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Peavey Foundation database

#61
Here are some pics of my '87. Burst body, rosewood board, "pinstripe" head (wish I had the truss rod cover), 5 screw control plate, speed knobs with rubber bands, inset jack. I don't know know if the control cavity is shielded, but it's very quiet. Plays great and sounds so smooth with the TI Jazz Flats.

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#62
I do love a nice sunburst.

Hey, has anybody noticed the inconsistencey with the tuners. My 87 has the Fender style tuners with the hex adjustments, and Timber22's has the Grover style. I have an 84 patriot that has the same style as my 87, but I've seen earlier ones with the grovers. Does anybody know if there is a sequence, or was it random?
 
#64
I thought there was a post earlier about matching headstock Foundations. I have a rosewood '87 that is metallic purple with a matching headstock. The pinstripe is a contrasting pastel lilac. Unfortunately the original owner felt it would be cool to modify the horns to look like an SG. I have located a similar period Dyna-Bass body that I am currently painting as close to the headstock as I can. I have also bought a 2 band preamp. I have wired it passive/active with the passive circuit vvt before the switch. The passive tone is also functional in the active mode so I can quickly roll off highs. When I have assembled the whole thing I'll be sure to post some pictures.
 
#66
Actually, the new body is from a Dyna Bass, so the cavity is even bigger than a Foundation's. That said, Five pots, a jack, a switch, a preamp and a battery are alot to put in any control cavity. One nice point, the Dyna Bass has threaded inserts for the control cover screws. Unfortunately I didn't get the control cavity cover so I had to make one out of 1/8" wood sheet from a craft store. I have painted it to match the body which is hardening before I can do final wet-sanding and buffing. Then I get to assemble.
 
#67
I can't find the post, but I wanted to thank whoever mentioned that the black allen nut on the bottom of the old style tuners was a tensioner. I just assembled my Foundation/Dyna bass project and tried the tensioners out. They really work. I'll try to post pictures of the project tomorrow and let you in on some differences I found between Dyna Basses and Foundations while building it.
 
#68
Here are the pictures of my Foundation/Dyna-Bass project:

http://s360.photobucket.com/albums/oo42/bassmanrocke/?action=view&current=Dyna3.jpg
http://s360.photobucket.com/albums/oo42/bassmanrocke/?action=view&current=Dyna5.jpg

Here's the story, I bought my black and maple '87 Foundation and loved it so much I immediately started looking for more(a character flaw). I came across another '87 on Craigs list. When I got there I found the body had been modified to look like an SG and then spray painted a horrible pink/red. To complicate things the action was high and the headstock was its original purple. It was otherwise complete and did have superferrites. We agreed to $75 and it was my second Peavey. I took it home got out my trusty peavey wrench and the action problem was no more.

In the two and a half months that have followed I have managed to add 3 more Peaveys to my collection. So what to do with the homely number 2?

Well two things happened. First, I was hanging out at my local repair shop and started talking about my project and he pulls out a similar vintage Dyna-Bass body and neck that someone had broken the headstock, defretted and painting in black/gray undercoating. My wheels started turning, and the body became mine for $20. Secondly I realized that my older daughter who plays a little absolutely loves purple. I decided to do a purple finish to match the headstock and give it to her as a gift.

I have done spray can refinishes before, and I don't mean one coat and we're done. I have been painting and sanding and painting and sanding this bass for at least a month. The finish is almost factory level. It doesn't quite match the headstock, but it was as close as I could get.

The electrics are another story. Since the body was a Dyna Bass it had extra holes. I am a passive bass fan, so I toyed with filling the holes and making it a Foundation, but instead went with active/passive; though it is different than a Dyna Bass. I wired it passive vvt and placed the switch after this circuit so the passive tone can still roll off treble in active mode. The preamp is a 2 band I picked up on ebay for about $20. I thought about getting an Aguilar, but this went against the budget rebuild idea I had in my head. The system works very well and is extremely flexible and noise free.

I also happened upon a set of purple Aurora strings on ebay for anouther $20. I had to have these as they really finish off the theme well. I can hardly wait to give it to my daughter next weekend.

