Stupid But Good-Natured Question

[Eric Penzer]

I mean well, really, so don’t shoot me. I just got a new bass that is passive - TV Jones Thunderbolt pickups. The picks sound great but I wish there were a better variety of tones. Mostly I play active basses with preamps that allow for a lot of different tones. Byers the stupid part of the question - can I use a preamp with passive pickups? Are there pAssive and active pickups, or is it one size fits all? Also, related question - the bass is wired V,V,T. Is there a way to require it to make in V,Pan,T? Thanks all!

 

[klattman]

Passive pickups going to an active preamp is very common. I built a few basses this way.

 

[ctmullins]

Yep. And if you want to convert this bass to active, and if you like a pan pot instead of two volumes, have a look at Audere - they use a buffered blend, which is much nicer than the typical passive blend knob.