Pickup and Preamp overhaul: upgrading to Delano and ACG

I recently acquired this MPG Level 5 in a trade. And I've been kinda slow on projects lately, so I decided to take this bass to a whole new level (no pun intended!).

This particular bass has passed through a few hand lately and I asked a few of the previous owners why they gave it up. And pretty much everybody said it didn't sound lively enough.
Bartolinis tend to be a very mellow, smooth pickup and the preamp compliments that well. But if you're like me (and I know I am!), a Stingray-style bass should be kinda agressive. Punchy, thick...

And if you're familiar with single-pickup designs like me (and I know I am), you know that there are some tonal limitations that come with the simplicity.

Taking all of that into play, I decided I wanted to help this bass find all kinds of new uses! So I opted for a DELANO Dual Coil pickup and an ACG FILTER Preamp.



First thing's first: take the Bart stuff out!



I should mention that the ACG is a buffered preamp and is designed for 2 pickups. I decided to wire the pickup as North and South coil, as if they were 2 separate pickups.

I should also mention that the switch hole needed to be filled and I'm not one for dummy switches. But this buffered preamp isn't easily bypassed, so for the moment, I opted to wired up the bypass to just send the pickup directly to the jack in parallel mode. (And thanks to line6man for the advice on that one!)



Once the preamp was in, the pickup went in relatively easily and I wired the whole mess to the switch and VOILA!





It's now got a "WalEmbicRay" thing going on. I think I have some learning to do on the preamp settings, as it's practically infinite. But it's got a crispier, cleaner, and higher output. And the filer controls on the preamp can go from zingy-jazzy clear to absolute brown note with the flick of a wrist...
The art seems to be finding where within that swath to set things.

Anyway, I love doing projects like this!

 

The switch basically started as just a functional hole filler, honestly. But when bypassed, the pickup alone in parallel sounds great. It's very "authentic" to the SR5-ness.
And the ACG has a huge learning curve! I have to figure out how to work with it better, but every time I plug this in, I feel like I'm learning something.

 

UPDATE: I bagged the ACG. It was a cool preamp, but just a bit more than I needed for this. The natural tone was really good, so I opted to put in a real-deal Musicman Stingray 3 band. It wasn't a direct drop-in, but a fun project nonetheless.

Started with this:


Removed the pots:


Spliced in wires:

And pots:

Fit it in:

And added some foam to keep the board from hitting the shielding:


I plugged it in late last night and it's got the SR5 vibe in spades! I attached a crappily played clip though...

 

Matt Pulcinella made some pretty sweet basses for a while. MPG Home Page

He's since stopped making them to concentrate on his own music. But what he's built over the years are great basses that compare very highly with many other boutique companies. The prices have come down, but what you get (assuming it was taken care of) is a lot more bass for the money than you would with many other companies. I'm not going to name names, but this thing easily beats out some that I've played which cost a hell of a lot more.

I did actually take this to a jam last night and loved the results. Ergonomically, this bass is super comfortable in any position. It weighs very little, but sounds huge. And the new pickup and ballz-out preamp really cut through. The ACG was very capable as well, but man... what a learning curve!

 

Already sold it to my man Roger, sorry.