Experiment - cheapo rail strat pup for bridge

[AndyPanda]

I have this rat bass that had a route for a single coil P pickup in bridge position but no pickup. And I had one of those super cheap ($7 I think) rail humbuckers for a strat that fit right in the pickup route though it is just barely wide enough to cover all four strings. It had way too high a radius so I filed the rails down flatter and it is balanced now and gets a very "interesting" sound. (I think it's a good sound - but I'm a new bassist so what do I know?). The bass has a nice "normal" P pickup in the P position and now this dual rail in bridge and just a volume and blend - no tone control. There is quite a range of tonal variety sweeping between the two.

Anyway ... (remember I'm new - just learning bass - but I have played other instruments professionally for years) ... I was listening to Black Velvet and wondering how to get that sound on bass - and then after searching I learned that it's a keyboard/sampled bass. But I decided to try and see how close I could get - and that rat bass with the strat pickup actually sounds pretty close. Here's a recording (remember, I'm still learning to play bass - so go easy on me)

Blue Steel round wound, tuned down to Eb, direct into DAW with the Amplitube/Fender TPB-1 preamp boosting the upper mids .... 100% bridge pickup and I'm plucking over the bridge pickup. I used a highpass EQ on the original song to remove most of the original bassline.

 

[DavidEdenAria]

Sounds good!

I'm all for trying things w "rat basses".

 

[bholder]

This is pretty much a standard trick to get a humbucking replacement for the single coils in old Musicmaster and similar. I took the cover off the original, it was actually a 6 pole single coil strat pickup inside. So the rails give much better string coverage as well.

Sounds pretty good, burpy in a good way, like a bridge pu should be.

 

[bholder]

That's a great bassline (guitar fills too), I'll have to figure that out.

 

[AndyPanda]

That's a great bassline (guitar fills too), I'll have to figure that out.

on a 4 string, it's really easy if you tune down a half step ... everything falls nicely into place.

 

[DavidEdenAria]

This is pretty much a standard trick to get a humbucking replacement for the single coils in old Musicmaster and similar. I took the cover off the original, it was actually a 6 pole single coil strat pickup inside. So the rails give much better string coverage as well.

Sounds pretty good, burpy in a good way, like a bridge pu should be.

I've had a couple of MM basses, still have my 71....they do have the Strat looking pickup but its generally not as hot of wind as most Strat pickups....around 5k I think.

I am actually going to experiment w my 71 MM bass pickup used in a Strat....I will then try several other pickups in the MM bass slot...a hot Dimarzio w adjustable poles which is supposedly a hot P 90 sound.....then a Duncan Hot Rails wired in parallel for a cleaner tone.

 

[AndyPanda]

the pickup I used was meant for neck position on a strat - and it's not so overwound.

 

[DavidEdenAria]

the pickup I used was meant for neck position on a strat - and it's not so overwound.

If you get a chance can you measure the resistance of the pickup just for curiosity sake?



I thought the stock Musicmaster pickup in my 71 MM bass was quite noisy....I will probably go ahead and copper foil the whole bass.

 

[AndyPanda]

on you MM that would have been a single coil pickup. The one I used is a humbucker made to be the size of a strat single coil - so it's dead quiet. I'll try to measure the coil - I measured it when I bought it many months ago but I don't remember now - in fact I cannot remember if I wired it series or parallel.

This is the pickup I used ... it was only $7 when I bought it though.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CE20FC0

In the questions/answers it says 9K
and I just measured and got 8.8K with the 500K pot so there you have it.

 

[M.R. Ogle]

Don't tell your bass that you're outfitting it with a GEETAR pickup, and don't tell the pickup that you're bolting it into a BASS... and everything will work just fine.