PRS style PJ-Bass

[fender3x]

I am sort of going the other way. If you have too many options you can forget what they do in the heat of battle. Also some are pretty subtle, particularly on a bass.

After lots of knob and switch twiddling with my G&L here's what I think... Series and single coil will be quite different. Parallel will be like single coil, but not quite as good...you lose some of the highs...but, like series, it's humbucking.

A blend pot may be too subtle, and I think you may lose the hum cancelling quality when the coils are unbalanced, tho I confess I don't really understand that.

Two of the four settings I like on my G&L remove the bridge pup from the mix. On my P-J bass, I mostly just use the P. I dial in the J for a funkier sound or just to hear myself better. I never solo the bridge pup on either bass. Of course YMMV ;-)

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[kuanjb]

I am sort of going the other way. If you have too many options you can forget what they do in the heat of battle. Also some are pretty subtle, particularly on a bass.

After lots of knob and switch twiddling with my G&L here's what I think... Series and single coil will be quite different. Parallel will be like single coil, but not quite as good...you lose some of the highs...but, like series, it's humbucking.

A blend pot may be too subtle, and I think you may lose the hum cancelling quality when the coils are unbalanced, tho I confess I don't really understand that.

Two of the four settings I like on my G&L remove the bridge pup from the mix. On my P-J bass, I mostly just use the P. I dial in the J for a funkier sound or just to hear myself better. I never solo the bridge pup on either bass. Of course YMMV ;-)

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Yeah I can understand that. I'm actually really surprised at the number of knobs on a lot of basses. I don't think I'll go quite as far. But as it's really just for me to play around with and experiment I would like a few tonal options available.
I really like my SG with a tone and volume pot for each pickup (2V2T). Mainly the individual volumes really. So at a minimum I like 2V1T.
For the bass, without a pickup selector, having the two volumes gives basic pickup selection / blending. The other alternative would of course be a single volume and a blend. For the time being I'm going with the two volumes. One tone will I think be enough.
So then I'm just left with the humbucker and whether I want any special controls. At this point in time I'm still looking the idea of being able to split it. Parallel and series control I'm thinking of dropping.
So the question is how to split it. Mini toggle. Push/Pull pot. Or another pot, blend or volume. I really don't think I need to be able to select which coil I'm split to. I'll just experiment and see which coil I prefer the sound of.
So I'm thinking the additional volume pot would work the best. It allows, apparently, the ability to have slight humbucking while having the more single coil jazz sound. Depends on what other effects pedals and amps you're using as to how much you need to give the humbucking.
With all of that it'd give me 3V1T. Am I crazy for thinking I need a three way pickup selector too?



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[fender3x]

There seem to be two schools... Dusty Hill on one side. Phil Lesh on the other.

I love my G&L and can dial in a huge range of sounds...but I have to do that. I sometimes have to think about what I want to get it set up right. My Fender Precision is much easier. Just plug it in and it sounds great. Not much variety in the sound, but all the settings are good.

My Frankenjazz is the one tho, that I think is just about exactly right--and is most relevant to this discussion. Initially I had it set up with DiMarzio J's. I had a 1 volume, one tone and a blend pot, with push pulls on the V and the T to put switch between series and parallel humbucking (J's are a side-by-side humbucker). After hearing them the first time, I don't think I ever used the push pulls. I just left them in series all the time. The blend pot was OK.

More recently I re-routed the mid pickup and installed passive EMG Geezer Butlers with a VVT controls. I have discovered this really fits what I like to hear much better. I generally leave the P all the way up. I adjust the T to whatever I am playing, and I roll the bridge pickup in and out to add or eliminate crunch or just to hear myself better in the mix. I find it really intuitive, so I end up using the controls more on this bass than any other even though (or maybe especially because?) they are very simple.

[wazkelly]

Some good discussions happening here and will throw my 2 cents worth in the ring.....

2 x Vol & 1 x Tone is probably the better option and if you really want to hear what the Bridge Humbucker can do you could use a mini DPDT switch like I used on my MMB4. It does sound best in series but the mini switch coil splits to front coil or rear coil. Parallel just sounds crap and not worth trying whilst the coil splits drop the volume and there is only ever so slight difference between front & rear coils, where the front one has just a bit more bottom/mid. I might have done a sound video too and all that stuff can be found following link in my signature to the build diary.

Would not recommend a blend or balance pot as I tried to do that and it was not successful to get both and the resultant sound from mini switch was easiest way to go in the end, that is if you can be bothered for sounds you may barely use.

Cheers, Waz

[kuanjb]

Bit of headstock reshaping. PRS-esque, but reversed. So kind of like the Silver Sky.

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[kuanjb]

Extended the bridge pickup route for the double J pickup. Don't have a router so tried to do it with chisels and a Dremel.

Think it urned out ok, but I did make one of the semi-circles for the screw tabs a bit big. The location of the screw tabs on the original routing didn't match the new pickup so had to extend both ways. I honestly hadn't thought that J bass pickups would differ between manufacturers.

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[fender3x]

I am really impressed at how well you did that freehand without a router. Wow! I would have been worried even with one. You must have great penmanship ;-)

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[supapuffin]

Judging by the chip pile you have there the lesson seems to be - never underestimate a patient man with a sharp chisel.

[kuanjb]

I am really impressed at how well you did that freehand without a router. Wow! I would have been worried even with one. You must have great penmanship ;-)

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Thanks. It's actually pretty rough, particularly at the bottom. And I have terrible penmanship. Mostly type everything.

I guess I watched too many Crimson Guitars videos where he did everything by hand. Anyway a router would have required me to make a template and probably end up being more work. Probably neater though. I really should have at least drilled out the majority of the wood before going at it with the chisels.

I just wanted to get it wired up so I could see what it sounds like and try out some wiring options. So far the normal wiring (humbucker is series) sounds pretty nice. The bridge humbucker is a fair bit louder than the P-Bass pickups. Dialling it in can give a bit of growl to the P or even just using it by itself is very nice sounding. It does not have the plucky J-Bass sound though so I'm probably going to try out different options for splitting the humbucker and see what tones I can get.

The other thing to consider is the pots. I'm just using the prewired pots which came with the kit currently. It has B250K for the two volumes and an A250K for the tone. I would have thought that audio pots would be better for volume and linear for the tone. And I'm not sure about the 250K value.

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[fender3x]

You can run the humbucker in parallel, but if you do I bet you won't like it much. Out of phase is even worse IMHO. On a split humbucker series usually sounds best, so if you do want a parallel setting I'd recommend doing a series/parallel switch

It may not ever sound like a Jazz, but 500K pots on the split humbucker Will brighten it a bit when dimed.

I use audio pots on both tone and volume. Most folks use audio on the volume pot. Some folks use linears on the tone pot. At 0 and at 10 they are the same. The difference is how fast the treble rolls off in between on tone.



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