• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

Neck pickup volume dilemma

birdxofxprey

birdxofxprey

Aug 9, 2006
806
87
Indianapolis
www.bandmix.com
#1
Hello talkbass! I'm having an issue adjusting the volume on a neck pickup. Hope some of you have an insight into this. Thanks!

The neck pickup on my Spector Euro 5 sucks a ton of low end into my sound and I often have to roll back the volume on it just a little bit to tame it to my liking. No big deal, in itself.

The problem is that the volume knob for the neck pickup doesn't adjust the volume evenly. What I mean by this is that if the pickup is at full volume and I roll the volume knob back one quarter turn, the volume decreases by about 80% (thus, rolling it the rest of the way down does very little).

So when I need just a little less than 100% on the neck pickup, I have to roll back the dial a miniscule amount - 1 mm to much or two little makes a big difference - and that makes getting to the right spot very difficult, pretty much impossible to do on the fly. If I bump that knob while playing and move it just a little the sound changes significantly.

Anyone else experience this? Is there a way to adjust that knob so that it more evenly decreases the volume? What I need is for a 25% turn of the knob to decrease the volume by about 25% (a reasonable expectation, I think).

I've tried leaving the pickup all the way on or all the way off and compensating with the eq on the amp but that's a pain and not getting me where I want to be.

Thanks in advance for any advice.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Bar Band Bassman
#2
A neck pickup is usually a lot more bassy than a bridge pickup.

If the pickup windings are equal, I believe the neck pickup will tend to have more output as well. It' common to overwind the bridge pickup for a hotter output. Perhaps one of the pickups is not original, or the bridge pickup is weak.


You can mess with the height of each pickup. Raise the bridge for more output and lower the neck for less output. I usually try to set up my bass so the volume between pickups is even with the blend at the center or both volumes wide open. Also the sound may become a bit mid scooped when the level are equal.

Perhaps your volume pot is damaged or the wrong taper.

IME the effective range of blending two pickups is pretty small. After adjusting the blend control or one of the volume controls a small amount, you only hear the dominant pickup.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Bassdirty and Bassic_desires
#5
birdxofxprey said:
Thanks. Ive got the neck pickup lowered as low as it will go and bridge pickup is set pretty high.

I dont think the range for blending pickups is small. In this case its lopsided. If I wanted only a little neck pickup, I'd have a huge range to work with.
Click to expand...
What he is saying is that the USEFUL range of blend is small- as you mention, nearly half the knob doesn't have much audible effect. That is pretty normal from passive blending. If you really want even blending then you'll want to look into active/buffered blend controls- those are the only blends I've ever used on an instrument that give something similar to the "ideal" for blending. You can also mess with linear-taper volume controls- most likely the stock volumes are audio-taper, and linear taper in my experience can be a bit more useful for blending (still far from perfect though). Using a different value volume pot for one pickup won't likely solve the issue.

Edit: I'm not very familiar with Spectors, but what pickups and controls are in your instrument? Below posts suggest active EMGs, and the "Euro 5" instruments I see on Spector's site all show basses with Blend and Volume controls vs Volume/Volume to mix pickups. Also does your bass have a P pickup in the neck and J at the bridge or is it two soapbox-style humbuckers?
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Wasnex
#6
Forgive me for asking but could not determine in your post (at least with my eyes) Did you buy the guitar new and has this 'fault' always been present? Have you always had this problem if you bought it secondhand?
I'm not familiar with this guitar but it look like it has EMG BTS pre. That would make it very difficult indeed to change pots from A to B type as the existing pots have PCB's attached. (not impossible but beyond the average skill set)
If the problem has recently manifested then I'd say your pre has developed a fault, it it's still under warranty then get it fixed FOC, if not reach out to EMG.
Invalid Link Removed
Other less desirable action is to buy or obtain a cheap 2 band pre and jury rig to see if the problem persists.
If you look at the link there is a dip switch that controls the HF response , probable won't help your problem but play the instrument in the different switch modes to see if it sounds any better to you.
Other than that unless you know someone who has the spector or someone on here with one who can verify they have/don't have this problem then I'd look at the pre as the main offender.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Bassdirty
#7
birdxofxprey said:
Hello talkbass! I'm having an issue adjusting the volume on a neck pickup. Hope some of you have an insight into this. Thanks!

The neck pickup on my Spector Euro 5 sucks a ton of low end into my sound and I often have to roll back the volume on it just a little bit to tame it to my liking. No big deal, in itself.

