I have an Ibanez with two regular pickups and one piezo. Sorry, doesn't look as cool as the items here on display.
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Show us your 3 pickup basses!
- Thread starter Doner Designs
- Start date
- Jun 30, 2010
- 49,587
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- musician/artist/owner - Gildaxe
'63 Burns of London Vista Sonic med-scale - quite possibly the first 3-pu bass
Very tempting. I might try that out eventually. Those are quite expensive switches, but they look solid.Freeway Switch, master volume, master tone.
- Jun 30, 2010
- 49,587
- 221,959
- Disclosures
- musician/artist/owner - Gildaxe
Considering three pu basses and those with a myriad of pu switching options... kudo's to those who use such to tailor their sound both live & recording. I own two three pu basses, both with relatively basic tonal options. I rarely if ever use the neck-hugger pu - that much boom is not the tone/sound I personally prefer.* During an average gig, my primary tone control manipulation is the tone pot. Many players do not use or even have a tone control. Again - to each their own. Recording? I record clean w/a mic'd amp and d.i. mix, which can be sculpted in post production. So three pu's and too many options have no place there. It's fun having a lot of tonal options - I just don't know how useful it is in real-world application.., unless of course you're Bootsy...
*there are some 3 pu basses where the 3 pu's are butted up against each other in the more central "sweet-spot" (could be cool!) - I'm referring to a neck-hugger 3-pu configuration. Possibly appropriate for Reggae/Dub or Mountain/Cream material...
*there are some 3 pu basses where the 3 pu's are butted up against each other in the more central "sweet-spot" (could be cool!) - I'm referring to a neck-hugger 3-pu configuration. Possibly appropriate for Reggae/Dub or Mountain/Cream material...
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Is it a 2 pup, 3 pup, or 6 pup bass? The neck pup is dual coil, the bridge pup is quad coil. One volume for the neck, one for the bridge, but... The bridge coils can be ran in series or parallel, or you can shut half the pup down and run it as a single coil although that coil is still split and is really two coils. So the bass is basically 3 single coils that have all been split into 2 coils each.
- Apr 18, 2008
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- I'm highly opinionated and extremely self-assured
Definitely not 6 pickup. The definition of "a pickup" includes "must sense all strings". So a split-coil P pickup is a "pickup" singular, and not "pickups" plural.
You have three pairs of coils that each are capable of sensing all strings.
- Jun 30, 2010
- 49,587
- 221,959
- Disclosures
- musician/artist/owner - Gildaxe
I was anticipating something interesting, but it turns out the way it's wired it sounds like an anemic chicken! That option is usually a 6-string guitar thing and is not really something useful on a bass. I reversed the ground wires (as shown below) and it sounded much better - like a good Jazz bass. So Wild Dog is the M&B pu's, Treble is the M-pu only, Bass is M&N-pu's, and Contrabass is only the neck-pu and very bassy.
I followed @JIO ‘s instructions and made the same wire swap on mine, and it’s really hard to overstate the improvement. (I also took his suggestion and put D’Addario Chromes on, which were also a big improvement over the Rotosound TruBass strings, which I had only put on there because I had read somewhere that they were designed for the Burns Bison.)
I know some friends that have their own variant as this.
But not in the form of an Epiphone.
Center pick up is from a Bi-Cen TBird flanked by 2 ThunderBuckers which are since out of production.
But not in the form of an Epiphone.
Center pick up is from a Bi-Cen TBird flanked by 2 ThunderBuckers which are since out of production.
- Jun 30, 2010
- 49,587
- 221,959
- Disclosures
- musician/artist/owner - Gildaxe
Speaking of a Burns Bison.., if you are unaware of this awesome thread - you need to check it out. Dave Richmond (tb member!) joins in!
Would love to see the switching and EQ options on those basses!
This has three of the new EMG slim soapbars.
The bass on the left has 4 push-pull pots, from bridge to neck: Tone control with series-parallel for combining the neck pickup with the middle and bridge pickups, bridge volume with series-parallel for combining the bridge and middle pickups, middle volume with middle coils series-parallel, and neck volume with neck coils series-parallel.
The Triple-P has 4 push-pull pots and 3 switches, from bridge to neck: Tone control with inline bridge cap (like a Rickenbacker), switch for middle pickup and neck pickup D-G coils swap (turns the middle pickup into a reverse-P and the neck pickup into an "extended-P"), bridge volume with bridge coils series-parallel, switch for combining the bridge and middle pickups in series-parallel, middle volume with middle coils series-parallel, switch for combining the neck pickup with the bridge and middle pickups in series-parallel.
The Jazz bass has 2 concentric and 1 push-pill pot and 2 switches, from bridge to neck: switch for combining the 2 bridge pickups in series-parallel, switch for combining the 2 neck pickups in series-parallel, tone control with series-parallel for combining the 2 bridge pickups with the 2 neck pickups, concentric volumes for 2 bridge pickups, and concentric volumes for 2 neck pickups. The 2 bridge pickups are opposite polarities and winds (RWRP) - same with the 2 neck pickups - so they hum-cancel when combined. Also, the 2 pickups in the standard jazz positions are RWRP - same with the 2 pickups in the positions closer to the neck than standard - so they also hum-cancel.
The Tele bass has 4 push-pull pots and 4 switches, from bridge to neck, top row: bridge volume with series-parallel for bridge pickup coils, switch for combining the bridge and neck pickups in series-parallel, middle volume with series-parallel for middle pickup coils, switch for combining the middle pickup with the bridge and neck pickups in series-parallel, and neck volume with series-parallel for neck pickup coils. Lower row is tone control with inline bridge cap, switch for bridge pickup coils select, and switch for neck pickup coils select. The bridge and neck pickups are aligned so the hum-cancelling single coil combos are the outer coils combined, and the inner coils combined.
All the volume controls are wired shunt-style, which allows for independent operation in both series and parallel modes. All tone controls use .047 microfarad caps, and the inline bridge caps are .0068 microfarads.
Sounds more complicated than it is, as I think the controls are laid out fairly intuitive. There are a lot of great tone combos available on these basses. And you can always just run 1 or 2 pickups at a time.
Interesting combinations, they'd be fun to play with!
Do you find that, even with all those options, you sometimes gravitate to small set of options on each bass? I have an L-2500 and a Big Al SSS and, even with so many options available on those basses, I have "favorite" settings that I'm perfectly happy to use for an entire four set gig. I don't always do it because I like playing with the options, but I often do. That doesn't mean I don't appreciate the tonal variety they have, but it does mean I've played with those basses enough to find settings that I've kind of tweaked to perfection, at least as far as I'm concerned.
Absolutely brilliant! I'd love to take the 4 X single coil out for a spin!
