Stingray and bongo with tube amps

[Tim Skaggs]

Yeah, StingRay pickups are wired in parallel.

As I found all over the place when looking at the hot output issue. That was the primary info in my decision to re-wire my SBMM to be switchable to parallel (where it remains set most all the time). It has much more of a classic Stingray tone in parallel. I'm a little bewildered that SBMM decided on series wiring of the pickup. It has plenty output in parallel, much better high end, and I don't have to look for ways to keep it from OD'ing the input of my tube amp….

 

[Geri O]

Interestingly enough, I think my Stingrays have a fairly low output compared to some other active basses.

If your Stingrays are pre-Special era, then yes, their output is more along the lines of passive basses. I read that from something a Music Man person wrote, might have been Sterling himself.
Now, it's my understanding that the Stingray Specials, with the new 18v preamp are somewhat hotter now, but I've not compared my Special with an older model. I hope to sometime soon. But compared to my active Mike Lull (with an admittedly variable output on its preamp) that's moderately hot, not smoking hot, the output of my Special is fairly close.

(Note the lack of any hard numbers or data to make my points….)