Tapewounds on an ABG-acoustic bass

^^^
I'm running tapes on two Takamine ABG's with zero issues; not Fishman though. I think the Tacoma has the Fishman system, maybe someone in the Thunderchief club can help. Also check the ABG Fetish club.

 

Which tapewound strings did your Spectorcore not like? Now that there are so many variations on a theme, a different brand, gauge or model might work. For example, La Bella regulars and others of the heavier gauges (@60 to 110) will put more downforce on the saddle than lights, or strings of similar light gauge, like D'Addarios and others (@50 to 105), and La Bella has black tapes, white tapes, and copper tapes, to fine tune (pun intended) the tone desired out of the bass.

 

Piezo's respond to pressure ... vibrations. Tape wounds of any kind should work just fine with a piezo equipped bass. I'm guessing there's something amiss with the bass, not the strings. My Thunderchief has an under-saddle piezo (LR Baggs) and my Guild B-50 has a sound board piezo transducer(s) (K&K). Both work just fine. I'm not sure what model your bass is, but from what I saw on the website you also have a humbucker. There's a caveat on the website ... "For the proper operation of the Fishman piezo bridge pickup system the strings used must be standard metal. Coated or tape wound strings will not work." I understand this requirement for the magnetic pickup, but not for the piezo's in the bridge. I've used a Godin ABG with piezos in the bridge that was fine with tapes. I think the caveat isn't the piezo's won't work right, but the humbucker won't. The Fishman system is a simple mixer to combine the magnetic p/u and the piezo into a mono (or stereo) signal and it wouldn't get a signal from the humbucker.

 

Rob Allen's basses all use a Fishman piezo system, come equipped with nylon wrapped LaBellas and sound very good.

I've also used tapewounds with magnetic pickups and had no problems

 

Tapes on an acoustic bass are actually one of my favorite bass tones/sounds...very cool tone.

 

I have a Carvin AC40 fretless ABG. I had tried all manner of strings and couldn't find anything I liked that sounded good on it, and seriously thought about selling it. On a whim I remembered that I had of set of Fender tapes on my fretless P Bass a few years back I really liked, so I put a set on the the Carvin. The sound was awesome. It had more mwah than any of my electrics and is now my usual go to bass for playing in the p&w band at church youth group on Wednesdays. Great strings, and affordable as well. If you want to go with a more "upright-ish" sound, go with LaBella tapes. GHS Tapes are really cool, and I have a set on my five string fretless. They bridge the gap between the Fenders and LaBellas in tone.

 

Most (if not all) ABGs have a thin strip of piezo directly under the bridge saddle. If it is not positioned properly underneath the saddle, one side or the other will sound weak. (Oddly enough, it always seems to be the E-string side.) Or there may be some foreign object underneath the saddle preventing solid contact between the bottom of the bridge, pickup element, and saddle. But more than likely, it just needs shifting a little.

With my Michael Kelly Dragonfly, I loosened all the strings, and was able to reach in through the soundhole, and pulled slightly on the wires coming from the piezo element (they were on the E-string side of the bridge), which pulled the piezo element over towards the E string side. When I thought I had it in the right position, I put a little pressure on the saddle, and tightened up a string or two to hold it in place.

Works great now.

-Alex

 

It seems the Spectorcores bridges are a completely different animal. Looks like they are individual piezo elements embedded in typical metal saddles. And it seems they are using the entire saddle itself as one of the conductors. Now how they managed to rely on the string itself as the conductor to ground instead of any of the screws holding the saddle boggles the mind. Are all of the screws and springs non-conductive?

Then again, I've never actually seen one, so I could be completely wrong.

 

Piezo systems usually do not have an external ground to the bridge. Since the signal is pressure induced, instead of magnetically induced, as such a piezo elements generally have a high output impedance. They rely on a buffer preamp to interface to conventional sound equipment; the ground is part of the preamp design.

 

All electrical circuits, in order for current to flow, require a closed loop. I was merely inferring that the metal of the bridge saddle itself was being used as the return path — the "ground" if you will.