Quote:
Originally Posted by ezemvn  i plan to get some bass distortion built into my bass guitar as opposed to having it lugged around in a pedal. ive got a custom preamp built into it ..so i might put the effect routing after the preamp so does anyone here have any ideas, tips for it? i know it sounds risky and im open to criticism, but you never know until you try i guess |
Yes, I can tell you quite a bit about it! Back in the late 60s I took my Kingston cheapo short scale bass and built a Vibrato (actually a tremolo) circuit plus a leslie speaker imitator into it. I don't remember if the board was a kit or I built it myself but that isn't important. The idea of a pedal in the bass was a pretty good one PROVIDED you stick with the pedal that you use the most with your bass. In my case I liked the B3 thing, in yours I guess it's distortion.
A word on bass distortion.
Guitar distortion does NOT work well with bass! To get an effective tone you need to allow some of the lows to bypass the pedal and keep the distortion levels pretty tame! What I use in a pedal that works VERY well is a bass modified Bad Monkey:
Humphrey Audio Mods Worldwide
This is what you might want to build into your bass! I'd suggest you use whatever circuit you end up with for a while as a pedal before you decide to make it permanent.
What I learned from my experiment was that first circuit I used was not only quite primitive (considering the year) but also ran from a 9v battery. It was (is, I still have it!) exceptionally noisy! And that's the rub. Nice modern quiet pedal circuits take considerable current. I'd strongly recommend NOT using a battery to run the pedal circuits Rather use the TRS "phantom power" idea (See TB thread on this) using a pedal board power supply.
As an emergency backup for a dead battery, I installed TWO output jacks on the bass where one was passive out, and the other was the output from the pedal mod. Probably an active-passive switch would be more convenient.
Like all pedal circuits, mine had a series of pots for adjustment I arranged them along the upper horn in a row. Pretty handy! Below on the lower horn I had a row of switches that allowed you to turn each effect on or off to easily single the effects or return to straight bass. Not a bad arrangement. Worked out well. Note my bass had a large pickguard which made mounting stuff and covering up nasty routes for boards and controls easy!
And I'd suggest you do what I did, namely to do your experiments on some junker cheapo bass until you are truly satisfied with what you've done.
While what you propose is what I did, today my idea is a bit more advanced. I'm thinking of a digital DSP style multi-effects circuit and a set up where you have a series of push buttons along the upper horn where each is a preset "tone" that you have previously programed and dialed-in. This could allow a totally amazing array of distortions, amp models, chorus, phaser, octaver, and maybe even wah on a whammy bar! All turned on or off with the touch of a button! But that is a pretty advanced project!
Right now I'm thinking my two most used effects are chorus, and EQ. Which is another thing the digital DSP does, you can have a ROW of preset bass EQ settings each there each ready at the touch of a button. NO knob twiddling or switch flipping!
So my bottom line is that in my experience I think you are onto the next phase of bass, though such ideas do not seem to have caught on. Like I said before, start with the effect you are presently using all the time and think about building THAT one in to the bass. And then when that works you can go from there.
Good luck!
