Fender musicmaster bass string spacing for Curtis Novak pickups?

[joshuajong]

I'd like to change pickup on my musicmaster bass to Curtis Novak BS-DS.

I checked their website and it has 3 options

• 15.6mm – Vintage Hagstrom Bisonic, Starfire, and Gibson
• 17.4mm – Fender Pbass, and JazzBass neck
• 19.0mm – JazzBass bridge

So, which one is right one for musicmaster bass?

 

[LushPuppy]

I believe the 15.6 will get you closest to the right spacing.

 

[mrpackerguy]

Email him and he'll send you the right one - that's what I did - with new strings and cutting the tone-suck capacitor, it improved my Musicmaster's tone. Without doing those extra things, I really couldn't tell a difference between the Novak and the stock pup. And the Novak is not a humbucker either.

 

[WI Short Scaler]

Unless I'm mistaken the string spacing on Musicmaster is 17mm. That was the spacing on the Nordstrand I had in a Musicmaster body for some time. It worked well.

 

[bholder]

I believe the 15.6 will get you closest to the right spacing.

Yes I think I recall Musicmaster bridge spacing to be around 16mm, so 15.6 should be good at the pickup.

 

[Jefenator]

The spacing on my '77 Musicmaster is roughly 17.83mm (basically 18mm) at the bridge, 16.33mm over the pickup.
Some pickup makers like Aero might actually ask for a spacing spec in 10ths of a mm.
A Bi-Sonic in there would be pretty bada$$ but I've also been pretty impressed with the Aero Musicmaster bass pickup (4 poles for bass in the Strat guitar shape) and a red Lace Sensor.