Bridge adjustors choking acoustic sound?

[Dorian]

After months of indecision and reading of old TBDB threads I finally took the plunge and got a Full Circle installed on my new-ish Chinese carved wood bass. I'd been using the Realist for many years with my previous plywood bass but since I upgraded basses I found I was often not happy with the amplified sound, especially when playing at medium to high volumes with my Balkan / World Beat band.

I haven't actually played amplified yet (we've got a 4 month old daughter at home so practising plugged in is not welcome ) but will be testing that out at a rehearsal studio tomorrow night.

BUT - after a couple of days of practising pizz and arco at home I'm sure that the acoustic sound of my bass has changed pretty fundamentally. The volume it produces seems reduced, and the very pleasing, resonant tone I got playing up into thumb position on the D and G strings (which convinced me to by the bass in the first place) seems really muted now. In fact, the whole instrument feels like I'm playing it with a rubber mute.

The bass did not originally have bridge adjuster so my luthier had to cut the bridge and fit them before installing the pickup. He asked if I wanted to keep the string height where it was (about 9 mm on the G string at the bottom of the fingerboard) and I asked if he could set it up at that height but have the option to take it down by 1 mm or so if I was doing a really long gig. Was this a mistake?

I've never had a bass with an adjustable bridge before so I'm not sure if this is something I should have expected. Its also possible that I'm over exaggerating the differences in sound because of not playing for a couple of days (and having a good case of 'baby brain' too ) but it just FEELS different.

Any comments or advice from you guys would be very welcome...

Dorian

[Jake deVilliers]

I have noticed the reduction in acoustic sound when installing Full Circle Pickups. The transducer adjuster is pretty heavy at 20 grams and the plain one is plenty heavy too at 17.5 gr.
I've been using the Upton adjusters which are 25.1 gr out of the box but liberal use of the drill press will get them down to ~18-19 gr. You can definitely hear the difference that those 5-6 grams make.

Its also important that the bridge to adjuster contact is solid and complete.

[Dorian]

Thanks for the reply - its good to know I'm not the only one who has experienced this!

Originally Posted by Jake deVilliers

Its also important that the bridge to adjuster contact is solid and complete.

Ah - so I guess I could expect to get a meatier sound with the bridge adjusters set to their lowest level and making full contact with the bottom of the bridge. Actually, that sounds really obvious now I think about it.

[Jake deVilliers]

Originally Posted by Dorian

Ah - so I guess I could expect to get a meatier sound with the bridge adjusters set to their lowest level and making full contact with the bottom of the bridge. Actually, that sounds really obvious now I think about it.

That's not what I meant Dorian. I install adjusters threads down and want the top portion of the bridge to have good, full contact with the top of the adjusters, then the threads can be at whatever height is necessary to adjust the strings to the right playing height.

The vibration/rotation of the upper part of the bridge seems to be transmitted very well through the threaded shaft to the feet and the top.

You could try replacing the adjusters with some lighter ones just to see what effect they have...

[Dorian]

I see what you mean, but the bridge adjustors seem to be very solidly and evenly connected to the upper part of the bridge, so not much room to change anything there.

However, on moving the the bridge down to its lowest level so the adjustors are fully connecting with both halves there has been a big change in the acoustic sound - almost back to what it was before the bridge was cut.

This will do me fine for now, since I wasn't that bothered about being able to adjust the string height anyway. I just hope that I like the sound of the Full Circle when I plug it in!

Thank you again for taking the time to help me with this Jake. Its slightly scary that even though I make a good part of my living playing my bass that I know so little about how its put together and what makes it sound the way it does Need to do some reading I guess...

[JtheJazzMan]

On my previous bass I found the full circle had a strong muting effect on the tone, I then transferred the same pickup to my latest bass with a new bridge, and I dont *think* it had as much of an affect, but the human memory is terrible at accurately remembering such things.

So to answer your question, its a definite maybe.



Thinking back, I dont think the install on the first bass was as good.

Poor contact between the wood and metal would surely be a big issue.

[Andrew McGregor]

The pickup is a transducer, it turns some of the acoustic energy into electrical. If it's not very efficient (which it most likely won't be, acoustic efficiency and good sound don't go together), then it's going to absorb some sound. And it will have a frequency profile to it, which will change the tone a bit.

[Jake deVilliers]

Well, the good news is that the Full Circle gets a terrific amplified sound, so if you do most of your playing plugged in its a very worthwhile trade-off!

[Dorian]

That's what I'm hoping for! Sadly I don't get to play too often without plugging in, just when I'm jamming or rehearsing without any drummers around

[arnoldschnitzer]

I've installed at least a hundred Full Circle pickups, and I've yet to hear a dropoff in acoustic sound. I wonder if something else changed when the OP's bass was worked on. Perhaps the soundpost fell and was re-set in a different place, or perhaps it's not fit well.

[Mark Carlsen]

Originally Posted by Dorian

Thanks for the reply - its good to know I'm not the only one who has experienced this!



Ah - so I guess I could expect to get a meatier sound with the bridge adjusters set to their lowest level and making full contact with the bottom of the bridge. Actually, that sounds really obvious now I think about it.

This will choke your sound out for sure...They need to be open a little bit .

[Dorian]

Originally Posted by arnoldschnitzer

I've installed at least a hundred Full Circle pickups, and I've yet to hear a dropoff in acoustic sound. I wonder if something else changed when the OP's bass was worked on. Perhaps the soundpost fell and was re-set in a different place, or perhaps it's not fit well.

That's very interesting. It sounds like it might be worth taking the bass over to my luthier and getting him to check everything over, just in case something else is wrong.