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The Fifths Tuning Club

@Dave Siff I've dabbled in 5ths tuning but not a committed to it guy. So pardon for having my 10cents worth about those string gauges. If your happy with the lowest and highest string gauges, than a useful calculation to find the ratio between those two strings and apply it to have the remaining inner string gauges be in that ratio relationship is to
'Divide the smallest gauge by the largest gauge
and raise that to the power of 1 divided number the number of inner spaces bewteen the strings.'
So the equation for your 5 stringer would be
.020/.110=0.1818. Raise that to the power of 1 divided by 4. This gives a ratio of 0.6529. You can apply it from the largest gauge to each subsequent gauge by multiplying gauge by the ratio. Or start from the smallest gauge and multiply by the reciprocal of the ratio. In this case 1.531. Now applying that ratio to each string from smallest to largest by multiplying by 1.531 yields with rounding
F#3/.020
B2/.030
E2/.046
A1/.071
D1/.110

Obviously the exact gauge as given is not always possible for every string and one has to choose the closest gauge available in the brand and type of string desired. You can see that your 60 gauge and 85 gauge for E2 and A1 are a big departure from the ratio. A 45 sounds about right. Think of it as how E2 is on a guitar. Your .020 is common for G3 on a guitar and is a good fit for slightly downtuning without increasing the gauge in this case. Your .035 B doesn't depart from the ratio much. So prob not worth changing. So that leaves the 085 A1 string. You say you like that gauge. Nonetheless if you wanna do the ratio thing, swapping it out with an 070 is the go.
In summary. 3 of your gauges could stay in place. And replace the A and E with .070 and .045 gauges respectively.
Thank you! I appreciate this.
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Real-Time Tuner For Fretless Practice

I made a little free web browser app that does two things: it creates a drone which you can turn on and off at a note of your choice and also measures your intonation in real time. It’s a bit of a work in progress, but if anyone feels like playing with it it’s here:


Now I know that this is not a substitute for playing music and developing your ear the old way like I had to, but maybe it will help somebody or at minimum someone will have fun with it. Enjoy! At some point, I’ll probably introduce this in a talkbass thread separately.

Mesa D-800 or 800+

How that the d-350 exists, that checks the box for keeping the simplicity of the D-800, with the brighter voicing of the D-800+, with the tradeoff of losing watts.

I think my ideal Mesa head would be the d-350, only with more watts, and a built in HPF. But I guess you can't have it all. As it stands I'm debating between the d-350, d-800 and d-800+, because there are pros and cons of each. In the end I think the d-350 might be calling my name though.
The D-350 has a fixed HPF. I believe it's set at 30hz. I own the amp and it's a honey.

What is it

Compare your bass across the horns with the OP's photos.

My photo shows Fender PGs laid over Harley Benton PB-50s. Note they have the same narrow 'shoulders' as the OP's bass and also narrower across the bouts.

View attachment 7516959

Biggest 'tell' is the Wilkinson single coil in the OP's bass. Thomann contracted Wilkinson to make that pickup specifically for their PB-50. It was never sold as an aftermarket part nor did it appear on other SCPBs of the time like the Douglas Pisces or the Freya .
When I look at the OP bass again, there is also that tugbar which did not come on the ri, though someone could have installed it later. Your basses in the picture are sweet. I like that minty green.
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Mike Lull single coil 54 P

Great question! The red one was first, I was listening to ZZ Top and wanted to get that tone. Turns out I don't sound like Dusty! Kept it for a long time but ended up selling because I couldn't get my sound out of it. The ash one was probably just stupidity, another try with a different body wood, same result. The white had a mahogany body and I bought it used here on TB, best sounding of the 3, but still not what I wanted.

I have many Lulls and the new awesome one tends to push other really nice ones out.

That white one is gorgeous, I would have kept it on looks alone, but I get it. If you can't get the sound you want out of it, you won't play it.
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Luckily I checked!

I went from the garage to college and then back to the garage. In the business major, I spent MOST of the time arguing with professors that
lots of things they were saying weren't true and I have seen counterexamples. Especially in microeconomics.

I switched to physics and opted out of any more professional "programs".

When I am looking at buying something now, the first thing I tell a salesman is "If you even try to upsell I will immediately write you off and leave".
I also went from the garage to college and then back to the garage. Listening to professors read word for word from a textbook (that most of them didn't write to begin with) wasn't my jam and I did butt heads with more than one professor.

39 years wrenching and I retired when the industry became nothing more than a race to the bottom.

Funny you mentioned upsells...... I went with my Dad last year when he bought a new car and I couldn't believe all the add on crap they tried to talk him into buying.

Needless to say the sales manager wasn't too happy with me when my Dad didn't go for any of those wallet flushes.
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Outdoor gig with Accugroove/Aguilar stack

No, I pretty much run mostly a flat EQ on most of my basses, most of the time. I will occasionally boost the bass or boost around 1.2k if I want a little more attack, but otherwise, I keep it simple since the 680 sounds so good.

How long have you had your 680? I feel like it is genuinely a piece of gear I will never sell. I'd probably part ways with some of my beloved basses if I needed the money for whatever reason.
I’ve had it since 2021? I got it off here. I can’t seem to find the ad but this is how I use mine
IMG_1847.webp
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Max string spacing based on pickup dimensions (6 string precision bass content)

You can buy magnet field viewing "paper" on Amazon. You can lay it over the pickup and see exactly where the magnetic field is. That's how I figured out that, while a Bartolini 4 string and five string pickup are the same physical size, the magnetic field is much smaller on the four string.

A crazy live tone experiment.

Phase 2:

This time I used a VT Bass DI dialed in to replicate the sound of a BDDI (900 Hz mid scoop, boost lows & highs, engage cab sim & bite). It made the bass sit better in the mix out front. The difference was subtle, but clear and heard by others. One downside is that the upper fret notes were weaker due the mid scoop and fills tended to disappear more.

I think at least some of the benefit was the huge amount of compression the VT Bass DI brings to the table.
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SBL Blueprint

Anyone here that has done (or is in) SBL Blueprint and is willing share their experience? (DM is fine)
Not trying to start an discussion on the cost of it and how it's much better and cheaper to have private lessons
It's one of those things where it seems so few people do it each year that there's essentially no feedback out there about it.

They've been doing it for a few years, so my way to view it is if it was a bad program, you'd think there'd be people out there pooping on it given the cost.
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