Dingwall Owners Club

[BurningSkies]

I wish I could go to all those events, but musical is every night.

End of the month the funk ensemble is hosting Alto Cincos open jam (last Tuesday this month), plus playing in Shemin auditorium on a Sunday. Rock ensemble is also playing Shemin, and Beats & Eats. I'll be blasting Facebook with reminders of course.

Nice. Cinco is fun. We did Otro for Max a while back. So fancy over at VPA. The last time I was in that room, it was for the MTV class I took in the late 80's! Good to see you're playing a bunch. We just tied up a 3rd gig in Ithaca coming up as well as some other pieces and parts. We're down at the Everson August 4th outside, which should be fun.

 

[J Posega]

Contemplating life. This particular selfie angle makes my frets look straight (aka lame)

 

[been_effected]

View attachment 843485

Contemplating life. This particular selfie angle makes my frets look straight (aka lame)

That photo just makes me miss my beard...I cut it back to a more manageable length a week ago

 

[BuffaloBob4343]

The current news is that I'm talking to Sheldon about this. He says that theoretically it IS possible to fit the FD-3 coils in the limited sized shell footprint these have. He did a quick CAD to see. ***(PS that's superextramuthahumpinawesome that he'd do that on the fly)*** He's going to consult with his team about doing it or not. If he does decide that it's feasible to do and that the shop can take the time do it, I'll leave it up to him if there's a better way by wood or plastic. If it's wood shells, I promise we'll come up with something fun.

If it makes it any easier to get this done because of additional revenue potential to justify the time, I would be willing to jump in on this with you. Let me know if that is possible and/or makes sense.

 

[BurningSkies]

If it makes it any easier to get this done because of additional revenue potential to justify the time, I would be willing to jump in on this with you. Let me know if that is possible and/or makes sense.

Thanks! If Sheldon appears willing, we should definitely discuss. But we should also make sure that we have the same sized pickups.

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[BuffaloBob4343]

Thanks! If Sheldon appears willing, we should definitely discuss. But we should also make sure that we have the same sized pickups.

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Good point. After measuring mine, it appears that mine are the standard P2 size. They appear to be about 4.25 by 1.25 ish as measured (I guess P2 is actually 4.26 x 1.27).

 

[BurningSkies]

Good point. After measuring mine, it appears that mine are the standard P2 size. They appear to be about 4.25 by 1.25 ish as measured (I guess P2 is actually 4.26 x 1.27).

Good call, huh?

I may end up pulling one of these just in a bid to find out what they say on the bottom of the pickups and to measure across the bottom plate. The oddity is that they're smaller than what appears to be any of the options. Roughly 3-7/8 x 1-1/8 (or 1-2/8). I'm curious. I think I'll probably end up having to pull and send them out to make sure we get the measurements correct anyway.

I can at least add this to the knowledge pool. Here are the shell shapes that Nordstrand will do:

 

[BuffaloBob4343]

Good call, huh?

I may end up pulling one of these just in a bid to find out what they say on the bottom of the pickups and to measure across the bottom plate. The oddity is that they're smaller than what appears to be any of the options. Roughly 3-7/8 x 1-1/8 (or 1-2/8). I'm curious. I think I'll probably end up having to pull and send them out to make sure we get the measurements correct anyway.

I can at least add this to the knowledge pool. Here are the shell shapes that Nordstrand will do:

Definitely a good call! Looks like the DC5 et al. (in the middle) would be the right one for me. I guess, given that yours are smaller, you could always have the bass routed to the larger size, no?

 

[BurningSkies]

Definitely a good call! Looks like the DC5 et al. (in the middle) would be the right one for me. I guess, given that yours are smaller, you could always have the bass routed to the larger size, no?

Nordstrand (shop) thinks these are too short to be 5 string pickups, and if they were fanned layout they certainly wouldn't be.

I certainly could...and that would be easy, wouldn't it? But here's the deal. This is a really early one. One of the very first production basses. Early enough that apparently not even the pickup models are standardized to P2 or BD, etc. It's been hard to actually date it to some non-linearity in the early serial numbers. With that, I sort of feel I need to respect the original layout and design of this, while also 'updating' it to be a usable instrument for what I do.

I really consider it a 'historic' instrument and want to be able to 'do no harm' to the bass. Otherwise I could have stepped in and routed the pickups and added switches, etc. That's not my intent. I really want to make sure that if down the line I need to (or someone else wants to) it can be put 'back to stock'.

I also promised the last owner that I wouldn't do anything invasive to the bass. I'd really like to be true to that but also PLAY this bass like it was intended.

Also, by now you should realize that when it comes to stuff, I apparently can't do things the easy way nor do situations come out the way you'd think.

 

[groovaholic]

IIRC, some of those Bartolinis had bar magnets rather than individual pole pieces; I wonder if this was a 4-string pickup with a wide enough aperture to be used on a 5er.

If so, there might be current 4-string pickups that could work.

...Just not sure if that would accomplish your tone goal.

 

[BurningSkies]

IIRC, some of those Bartolinis had bar magnets rather than individual pole pieces; I wonder if this was a 4-string pickup with a wide enough aperture to be used on a 5er.

If so, there might be current 4-string pickups that could work.

...Just not sure if that would accomplish your tone goal.

Yeah, and someone I've been talking to 'behind the scenes' has also suggested that a Nordstrand P5 might be able to fit into a custom shell and be close. I just happen to really love the FD-3 run in series. There's a really refined control of what's going on in the lows that sculpts the bottom end very effectively. I'd really like something that gets closer to Sheldon's 'modern' era of tone.

