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Official Zon Club Part 5

#3,281
smeet said:
Oh also, the bass was made in 2012 and not 2004. I don't care either way, but what if any difference is there between basses in those years?
Click to expand...

Oh great news! I was also wondering cause from the pictures in the classified it looks more "modern" than a 2004. They started adding Trussrod beginning of the 2000's so you have a more modern one that should be more durable in the future. I also believe the neck coating will stand better in the long run. (I have a fretless that spent 6 months this year to get the neck recoated, it is now absolutely perfect and feels like new but still).

If it was me i would also avoid sending it back to the ZON shop, they would definetly make it right for you but who knows how long it will take, my fretless recoating took a little bit less than 6 month, it was ok cause I did not really need it but that's a long period for a maintenance.

My recommendation is to find a trusted tech that is local to you, get the John East (if the size match of course) and give it a shot, you will immediately see if it's working for you without the hassle of the wait time and the shipping cost (back and forth).

The polyfusion is nice, very musical, but for a me a quality preamp is a quality preamp :)

A more standard preamp that any good tech can service is the right move for an instrument that should serves you well for year!
 
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#3,285
smeet said:
I would have to mail my bass to Zon to have the ZP-2 installed...
Click to expand...
mmmm.... yeeeaahhh, no. I would also not do that. Joe's shop is absolutely notorious for taking a very very long time to do things and not communicating very well during that time.

I'd either just insist they send you the parts/instructions and have a pro install it, or, go a completely different direction as mentioned here with a aftermarket system. I think my Sonus has a bart in it, and it sounds great.
 
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#3,286
smeet said:
OK, I just got off the phone with somebody at Zon (not Joe). As already determined, it is NOT anything that Zon makes or uses. The installation seems to have been done pretty crudely, resulting in the aforementioned strange blend behavior. The original preamp was a Polyfusion ZP-2.

I would have to mail my bass to Zon to have the ZP-2 installed. So... Seeking opinions and experience - Polyfusion ZP-2, or John East Uni-Pre? The Uni-Pre has sweepable mids, a passive mode, a bright switch, and configurable low and hi frequency controls. Is the Polyfusion better for this instrument in some way?

By the way, here's some more pics. The back side of the preamp board (says basstec?):
View attachment 7076196

And the pickups, are these original? Neck:
View attachment 7076197
Bridge:
View attachment 7076198
Click to expand...
The Polyfusion pre is very mid focused with shyer lows. My Sonus had the 2-band Bart circuit and it slayed. Something to consider. And no, you shouldn't have to return the bass. Joe sent me the Polyfusion when I tried it.
 
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#3,290
smeet said:
I'm trying to decide between a traditional 3-band eq and trying out a filter-based pre... May as well try something new I guess!
Click to expand...
Do it!

I'm getting a bass built with a filter preamp from JTex in Canada. It is:

Two of these (one for each pickup) JTEX Electronics - Distiller
One of these JTEX Electronics - LFC (1-band EQ)

I have demo'd this preamp and it sounds great. It's based on how the Alembic filters function, but the design is now pretty different. They have a wider bandwidth than most of the others that I've looked at on the market (ACG, Underhill, Lusithand).
 
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#3,291
Nolan Tremblay said:
Do it!

I'm getting a bass built with a filter preamp from JTex in Canada. It is:

Two of these (one for each pickup) JTEX Electronics - Distiller
One of these JTEX Electronics - LFC (1-band EQ)

I have demo'd this preamp and it sounds great. It's based on how the Alembic filters function, but the design is now pretty different. They have a wider bandwidth than most of the others that I've looked at on the market (ACG, Underhill, Lusithand).
Click to expand...
I’m hearing a lot about JTex lately. How easy is it to install myself? I can solder but not circuit design. The main contenders seem to be JTex, East/ACG, Lusithand, and Underhill, but how to decide? Features look similar, so how about ease of use and sound quality?
 
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#3,292
smeet said:
I’m hearing a lot about JTex lately. How easy is it to install myself? I can solder but not circuit design. The main contenders seem to be JTex, East/ACG, Lusithand, and Underhill, but how to decide? Features look similar, so how about ease of use and sound quality?
Click to expand...
I'll be honest that the builder is doing everything, so I don't 100% know how easy the install is, but the JTex components all use pin connectors, so those components would be solder-less.

I did a video demo with my builder when I decided to go with this preamp with another bass with the preamp that is now owned by @Bernie Connors

It really does what I expected out of a filter preamp and I found that the 1-band bass EQ was really useful for what I was hearing on the demo. It had a ton of tones available, as you'd expect out of a filter preamp from the many demos you can find on youtube, etc of Alembic/Wal basses. The Distiller goes up to 8 kHz for the LPFs, so that's quite a lot higher than most of the other options (about an octave to two octaves, as I believe the Underhill/ACG/Lusithand have cutoffs in the 2.5-4 kHz range). With the Q switch I found that the higher settings could do what the pick attack filter does on the Wal or now the other preamps that offer it, so even though that's not specifically offered on the JTex as a separate control, it can do the same function through the LPFs.

This demo from @Combinator is quite similar to what I heard in the demo with my builder, but the MTD has only one filter rather than a filter for each pickup.



JTex pushes the idea of very high signal to noise ratio on their site and Jerry is the Chief Electronics Technician at McGill University's Sound Recording Program (from his website), so I believe that the quality of the signals is very high. McGill University is a well known and prestigious institution in Montreal.

I won't get my bass until next month, so I can't give a first hand account, but the video chat demo I did with the builder I'm using was very convincing that this is a very good system.
 
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#3,293
kesslari said:
I'm a big fan of John East's preamps, and have one of his (ACG) in my Zon and love it.
I'm told the Mike Pope is also another smashingly good fit, sound-wise.
Click to expand...
Between my different Zons, I've had/have Polyfusion, Bartolini, Aguilar, East U-Retro, East/ACG, Pope and Demeter and by far the best is the U-Retro. I think my TJ6 has had an East for almost 20 years now?! Time flies. But East and Pope were my favorites with my Lane Poor-pickuped basses. I like the Bartolini or Aguilar with Bartolini pickups. Polyfusion is always good, too. Only one I didn't really jive with was the East/ACG, but it was also a single pickup bass so less room to mess around with the sound.
 
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#3,294
and a Happy Holidays to everyone!

PXL_20241225_093901004.jpg
 
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#3,300
I don't think it's been shared here but Joe joined a luthier podcast about a year ago (February 2024)

Luthier on Luthier with Michael Bashkin

I really enjoyed listening to this and understand better the Ethos, while the carbon neck is for me the "magic" sauce of the ZON, Joe is actually passionated about tone wood

There is a little bit of back story of the change at the shop, my understand is that he scaled down A LOT and basically became a one man shop (+ Martin I believe), I wish he had more actively shared about that because that's probably why we all struggle a bit with order and reaching out to them.

Anyway, they are still my favorite instrument, I've been playing other cool brands for the past month but my ZONs will be there forever (I might actually add more to the stable :) )
 
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