WARWICK STREAMER PASSIVE MEC PICKUPS WEAK?

[bstringrandy]

I picked up an older Warwick RockBass Streamer with 2 passive MEC pickups. One of the pickups was open and there was quite a bit of sketchy wiring and soldering in the control cavity.

After doing much digging and finding out that these MEC humbucker pickups are hard to come by, I found a set of passive pickups, pots, and wiring on Ebay. The pickups ohmed out correctly and the pots were cleanly pre-wired.

I wrote an email to MEC and got an answer from Mr. Hansal that said connect red + green lead together and protect the solder point of it. For both PU ,the white lead is output , and black lead is ground. I wired it up as such following the wiring diagram from the Warwick site. I set the pickup height to a nominal point.

After all of this, I found the output is weak. When I say weak, I mean 1/2 the output of a Squier P-Bass. Both pickups work and the tone pot is functioning. I raised the pickups as high as they could comfortably go and the output didn't improve.

The strings on it aren't new, but they aren't dead either.

Is this normal, or is there something else to be looking for? I expected it to be a hotter aggressive sounding bass!

[Tommorichards]

It would help to have a picture of the wiring.

[bstringrandy]

The pots were pre-wired. All I had to do was wire the pickups and input jack. They followed this diagram:

Attachment 211046

[bstringrandy]

Here's a quick pic of the control cavity:

Attachment 211047

[Anarchyok]

The MEC pickups from the steamer std are very week. They are used in the current model rockbass streamer std, and they sound good, but very low output in comparison to most other passive pickups.

So, sounds like they are working normally to me.

[bstringrandy]

Alright then. I do really like the sound and playability of the bass. That's what they make gain controls for...

I'll crank it and roll

[markanini]

No need to let the pickups do the amps job. Indeed, turn up the amp an enjoy the huge tone.