GSR206B Budget Modding

[Nuage420]

Hey guys, I am starting a little thread for my tinkerings with the GSR206B I recently picked up. The goal is to increase the performance of the bass as much as possible on a budget.
This is purely for fun and learning.
I have no idea what I'm doing! But I'm gonna figure it out along the way. I'll screw it up a bunch, learn how to fix my screw ups and share it here. Hopefully it helps someone and I'm sure you guys will offer tons of advice along the way. I'll attach pictures along the way as well.

Now a little of my background so you have an idea of my level (lack of) knowledge. I'm no aspiring luthier nor am I a professional musician. My biggest fans are my kids who are too young to know how bad daddy really is on "his big guitar" and my friends who thankfully don't throw beer bottles at me when I play around them. When I'm not at work and not playing bass I work/ abuse/ race cars and motorcycles. I'm uneducated in this subject matter but not incapable of learning.

Onto the Topic at hand. I'm planning on purchasing one of the EHB1500's from ibanez and I'm debating the 5 or the 6 string. I've never touched a 6 string before but I have recently begun studying theory and extended range seems like a great tool to have around. before I drop serious coin on an extended range I wanted to give it a test run for a few months so I took a trip to GC to get my hands on two basses, an SR 2405 ,similar to my 4 string SR1300 main bass, and an ESP LTD 6 sting. Well they didn't have the ESP despite online inventory saying they did, so i plugged in the 2405 and gave it some jam, sounded great felt great was heavier than I expected. then I noticed this little 206 and figured SR becks don't vary much in size and shape so even though it's their bottom of the barrel model I could get an idea of how much access I would have on the fret board. An hour later in finally unplugging the 206, went to plug the 2405 back in and said nah screw it. it sounded great, felt great, the fear I had about it being over whelming with the added strings and tighter spacing disappeared after the first couple notes. It was instantly comfy and playable. I Grabbed the sales guy to get an appraisal on a bass I had picked up on a good deal (1992 peavey foundation) and turns out I got a great deal and I was able to trade it in and talk the price down on this 206 so it didn't cost me anything out of pocket. (BTW GC isn't doing the 10% off with trade right now with covid, but I got him to give it to me as "open box" something to consider if you're going that route).

I got home immediately put on the neon green eadg strings I pulled from the peavey before trading in (i have a 6 string set on the way for the B and C) and spent an hour or two setting it up making sure everything was snugged up. Went to put strap locks on and discovered the screws from. The factory are a larger guage than the screws that come with the locks. The top horn screw didn't even come close to tightening. So I put the stock button back on. I'm going to fill the hole with epoxy and give the slimmer screw something to bite later down the road. (if anyone knows a reason not to do it this way and can offer a better suggestion please chime in). Next low grade issue is the machine heads, well they're cheap and work but aren't the smoothest, I find myself shooting past and having to back off a lot. I solved this problem in the classified where I found a set of gold take offs from a Tune Bass that also came with some dome and concentric knobs and a bridge! I'm pretty excited about this, they're gold and I would have liked black but for $100 bucks I'm more than happy and the quality and performance increase in relation to the price.

I'm going to swap the nut out as well and really get this baby singing. The next area of interest is the electronics.

 

[Nuage420]

I have an EMG 3 band I removed from my schecter studio that I want too use. This is where I will probably have the hardest time and biggest fail. I work on my cars and motorcycles so I can solder well enough but HATE IT. I get anxious and unsteady when I have to use finesse. I'll have to drill holes unfortunately to use the 3 band and I may not want to do that. It's a free take off i already have so it's worth a look. (Again if anyone would like to chime in on this one I'm all ears) .

The final touch will be painting the body. Sorry, I already had the poo brown sr500 and I just don't dig it. And for a cheap bass I'd rather give it a good DIY paint job and let it be different than the rest. To keep costs down I'll use paint amd clear I already have in my garage. I'm leaving towards a flat camouflage green or a flat white, maybe I'll find a way to use both.

I had only one mishap but it's negligible. The battery cover had the metal inserts however the electronics cover is just self tap screws. Well when you goto remove it becareful, it's stuck on there. I don't know qhat adhered it but I had to use a mini flathead and pry it open after I broke two 1mm picks trying to pry it off. No biggie but it left a tiny mark, there's going to be hundreds more before I'm through and it's going to get sanded and painted anyways.

That's all I can think of for now. Thanks for following along and hope you enjoy!

 

[Aidil]

Seems the new bridge is rather short in saddles travel distance compared to the original. Or is it just the angles of the photo was taken?

 

[Nuage420]

Not sure, I just tried to recreate for approximation. It probably has more than enough adjustment accomplish the task. if not I'll figure something out. I was only looking for tuners, the knobs and bridge were bonus. I tried to figure out what it came off of and it seems the average price of Tune Bass with this style bridge was a few thousand bucks. And the tooling marks lead me to believe it'll have more mass and will be a significant improvement. What I'm unsure on is where exactly I need to reference the mounting of the new bridge. If I'm too far it'll throw off the intonation along the fret board right? I couldn't just mount the new bridge farther and stretch the scale length to 34.5" because that would mean my frets aren't in the correct location?

 

[Nuage420]

Did some height adj on the pickups and fiddled with the Phat ii. Couldn't really clear up the mud while using my MB 103p, even flat i would have needed to cut bass on the amp to clear up the phat so I plugged into my little B30 acoustic and used it to adjusy the pickups and find a sweet spot that would allow me to maximize the range of the treble cut knob and increase the usabile range of the phat2. I found a good spot was able to even out the volume across the strings and made the tone changes on the treble cut and bass boost knobs more noticeable and usable when i plugged back into my MB. I think I'm actually going to attempt to keep the phat2 in the bass as well as add the 3 band eq. It's a nifty easy to access scoop that has a place in my playing style. I can see rolling it on a little to boost a solo part or if you just need to cut through a hair and not have to mess with your 3 band on the fly.

