• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

Different Pickguard Changes Tone

#165
D Bopp said:
My main bass is a Custom Shop 59 RI P. It came originally with a gold anodized guard.

I've been playing it with a 62RI Tort guard installed, and it sounds amazing. The best tone I've ever heard on any of my basses. Recently, I decided to put the gold guard back on. I played a few gigs with it, and didn't think much of it, except that I noticed the bass wasn't sounding as good as I remembered. I originally thought it was the head I was using, or maybe the strings were getting old.

After the 3rd gig, it hit me that the bass hadn't sounded good since I swapped the pickguards. The next day, I put the tort guard back on, and Bam, there it was again!

I've never even thought that the pickguard material may change the tone. But I wasn't getting as much of a thump, or even sound up the neck with the metal guard on. Maybe the metal reflects the frequencies a little different. Who knows?
Is this a common known thing and I'm just late to the game realizing this? It may very well just be this particular bass, as I've had many gold guard P Basses in the past. But I may have noticed a difference on the others too if I had changed out the guard.

Anyone else ever experienced this?
Click to expand...

OK, so here's a thing. I'm sitting here with my fretless on the J-pickup and the lights are slightly dimmed - damned buzzing al over the place. As it happens I normally have a brass surround installed on the J pickup - at present I don't as I plan to place some firmer foam under the PU so have started removing bits of hardware. With this thread in mind, in just slipped the thing back into position. Did I mention that this thing is brass? Also it is NOT grounded, just screwed on.

Putting it in place (not even screwed down), most of the buzz went away. I slipped it off and back it came. On=slight hum, Off=massive hum. No question. Of course this thread came to mind straight away. Will I hear a difference in tone?

I just did a small test trying to compare tone with and without the surround in place and I can tell you - THE OP IS ONTO SOMETHING.

First I turned the dimmed lights off - no hum. With the surround in place, the tone was warmer, less scooped with a notably less prominent zing - a 'traditional' J sound which even seemed to have a slight compression or reduced dynamics. Without the surround, it is brighter, slightly punchier with a richer harmonic response - a more 'modern' sound. I put the surround on and off about 20 times in less than 5 minutes, so my ears became quite attuned. The differences ARE THERE.

I know this sounds crazy, but it just happened. Now I have a new problem - I can't choose between the two...

And I wholeheartedly apologise to the OP for my 'shenanigans' call made in a previous post.
 
#167
D Bopp said:
My main bass is a Custom Shop 59 RI P. It came originally with a gold anodized guard.

I've been playing it with a 62RI Tort guard installed, and it sounds amazing. The best tone I've ever heard on any of my basses. Recently, I decided to put the gold guard back on. I played a few gigs with it, and didn't think much of it, except that I noticed the bass wasn't sounding as good as I remembered. I originally thought it was the head I was using, or maybe the strings were getting old.

After the 3rd gig, it hit me that the bass hadn't sounded good since I swapped the pickguards. The next day, I put the tort guard back on, and Bam, there it was again!
Click to expand...

Aluminum is a paramagnetic material. It will exhibit weak magnetic properties in the presence of a magnetic field. Although I've not had the personal experience of the OP I can see where it could have a slight effect on the size/shape/strength of the magnetic field the coil of a pickup sees and change the sound.
 
  • Like
Reactions: SteveCS
#168
mech said:
Aluminum is a paramagnetic material. It will exhibit weak magnetic properties in the presence of a magnetic field. Although I've not had the personal experience of the OP I can see where it could have a slight effect on the size/shape/strength of the magnetic field the coil of a pickup sees and change the sound.
Click to expand...

Yes, but it is readily affected by nearby magnetic fields in a dynamic situation - a moving/changing magnetic field will induce significant eddy currents in a lump of aluminium in close proximity, which is why it is used in eddy current braking systems. The eddy currents produce a magnetic field in opposition to the one causing the currents. My guess is that the metal has no effect on the static field surrounding the pickup, but when the field is modulated by the string this will induce eddy currents in the metal. These eddy currents will generate an opposing magnetic field around the pickup that could plausibly change how the current is induced in the coil. This might be heard as a change in 'tone'. What I heard in my 'experiment' was subtle but absolutely noticeable. The pickup is a Duncan SJB-3B (quite 'hot') and the brass surround is about 2.5mm thick.

There is plenty of anecdotal evidence in the Telecaster forums(!) that removing the chrome cover (typically brass or copper) from the neck pickup has much the same effect...
 
#171
ggoat!!! said:
I remember when I switched from Schaller to Dunlop straplocks. Talk about an epiphany! The difference wasn't in the actual sound of the notes played, but the "space" between the notes and the existential groove of my playing. The Dunlop straplocks provided a sense "air" and "space" to my playing. Black backgrounds between plucked notes were seemingly "more blacker." There was simply more "there" there. I installed the Dunlop straplocks when the humidity in my home was 34% and allowed no ionizing substrates to operate in a 32 meter radius as to not interfere with the wood to metal interaction as I didn't really want to have to screw the straplocks into the body more than once; 1 fiber of wood lost can drastically decrease the blackness of the blacks. The sense of immediacy and detail in my playing increased substantially. But, I ended up ultimately having to take the straplocks off and reinstall them because I initially installed the Dunlop straplocks during a full moon cycle, but I realized that the alloys contained therein might not "mesh" with the moon's cycle so I uninstalled them using latex-free gloves, waited exactly 4 days, and reinstalled them again this time during a harvest moon, specifically at 11:07pm as there are scientifically less charged free electrons in the air at that specific time and the harvest moon has less of a chance of contributing to the oxidization of the exposed screwthreads. I also ordered specially treated Jamaican alloy steel screws this time, just for the funk of it. This made a HUGE difference, and what I thought would be detrimental by unscrewing the straplocks turned out to be a mindblowing sonic revelation! Once again, the black spaces between notes were actually even more "more blacker." The sense of immediacy was immediately more immediate than immediately before, and I had an even greater airy sense of spacial air in the same air space. There was even more "there" there, even more "there" there than there was "there" there before. Dunlop straplocks are keepers! But, I might be missing some of that fluidity of note sustainability mojo that I was soooo used to when I was using the Schaller straplocks...but I've found that if I use baby wipes versus regular Charmin my fluidity improves substantially...and the blacks are even blacker upon visualization. I never knew I had so much funk in me!
Click to expand...

Possibly another recovering audiophile and former reader of Stereophile magazine? If so, I feel your pain. Lol. Great post, btw. You would have made a great home audio equipment reviewer. And let's be honest. We can never have too much 'there' there. Or blackness in between.

M. M. :)
 
  • Like
Reactions: mech and ggoat!!!

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back