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Pickup Volumes

W

WilliamSandoval

Jun 1, 2011
788
5
Colorado Springs, Colorado
#1
I'm not sure how to word this question so if you don't understand... well, I warned you.

If there were two pickups- one bridge and one neck, and the neck pup was at 60% and the bridge at 40%, would it be the same as having the pups at 20% and 0%?

I understand that it would be at a lower volume, but would it be the same tonally even though the bridge pup isn't on?
 
#2
No, a pickup blend of 60/40 isn't at all the same as 20/0. 100/0 is pretty much like 20/0, because all the output is form one pickup, but when you combine the output from two (or more pickups), they each have their own signals that interact with each other.
 
#5
WilliamSandoval said:
If there were two pickups- one bridge and one neck, and the neck pup was at 60% and the bridge at 40%, would it be the same as having the pups at 20% and 0%?
Click to expand...

As has been said, no. If you want the same tonal blend with a different neck volume then you need to maintain the same neck/bridge ratio. You are starting with the bridge at 2/3 the neck so if you drop the neck to 20% then the bridge needs to be set to 2*20/3 = 13.33%. When you change the neck to 80% the bridge will need to go to 2*80/3 = 53.33%. It is the 2/3 ratio you need to maintain, not the 20% difference between the starting settings.

Ken
 
#6
khutch said:
As has been said, no. If you want the same tonal blend with a different neck volume then you need to maintain the same neck/bridge ratio. You are starting with the bridge at 2/3 the neck so if you drop the neck to 20% then the bridge needs to be set to 2*20/3 = 13.33%. When you change the neck to 80% the bridge will need to go to 2*80/3 = 53.33%. It is the 2/3 ratio you need to maintain, not the 20% difference between the starting settings.

Ken
Click to expand...
You're not accounting for the fact that the more you roll down the volumes, the greater the series resistance between pickups. After a point, the pickups are essentially totally isolated from each other, but if you have one volume all the way up, and the other only a little bit down, though you wouldn't notice much insertion loss, you would probably still see some interaction of the coils' LCRs. Whether or not you can hear this is up for debate.
 
#8
line6man said:
Whether or not you can hear this is up for debate.
Click to expand...

And that would be why I chose to ignore it! Ultimately the only way to get the precise tone you get at 60/40 is to set the volumes to 60 and 40. You would have to consider your VVT setup to be TTT and vary your volume only with the amp controls or a pedal. There is some truth to that (in a passive bass) but I thought that was outside the spirit in which the question was asked and if you happen to have an active bass the simple mathematical answer may be correct, depending on how the pickups are buffered and loaded.

Ken
 
#9
this talk of "percentages" is a little iffy anyway. with typical passive basses, you don't really get a continuous sweep of various tones as you blend one pickup up or down.

really, a jazz bass has 5 sounds:

-neck
-both
-bridge
-neck "loaded" by enough bridge to change its tone without becoming just "both pickups"
-bridge loaded by the neck the same way
 

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