Hey Every one, I'm pretty new on here and just wanted to ask a quick question. I have been looking into getting a custom nordy made for my self, but when going thru all the options I was a lil unsure about pick up spacing. I saw 60's and 70's spacing. Im not sure about the difference, could some one help clear that up?
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Pick Up spacing
- Thread starter mikepcann
- Start date
How close to the bridge the bridge pup is and how far from the neck the neck pup is. Affects each pups sound. With guitars the neck pup is normally right up next to the neck. Hence you get a slightly diff sound from gibson scale versus fender scale guitars that are otherwise the same. With bass guitars though the neck pup is normally more like 1 and 3/4 to 2 inches away from the neck. For soapbar pup basses anyway. If the bridge pup is too close to the bridge it can cause overly treble oriented voice even with bass heavy pups. Hower, you ussuallu dont want the bridge pup to far away either. Or it starts to take on more the char of mid position pup youd have on a 3 pup guitar, or like trad P pup placement.
If your going with J pups, their narrower nature will make distances from bridge and neck a bit longer. Also in some cases, slanting them so one side is closer to the neck and other side closer to the bridge. This gives a little bit of that offset sound P pups have with their two halves where one side is closer to the bridge.
Id suggest talking to the builder about what your wanting to accomplish bass voice wise. To help you select pup placement. For example if you decide on P pups. You may find it suits you better to have them positioned reverse. Meaning the E&A string side is closer to the bridge. Rather then the more traditional opposite of D&G tsring half closer to the bridge. You should allready know what your fave pup type is. Soapbar, P, J, or humbucker (the giant ones with large exposed double row of pole peices). For both neck and bridge position. This can be two of same kind or any combination of 2 diff ones. You might for example decide to go with a soapbar bridge pup and a slanted J neck pup. Or even reverse positon P bridge and humbucker neck. Odd though those two weird example might seem. Lol. The more common would be two of same kind or a P & J pup setup. For bridge P pups I think it sounds better to have the D&G string half as the further from bridge side with the closer half at least 3/4 inch away from the bridges front edge. Though haveing D&G string half as the closer to bridge side can work fine if again its at least 3/4 inch from bridge and preferably a full inch. Imo.
If you look at various boutique basses along with Warwicks. You'll notice the pup placement is sometimes not the same as on most production basses. This is cause the maker and customer liked the tone tweak these shifts to pup postion gives. It has to do with both treblier/bassier sound and how other parts of the freq spectrum of the note are accented at various distances from the bridge. Its not a big difference, but can make for a nice or not as nice sound tweak. So again Id suggest discussing with the maker what youve liked and disliked about pup placement on various basses youve played or owned. And together decide what shift if any, from the common placement. Your pup installation will get. Part of what makes custom custom basses so unique is this greater customer and maker interaction to get the thing as close to dream bass reality as possible. Or perhaps even surpass it.
Maybe some of the pup and bass makers will chime in with their take on pup positioning & some starting measurements for the various pup types soapbar, P, & J.
If your going with J pups, their narrower nature will make distances from bridge and neck a bit longer. Also in some cases, slanting them so one side is closer to the neck and other side closer to the bridge. This gives a little bit of that offset sound P pups have with their two halves where one side is closer to the bridge.
Id suggest talking to the builder about what your wanting to accomplish bass voice wise. To help you select pup placement. For example if you decide on P pups. You may find it suits you better to have them positioned reverse. Meaning the E&A string side is closer to the bridge. Rather then the more traditional opposite of D&G tsring half closer to the bridge. You should allready know what your fave pup type is. Soapbar, P, J, or humbucker (the giant ones with large exposed double row of pole peices). For both neck and bridge position. This can be two of same kind or any combination of 2 diff ones. You might for example decide to go with a soapbar bridge pup and a slanted J neck pup. Or even reverse positon P bridge and humbucker neck. Odd though those two weird example might seem. Lol. The more common would be two of same kind or a P & J pup setup. For bridge P pups I think it sounds better to have the D&G string half as the further from bridge side with the closer half at least 3/4 inch away from the bridges front edge. Though haveing D&G string half as the closer to bridge side can work fine if again its at least 3/4 inch from bridge and preferably a full inch. Imo.
If you look at various boutique basses along with Warwicks. You'll notice the pup placement is sometimes not the same as on most production basses. This is cause the maker and customer liked the tone tweak these shifts to pup postion gives. It has to do with both treblier/bassier sound and how other parts of the freq spectrum of the note are accented at various distances from the bridge. Its not a big difference, but can make for a nice or not as nice sound tweak. So again Id suggest discussing with the maker what youve liked and disliked about pup placement on various basses youve played or owned. And together decide what shift if any, from the common placement. Your pup installation will get. Part of what makes custom custom basses so unique is this greater customer and maker interaction to get the thing as close to dream bass reality as possible. Or perhaps even surpass it.
Maybe some of the pup and bass makers will chime in with their take on pup positioning & some starting measurements for the various pup types soapbar, P, & J.
The 70's jazz bass had the bridge pickup slightly closer to the bridge. Just get up two images of the basses and have a look - it isn't a massive visual difference.
In general, pickups nearer the bridge sound brighter, pickups nearer the neck sound warmer. Slanting the pickups just makes the end nearer the bridge brighter, and the end nearer the neck warmer. Slanted Js do not sound like Ps IMO.
Lastly, as a rough guide, the further apart two pickups are, the warmer they will sound when mixed together.
+1.
The "giant ones with large exposed double row of pole pieces" are more commonly known as MM pickups. Humbucking pickups (humbuckers) come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, including P, stacked-J, side-by-side-J, split-coil, as well as soapbar. Many do not have exposed pole pieces, either.
Note that some manufacturers place all sorts of coil configurations inside soapbar housings, so the shape of the pickup is by no means indicative of the coils inside or the tones produced. Bartolini for one makes soapbars that have P, dual-coil, and quad-coil configurations internally.
Ric5
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- Jan 29, 2008
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Also you should consider pickup locations other than the Fender locations. The location of pickups for the jazz and p-bass have become standard. But the Gibson EB basses, Hofner basses, and Rickenbacker basses have true neck pickups. The neck pickup is an inch or less from the fretboard. This makes the notes played farther up the neck on the D & G strings sweeter. A lot of people don't know that Chris Squire soloed the neck pickup on his 60s 4001 for most of his work with Yes, and I think McCartney did the same. Pickups in the Fender locations are really good for slapping. Sometimes on a jazz or p-bass I like to route the neck pocket 1/2" closer to the bridge and then also move the bridge back 1/2". This effectively moves both pickups 1/2" closer to the neck. I like the tone this produces most of the time. It seems to work better on oil finish basses. Also When I convert a p-bass into a p j bass I will put the bridge pickup 1/2" to 1" closer to the neck.
On my fenderbirds I willl either put the neck 1/2" to 1" deeper into the body or just put the pickups in the Rickenbacker locations.
Check out the Sandberg California pj bass pickup locations.
On my fenderbirds I willl either put the neck 1/2" to 1" deeper into the body or just put the pickups in the Rickenbacker locations.
Check out the Sandberg California pj bass pickup locations.