 

[KaraQ]

When I put the EMG GZR pickup set in my GSR200B, I wired the phat II back in. The higher output/better pickups made a pretty significant change (for the better) in the sound and usefulness of it

Looking forward to your progress on your mods!

 

[Nuage420]

When I put the EMG GZR pickup set in my GSR200B, I wired the phat II back in. The higher output/better pickups made a pretty significant change (for the better) in the sound and usefulness of it

View attachment 3907632

Looking forward to your progress on your mods!

Awesome! I'm glad to hear my theory confirmed. I made a fun dirt patch on my gt1b for a song I'm working on and I just tried it out and was able to use the phat a little to help the scoop that's already there and created almost a bi-amp sound. Let the notes punch through harder and keep my bottom end cranked underneath.

 

[Jon Draffan]

[QUOTE\]....I'm going to fill the hole with epoxy and give the slimmer screw something to bite later down the road. (if anyone knows a reason not to do it this way and can offer a better suggestion please chime in)....[/QUOTE]

I was taught by a luthier to fill loose straplock holes by cramming flat toothpicks covered in yellow wood glue into the hole and break them off where they stick out. Cram as many as you can in and let it dry. Sand the broken ends if they stick out too far. That gives you some 'sort-of' wood to screw into. I have used this technique on everything from old bases to lose fence latches.

This looks like a cool project, thank you for documenting the process.

 

[Nuage420]

@Jon Draffan That makes sense to give it bite. I'll do this when I re finish the body so I can sand everything down. I may even add some extra contour in the sanding process.
I'm pretty excited about it. I considered trading it back in and knocking some of the cost off of my EHB but I'm a tinkerer at heart and want to learn how to do this stuff.
I can say though, I picked my premium ibby up earlier to play and holy moly there is certainly a grand worth of difference between the two in every category. It let me know to always play the 6 string first and enjoy it before I blow it away with my premium lol

 

[TerribleTim68]

Curious what you race.

 

[Nuage420]

Curious what you race.

I've had everything from import to domestic, i run canyons on a 2019 zx6r. Current project is a boosted rsx working out an awd conversion. I'm naughty and don't exactly do anything sanctioned.

 

[TerribleTim68]

I've had everything from import to domestic, i run canyons on a 2019 zx6r. Current project is a boosted rsx working out an awd conversion. I'm naughty and don't exactly do anything sanctioned.

Got ya, I'm more of the sanctioned thing. Ran this for a long time -

NASCAR sanctioned short track oval stuff.
Now we're trying to step back a bit to something more affordable, so I'm building this -

Won't be a sanctioned track, but still short track oval stuff.

 

[Nuage420]

Got ya, I'm more of the sanctioned thing. Ran this for a long time -
View attachment 3907990
NASCAR sanctioned short track oval stuff.
Now we're trying to step back a bit to something more affordable, so I'm building this -
View attachment 3907991
Won't be a sanctioned track, but still short track oval stuff.

Awesome!!! When i retire I'd love to get into more legitimate stuff. Probably rally cross. For now I am an extreme enthusiast most of my seat time is canyons and mountain roads. Some autocross days and track a few times.

 

[Andyman001]

any uses planned for the old bridge??

I'm wondering if it is a direct replacement for my (old) SR-506

 

[Nuage420]

@Andyman001 I don't know yet, might sit around as a backup. It's a B10 bridge I'm not sure if it's equal to or lesser than what you have. I'll certainly give you first crack at it if I don't need it though.

 

[JRA]

congrats on your new instrument, OP!

what a great project! looks like you're on your way to a great looking/playing ax. looking forward to your pics and your progress!

 

[Nuage420]

@JRA Thank you, it's a lot of fun and I'm already finding fringe benefits when I pick my 4s back up. My slap accuracy is dramatically improved, and I'm more comfortable with my fretting p and down the neck. I'm really glad I didn't buy a more expensive model, it's solid bone stock.

 

[AudioTaper]

[QUOTE\]....I'm going to fill the hole with epoxy and give the slimmer screw something to bite later down the road. (if anyone knows a reason not to do it this way and can offer a better suggestion please chime in)....

I was taught by a luthier to fill loose straplock holes by cramming flat toothpicks covered in yellow wood glue into the hole and break them off where they stick out. Cram as many as you can in and let it dry. Sand the broken ends if they stick out too far. That gives you some 'sort-of' wood to screw into. I have used this technique on everything from old bases to lose fence latches.

This looks like a cool project, thank you for documenting the process.[/QUOTE]

That's a quick way to do it. Or you can drill it out a little larger and get that size dowel rod, use good wood glue (titebond). Wait for it to dry all the way (24hrs)
I wouldn't use epoxy, not for long term.

Cool project

 

[Nuage420]

@AudioTaper You know what, I think i like that more. As long as the glue holds. Both methods should be fine.

Just grabbed the next piece of the puzzle.
MAMA single coil with 18mm spacing which should match up with that new bridge with 18mm spacing.

 

[Nuage420]

Got the rest of the strings in today. Tunbridge tomorrow should have the bridge tuners and knobs arrive. I also ordered a 2nd bridge that is an ibanez b306 in case the tune bridge isn't going to work out. Also ordered a 2 band concentric so I can keep the factory holes as well as keep the phat ii in the mix.