want to test the theories before buying more parts check out the split wiring post I did a while back and separate the red & white, and then wire it back up with just one of the humbucker coils working/connected. If that sounds crap swap to the other coil. If they both sound crap, just reattach red & white and leave as is in original series humbucker mode.
Cheers, Waz

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