Here's an interesting bit for you...This bass acoustically sounds and feels better than the Rastaburst. It's lively and has this really lovely sound when unplugged. It's a really FUN bass to handle... But the Rastaburst beats it hands down when plugged in. I can't help but think that it will reach it's true potential with FD's in it.

 

[eloann]

Thanx to you I've spent the day thinking about a TRS jack with separate ouputs for bass and treble strings - for use with a Y cable to selectively add effects to some strings.
I recently wrote a piece and tried to do that using high/low pass filters, gates and lots of crap. Gave up. Now ungiving up.

Credit due to Aram Bedrosian as well - I think his Ritter somehow has separate outputs for EACH string.

 

[Laklandfan]

Dingwall owners would know, I thought I saw awhile back that Nordstrand was making (or could) big singles what could be used as replacements in Dingwalls: designed to be slanted. Am I dreaming this?

 

[BurningSkies]

Thanx to you I've spent the day thinking about a TRS jack with separate ouputs for bass and treble strings - for use with a Y cable to selectively add effects to some strings.
I recently wrote a piece and tried to do that using high/low pass filters, gates and lots of crap. Gave up. Now ungiving up.

Credit due to Aram Bedrosian as well - I think his Ritter somehow has separate outputs for EACH string.

That might be a fun project. You could do that fairly easily with these pickups as they're '4 lead', or in other words have access to each of the coils' signals individually.

Thanx to you I've spent the day thinking about a TRS jack with separate ouputs for bass and treble strings - for use with a Y cable to selectively add effects to some strings.
I recently wrote a piece and tried to do that using high/low pass filters, gates and lots of crap. Gave up. Now ungiving up.

Credit due to Aram Bedrosian as well - I think his Ritter somehow has separate outputs for EACH string.

I can't remember if you're a Dingwall player or not, but the FD3's are available for aftermarket use in a variety of shapes, obviously. You might want to mess with a cheaper instrument before doing anything serious to a multi-K instrument.

 

[eloann]

That might be a fun project. You could do that fairly easily with these pickups as they're '4 lead', or in other words have access to each of the coils' signals individually.
I can't remember if you're a Dingwall player or not, but the FD3's are available for aftermarket use in a variety of shapes, obviously. You might want to mess with a cheaper instrument before doing anything serious to a multi-K instrument.

I've already tempered with my (now back to fretless) SJ5's wiring quite a bit actually. As long as I have it figured out in my head I'm comfortable performing that kind of surgery.

 

[eloann]

By the way...

 

[Blues Cat]

@BurningSkies Bill, do the covers slip off? Or are they epoxied all together? If they slip off, Nordstrand can modify their guts to fit in your existing shell.

Have you contacted Bartolini about a shell cover? That could be huge towards obtaining your goals.

@Laklandfan, I've installed Big Singles in an '05 ABII5 with excellent results. I don't have pics on my IPad, but I'll try to post pics soon. Turns out the Nordstrand's 19mm spacing lines up dead nuts perfect with the Dingwall's 18mm spacing when angled. I opted for left handed pole orientation on mine. You can kind of see how it lines up perfectly in my avatar.

Nordstrand (shop) thinks these are too short to be 5 string pickups, and if they were fanned layout they certainly wouldn't be.

I certainly could...and that would be easy, wouldn't it? But here's the deal. This is a really early one. One of the very first production basses. Early enough that apparently not even the pickup models are standardized to P2 or BD, etc. It's been hard to actually date it to some non-linearity in the early serial numbers. With that, I sort of feel I need to respect the original layout and design of this, while also 'updating' it to be a usable instrument for what I do.

I really consider it a 'historic' instrument and want to be able to 'do no harm' to the bass. Otherwise I could have stepped in and routed the pickups and added switches, etc. That's not my intent. I really want to make sure that if down the line I need to (or someone else wants to) it can be put 'back to stock'.

I also promised the last owner that I wouldn't do anything invasive to the bass. I'd really like to be true to that but also PLAY this bass like it was intended.

Also, by now you should realize that when it comes to stuff, I apparently can't do things the easy way nor do situations come out the way you'd think.

 

[Laklandfan]

@Laklandfan, I've installed Big Singles in an '05 ABII5 with excellent results. I don't have pics on my IPad, but I'll try to post pics soon. Turns out the Nordstrand's 19mm spacing lines up dead nuts perfect with the Dingwall's 18mm spacing when angled. I opted for left handed pole orientation on mine. You can kind of see how it lines up perfectly in my avatar.

I tried looking at your avatar, but it's still too small. But I think a Super J with Big Singles would be right up my alley.

 

[Blues Cat]

Messing with editor...

 

[BurningSkies]

View attachment 844265

@BurningSkies Bill, do the covers slip off? Or are they epoxied all together? If they slip off, Nordstrand can modify their guts to fit in your existing shell.

Have you contacted Bartolini about a shell cover? That could be huge towards obtaining your goals.

One of my tasks in the next few days will be to pull and measure the pickups. I know that Sheldon says they should be identified on the bottom as well. At that point I'll be able to tell if they're epoxied or sealed or not. Theoretically, Sheldon says that he can fit the FD-3 into this size/footprint from a quick look... I'll wait for him to get back to me on whether he's willing to make some in shop for me. Depending on what is said, I can talk with Bartolini about shells, or re-approach Nordstrand and see if I have better luck. I think the real problem is a matter of geometry if you look at the split/slanted coil layout of the FD3's.