I got a bass of ebay, used. it's a warwick rockbass corvette. It was outputting nothing at first. i replaced the battery (which was dead) and checked the electronics and pots, didn't find anything obviously wrong with it. I plugged it in and still couldn't hear anything until I turned my amp ALL the way up. It is outputting at such a low volume my electronic tuner can barely pick up a signal from it. HELP!!!!!!
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Help with active electronics on new bass
- Thread starter poobone
- Start date
First of all, don't turn your amp "ALL the way up" because if the electronics do start working you could blow a speaker pretty easily. Second, contact the seller. Third, check the jack to make sure you are getting proper contact with the plug. Fourth, verify your amp is working properly.
It could still be a loose wire or broken connection on the battery clip, so the preamp is not getting any power. Is there an active/passive switch on the bass so you can try it in passive mode? It's usually a push/pull switch on the volume control with the regular Warwicks, but I don't know about the Rockbass electronics.
Mike
Mike
+1! The active electronics on my EBMM went out. Checked everything I could think of until I started poking around with my DMM. If you have one handy, plug in the 1/4" and check for power - pins 4 and 8 on the Op Amp. Pin 4 is ground and pin 8 should be 9/18V. This what lead me to find the one of the wires broke right at the battery holder.
Like the others say, it sounds like your preamp is not getting power. It's probably something simple.
Have you looked at the battery clip and checked that there are no broken wires? Pull VERY LIGHTLY on the red and black wires where they come out of the plastic shield that covers the clip. Sometimes a wire will break but stay up inside the shield.
If your battery goes into a holder with metal fingers rather than using a battery clip, sometimes it's just a matter of bending the fingers a little so they contact the battery more firmly; I have to do that with my Bongo periodically when it does the same thing.
If you don't find a problem there, take a look at the output jack; its a TRS (tip ring sleeve) jack, like stereo headphones use, and the middle (ring) connector, when it touches the shaft of a TS (tip sleeve) or mono plug, connects the ground of the preamp. If the contact is bent (it happens) so that it doesn't touch the shaft of the plug, the preamp won't turn on. You'll have to take the jack out of the bass to see that stuff.
Oh, and if you are by any chance plugging a TRS (stereo) plug/cable into your bass, the preamp won't come on.
Don't panic. Your problem is most likely something simple, and cheap if you end up having to take it to the doctor.
+1! Onboard active electronics are simple circuits, so problems with them usually require simple solutions. I would imagine that unless the previous owner starting tinkering with the circuit the problem is with the wiring. If you don't have a DMM (Digital Multimeter) then get one and learn how to use it. Otherwise get used to paying someone else to fix these simple problems for you.