There were some things that I noticed were different between Foundations and Dyna Basses during the build that I thought I'd share(Besides the obvious active/passive thing). First, the bodies are not identical. The upper horn on the Dynabass reaches the 12 fret while a similar year Foundation only goes to the 11th. There were also some quality issues that go to the Dyna Bass' favor. The control cavity is larger on the Dyna-Bass due to the additional pots, but the cover screws are actually bolts and the body has inserts to screw them into . The ground strap hole under the bridge is different. The Dyna Bass has a small hole drilled to the rear pickup route. The Foundation's is a much larger hole similar to late seventies' Fenders. Finally, and probably the most important, the necks on the Dyna Bass are connected by bolts that screw into inserts in the neck rather than screws that go directly into the neck.
 
#69
WOW....that looks awesome!! I love the bridges on Dynas but that Foundation bridge looks pretty cool on the Dyna body.

I too have done pretty high level work with spray paint like that. I was considering it on my red Foundations and seeing your job makes me lean toward doing it instead of scrounging the money up to pay someone else to do it.

What a lucky girl come next weekend. ^_^

Great job!
 
#70
I didn't know where else to put this, and I figured my fellow Peavey folks would be able to appreciate it.

I acquired a set of Dimarzio pickups in a trade with Essthreetee, and decided to put them on the Foundation S. The Schallers on it weren't really doing it for me, but I love the bass in every other way. I tried one of those closeout 12 dollar split coils on it (I forget the name of the company at the moment), but it didn't do it for me and the solid pole pieces looked like crap. So back to my story. Got the Dimarzios wired up and tried them just to make sure I connected them right.

Oh.

My.

God.

It sounds incredible. I completely lack the vocabulary to be able to describe how much better it sounds, but I don't think there's any way I could be happier with it. Shockingly, it sounds very Geddy Lee to me; somewhere between the bite of the Rickenbacker and the kind of compressed sound of the Wal.

Bonus: the Dimarzios look exactly like the Schallers, so the bass looks stock and clean again.

I've been playing it so much I don't know if I'll ever get around to actually soldering the wires. :)
 
#71
I am surprised there is that much difference. The Schallers are built under liscence from Dimarzio, so if the difference is that noticable I would say you had a bad set of Schallers. I have used nos Schallers in three different P-Bass projects and they worked wonderfully. One interesting modification you can make if you don't mind adding a switch to you bass is to wire the P pickup parallel/series. This allows you to get a traditional p sound and at the flip of a switch get a more single coil tone.
 
#74
I have 3 black and maple Foundations including a '94 that is just like the one you are looking at. They are all good basses, and though most peavey players prefer the Superferrite Pickups, the newer ones might be a bit smoother sounding. All American Peaveys are quality built basses with exceptionally close tolerances. $175 is a solid though not exceptional price for a bass like the one you are considering. I got mine for $99 from a pawn shop, but that was an exceptioanally good deal. There are pictures of mine on post #58 of this thread if you want to use them for comparison.
 
#75
:crying: Why for does everyone else get the black Foundations but me? *snif* Why for do people get the burst Foundations but me? :bawl: I have 2 red and maples :rollno:....and why for am I complaining about it when I should just get off my aft and BLACK THEM out like I have been babbling about all over the place? :smug:

Just a drive by posting..carry on :D:bassist:
 
#76
Felt good... sounded fine (little bit of hiss as usual.)

Took it home.

It's by no means perfectly clean (some knicks etc) but nothing that makes it sound or feel bad. Bass is not my primary instrument, and this budget fit my needs perfectly.

There's a lineup to buy that bass I think, phone rang while I was there. The guy I bought it from was amazed at his response from the ad, he didn't expect so many responses so quickly. Turned out the guy was from my hometown of Kingston Ontario too.. weird.
 
#77
bassmanrocke said:
I am surprised there is that much difference. The Schallers are built under liscence from Dimarzio, so if the difference is that noticable I would say you had a bad set of Schallers. I have used nos Schallers in three different P-Bass projects and they worked wonderfully. One interesting modification you can make if you don't mind adding a switch to you bass is to wire the P pickup parallel/series. This allows you to get a traditional p sound and at the flip of a switch get a more single coil tone.
Click to expand...

Don't know what to tell you until I play another Foundation S. Maybe it's just 20 years of technology, but the Dimarzios are worlds better in this bass, so I wanted people to know about it. I've recorded with both in full bypass so I know there's an improvement. I hated the Dimarzio Jazz pickups, but really like these, and might not have liked them on anything else but this, which might explain why you've had good luck with them in other applications. The jazz pickup in this bass does nothing for me so wiring the split coil to sound like it isn't really an advantage. I've already got a Jazz that I love anyway (which does have a S/P switch) :).
 
#79

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