Some Pickup Questions (Size, Colour)

[ihasmario]

Hi,

First one - an easy one. Jazz bass kit. Which colour wire denotes bridge and which denotes neck pickup?

Secondly -
Not sure this is a frequently asked question - but here goes. I have a pickguard I would like to use without modification, but it is sized for "short" standard bass pickups.

As far as I can tell, this means 91.5mm or so. Whereas the pickups that came with the kit are the slightly longer variety (94.5mm or so).

Thanks

[wazkelly]

Hi mate, the ones I swapped out of my J Bass had red & blue wires and one of the PUP's was shorter than the other as follows:

Blue Wire: 91mm wide

Red Wire: 94mm wide

This tends to suggest the narrower one is for the neck position and wider goes at the bridge. A multimeter can also help as the lower rating usually goes in neck position. Sometimes a longer wire than the other PUP gives a hint as to which goes where too.

Not sure what you mean about the pickguard and probably need photos to figure that out.

Cheers, Waz

[ihasmario]

Hi,

I'll check at work tomorrow. The route in the pickguard (aftermarket) is too small for the pickups... I think. Could just be the one though... Will check soon

Thanks for your reply - really helpful

[wazkelly]

If it is a standard J Bass pick guard maybe you have 2 bridge PUP's which are 94mm wide or thereabouts and hence why one won't fit in the pre cut opening that probably measures about 91mm wide.

If this is the case you have a couple of options:

1. Source a smaller Neck PUP - I have both spares no longer wanted but their sound is only average with fairly low output hence why they were upgraded
2. Gently sand and file out the inside of the pickguard until the PUP fits. I have done this a few times in the past and it is a very, very slow and painful job

[ihasmario]

Hey,

It is a standard J Bass pick guard (apparently). And both pickups (just from memory) are a couple of mms too long (which leads me to believe they're L/bridge sized).

Will investigate further soon...

[stan]

if you take it slowly with a flat file you can do a pretty nice job.
Alternatively member Pablopepper can make you one that suits for a fair price

[Dedman]

It seems to be a fairly common thing that the kit parts are slightly different dimensions to "standard" parts. Making things fit is part of the fun of upgrading

[ihasmario]

Hey just checked. The pickups are different sizes, and one is the right length.

The thing that doesn't fit is the "bumps" that are for height adjustment. They do not fit properly. It seems I need the centre of the pickup adjustment to be 38mm apart, but they seem to be 35mm.

Can anyone confirm if the tonerider pickups are different?


Managed to find this http://www.tonerider.com/files/schem...eck_metric.jpg

Seems like it will fit...

[ihasmario]

Just checking - did you have any problem replacing the bridge pickup? I don't really want to resize the route

[wazkelly]

G'day mate, I replaced with Entwistles and yes the adjustment bumps/lugs were in a slightly different position which did require the use of a chisel on the Bridge PUP Rout and very patient sanding out on the scratch plate to make things fit. At a distance it is hard to notice but upon closer inspection anyone with a bit of knowledge on J Bass setup would spot the difference.

The link above mentions just the Neck PUP and the Bridge one may be slightly different. If anyone has installed a set maybe they could shed a bit more light on this for you.