help with strings and bits

[scotttaylor]

im very new to bass, i have a vintage bass 4 string i now not the best 1 ever but all i can aford, my strings keep going out of tune fast like every day, should i by new strings and what are the best sort of make,

1 of my string is now quiter than the others in volume, can i do any think.
and i uses a tuner but for some reason to my ear it all sounds diferunt, as i am lurning to play my first song i play what i lurn over and over its just not the same sound,

and any other sort of how to fixs things would be grate
thank you

[darkstorm]

Are the tuners loose? Do they turn super easy? If so that could be the problem and replaceing the tuners would fix that. How are you winding the strings on the tuners? Best way is you cut the string so that you have 3-4 winds around the post with end bit tucked into the tuners central hole. Wind string on slowly and snug each wind up against the previous one. Sloppy loose windings (not snug up against previous wrap) can cause string slippage and thus going out of tune downward.

Learn to tune by ear. Via useing a ref tone for first string then tuning each next string via ref tone of the previous string fretted. This will develope your musical ear. Once youve been playing for awhile, you should be able to tune each string as you put new string on for restringing, to pitch or very nearly so just by hearing it as you tune. O it may not be perfect electronic tuner pitch. But close to how we did it in the 70's and before when tuning was all done by ear with aid of pitch pipes, tuning forks, and or ref tones by keyboard player.

[lowfreq33]

+1 on the tuners.

D'Addarios are pretty consistent, it IS possible to get bad strings. But more than likely it is your tuners that are the problem.

[scotttaylor]

how tight should the pick up scews be 1 of the scews truns easery the there is locked down hard did not wont to mess with it with out asking