dang!, thanks for all the positive comments!
Let me try to answer some questions...
The Dremel was hand held, I bought it in a tool-box kind of kit that has a lot of attachments. One of them is a 2" round base that fits over the front of it, to use as a platform to route into wood freehand. I'll post a pic of it later on.
The pickups... the bridge pickup is the one out of my Dean Sledgehammer. I bought a pair of Carvin Alnico pickups for the Dean. But before I did, I also bought a Rockfield pickup out of a Traben Chaos on ebay. So now I had 4 mm-style pickups. The Carvin pickups are going into the 'Hammer and now the original Dean and Rockfield pickups were left over. I actually put an ad up in the classifieds to sell these pickups, but that lasted about an hour before I came up with this idea.
Right now, the neck pickup in this Jazz is one of the Carvin pickups...it showed up at my door AFTER I gave the Dean to the Luthier (who has the Rockfield pickup...) When I get the Dean back, the Rockfield will go into this bass and the Carvin will go into the Dean as planned. [follow all that???]
For someone wanting to do this mod, it might be way easier to use the SD basslines MM pickups (5-string) because they are a basic rectangular shape without the tabs for screws.
Also the string spacing and taper angles of the strings may play an important role with pickup selection. The stock string spacing at the bridge of this bass is 18mm. The Dean is also 18mm so the bridge pickup pole pieces line up perfectly in this bass.
The Carvin pickup in the neck position is their "narrow" spaced pickup, which is I believe a 17mm. In the neck position, these pole pieces line up perfectly as well. The Rockfield pickup that will eventually find its home in the neck position of this bass is also 18mm, so the pole pieces will not look so "perfect" here. The Carvin "wide" pickup is 19mm. You can get away with the 19mm bridge and 17mm neck pickup as I'm eventually doing with the Dean. The SD basslines pickup is I think 17mm....so you kind of rally have to do some homework with pickup selection on something like this. I did all the homework for the Dean because t is a "better", more expensive and prettier bass. This one, as I mentioned, cost me $99. I don't care so much about how well the pole pieces will line up in the end, as long as they're "close enough".
I have the original pickguard, but I hate the plain white so I took it off. I was thinking about modding it to fit the pickup, but that means it'll still be white and I'll still hate it. I might paint it flat black, though or I might eventually buy a flat black pickguard and mod it to fit. I'm apprehensive about painting because the paint will scratch off from playing and it'll look cheap.
I installed the screws into the holes because I also hate having holes in the bass w/o the pickguard...Having the screws in there doesn't look as bad as empty holes.
will keep y'all posted as time goes on...
Let me try to answer some questions...
The Dremel was hand held, I bought it in a tool-box kind of kit that has a lot of attachments. One of them is a 2" round base that fits over the front of it, to use as a platform to route into wood freehand. I'll post a pic of it later on.
The pickups... the bridge pickup is the one out of my Dean Sledgehammer. I bought a pair of Carvin Alnico pickups for the Dean. But before I did, I also bought a Rockfield pickup out of a Traben Chaos on ebay. So now I had 4 mm-style pickups. The Carvin pickups are going into the 'Hammer and now the original Dean and Rockfield pickups were left over. I actually put an ad up in the classifieds to sell these pickups, but that lasted about an hour before I came up with this idea.
Right now, the neck pickup in this Jazz is one of the Carvin pickups...it showed up at my door AFTER I gave the Dean to the Luthier (who has the Rockfield pickup...) When I get the Dean back, the Rockfield will go into this bass and the Carvin will go into the Dean as planned. [follow all that???]
For someone wanting to do this mod, it might be way easier to use the SD basslines MM pickups (5-string) because they are a basic rectangular shape without the tabs for screws.
Also the string spacing and taper angles of the strings may play an important role with pickup selection. The stock string spacing at the bridge of this bass is 18mm. The Dean is also 18mm so the bridge pickup pole pieces line up perfectly in this bass.
The Carvin pickup in the neck position is their "narrow" spaced pickup, which is I believe a 17mm. In the neck position, these pole pieces line up perfectly as well. The Rockfield pickup that will eventually find its home in the neck position of this bass is also 18mm, so the pole pieces will not look so "perfect" here. The Carvin "wide" pickup is 19mm. You can get away with the 19mm bridge and 17mm neck pickup as I'm eventually doing with the Dean. The SD basslines pickup is I think 17mm....so you kind of rally have to do some homework with pickup selection on something like this. I did all the homework for the Dean because t is a "better", more expensive and prettier bass. This one, as I mentioned, cost me $99. I don't care so much about how well the pole pieces will line up in the end, as long as they're "close enough".
I have the original pickguard, but I hate the plain white so I took it off. I was thinking about modding it to fit the pickup, but that means it'll still be white and I'll still hate it. I might paint it flat black, though or I might eventually buy a flat black pickguard and mod it to fit. I'm apprehensive about painting because the paint will scratch off from playing and it'll look cheap.
I installed the screws into the holes because I also hate having holes in the bass w/o the pickguard...Having the screws in there doesn't look as bad as empty holes.
will keep y'all posted as time goes on...