The problem is that the volume knob for the neck pickup doesn't adjust the volume evenly. What I mean by this is that if the pickup is at full volume and I roll the volume knob back one quarter turn, the volume decreases by about 80% (thus, rolling it the rest of the way down does very little).

So when I need just a little less than 100% on the neck pickup, I have to roll back the dial a miniscule amount - 1 mm to much or two little makes a big difference - and that makes getting to the right spot very difficult, pretty much impossible to do on the fly. If I bump that knob while playing and move it just a little the sound changes significantly.

Anyone else experience this? Is there a way to adjust that knob so that it more evenly decreases the volume? What I need is for a 25% turn of the knob to decrease the volume by about 25% (a reasonable expectation, I think).

I've tried leaving the pickup all the way on or all the way off and compensating with the eq on the amp but that's a pain and not getting me where I want to be.

Thanks in advance for any advice.
Click to expand...
If you open your bass and you look at the volume control, whatever value it shows, does it have the letter "B" or "A" on it? It sounds like it's an "A" taper (usually the best, for most applications) and perhaps, for your case, you would like a "B"(Linear) taper. At the end of the day it might still not give you the result that you are exoecting, but it could improve it. The best way to blend signals is with a proper, and well designed, PAN (blend) control.
 
#8
The problem with adding blend (pan) pots or otherwise changing pot types is the unknowns of the effect on the pre. For instance they could swap out one of the volumes to a master vol/blend/treble cut/bass cut configuration but what effect would that have on the active circuit that is designed to operate under VVTB? There are so many unknowns on how it could affect the pre or maybe render it useless.
I had enough trouble adding a MN250 pot and replacing existing switch before I got it right - I had normal vol on each pickup but when blended at centre volume dropped by half -, I sorted the problem but it took a lot of re-work, and that was on a passive.
It's definitely something I'd not be comfortable to take on on an active.
 
#10
Do your pickups have 4 wires or 2?

I think Bartolinis are normally 2, but if they are 4-conductor wires, you could think about modding them for series/ parallel or humbucker/single-coil switching.

Or just hardwiring the coils in parallel as they are likely series out of the box.

I modded my Spector Rebop to incorporate a single-coil switch for each pickup via a push/pull pot. No new holes drilled. I love the results, and single coil is definitely brighter. My pickups are EMG Hz (4-wire leads).
 
#11
TeeSee said:
The problem with adding blend (pan) pots or otherwise changing pot types is the unknowns of the effect on the pre. For instance they could swap out one of the volumes to a master vol/blend/treble cut/bass cut configuration but what effect would that have on the active circuit that is designed to operate under VVTB? There are so many unknowns on how it could affect the pre or maybe render it useless.
I had enough trouble adding a MN250 pot and replacing existing switch before I got it right - I had normal vol on each pickup but when blended at centre volume dropped by half -, I sorted the problem but it took a lot of re-work, and that was on a passive.
It's definitely something I'd not be comfortable to take on on an active.
Click to expand...
Often the circuits consist of a passive section that feeds into an active section. This sounds like the case here. I suspect it’s two passive pickups, each with its own passive volume control. The output of the passive section then feeds into the active circuitry, and then on to the jack.

So modifications or troubleshooting can take advantage of this. Specifically, the OP can modify the passive circuit to obtain better blending (or whatever the goal may be), and that will still just feed into the active preamp. No problems.
 
  • Like
Reactions: TeeSee
#12
birdxofxprey said:
Hey thanks for comments.
This Spector is a Euro 5 LT with Bartolini pickups and a darkglass tone capsule preamp, mid adjustment in the control cavity.
4 knobs on front; bass, treb, neck vol, bridge vol.

Sounds amazing when I hit the mark, just trying to make the mark a bit easier to hit.
Click to expand...
If you are comfortable moving to a volume/blend setup then an active blend like one of these should help: Invalid Link Removed
LBCA-02 Active Blend Control (select the one for passive pickups)
You’ll want to use a volume control that is 25-100K or so when paired with either of these.
Or if you want to keep the volume/volume arrangement you could grab a dual active buffer like this: Bartolini AGDB/918-2 Dual Channel Adjustable Gain Buffer then swap out the volume pots with 25K or thereabouts. The cool thing about the dual Bartolini buffer is that each side has a gain control so you can dial down the hotter pickup before the volume pots.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Gearhead17

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back