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Double Bass Wilson K4

#81
Listen, I am poorer then a church mouse but I make happen what I want bass wise. Manifest it is my motto. I also sell what I don’t use and recycle. Put the word out that you want a K4 and one will show up. Sometimes I wait a year or so but stuff shows up. Took me 4 years 2 basses a loan and a bunch of extra gear to get my Contrabassetto happening. Who cares what people think? Follow your interest.
My mechanic works from his home juggles his baby on his arm drives an old truck and can’t pay his rent. But he owns a fine set of SnapOn sockets. “My man” I say when he whips out those tools to work on my 25 year old VW
 
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#82
I'm poor too, now more than ever since my adopted city of Hong Kong has suffered the double whammy of months of protests and political turmoil followed immediately by this current virus scare. My income has dropped to well, let's just say, "not enough". The gravy train of gigs I had grown accustomed to riding for years here thanks to my city's once booming economy has derailed.. horribly! But we will get back on track eventually and I'm sounding better than ever now that my bass is outfitted with the Wilson K4. It's recent purchase is as much as an affirmation of my belief in better times ahead as it is an investment in better sound.
 
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#83
Mike Carr said:
I'm poor too, now more than ever since my adopted city of Hong Kong has suffered the double whammy of months of protests and political turmoil followed immediately by this current virus scare. My income has dropped to well, let's just say, "not enough". The gravy train of gigs I had grown accustomed to riding for years here thanks to my city's once booming economy has derailed.. horribly! But we will get back on track eventually and I'm sounding better than ever now that my bass is outfitted with the Wilson K4. It's recent purchase is as much as an affirmation of my belief in better times ahead as it is an investment in better sound.
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Better sound = better times!
 
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#84
Chris Symer said:
Although my Kolstein is now wearing a new bridge, I also had the Wilson in the old bridge with no problem. Played it with other pickups for a year or so with the holes from the Wilson open without any issues. I went for 11mm down this time hoping to get a bit less “direct” sound while still being clear and defined. I’ve also noted that as bridges age there can a degree of compression in the string slots. When the pickup was mounted at 9mm, after maybe 5 years or so it was more like 7mm. More of an issue on the g string because of its smaller diameter, even more of an issue in 5ths cuz now that is an A string and it cuts into the bridge more over time. Not a super big deal, just something I wanted to plan ahead for.
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Planning on still having gigs in 5 years? Love your optimism, Chris! :roflmao:
 
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#85
Back to the Wilson K4 for a sec...I have been using it exclusively with tubes in front either the BB or V8 from Sarno but I plugged it into a backline amp yesterday, Yikes, turn back the clocks to the 80's man. I wish I had known about impedance back in the day. I went thru a lot of gear back then and prolly 90% of my problem was mismatched imp. This pickup likes it above 5Mohms.
 
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#86
flatback said:
Yikes, turn back the clocks to the 80's man. I wish I had known about impedance back in the day. I went thru a lot of gear back then and prolly 90% of my problem was mismatched imp.
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Yes!....Would Class Action Lawsuits still be possible?
How on earth did the pickup designers & manufacturers not consider this as a huge component of pickup performance? I guess we'll never know.
Thanks.
 
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#88
Played again thru the big Ampeg SVT 3 Pro Amp with the 4 10 speaker box this evening. Straight in, no preamp. Right before we hit I played a few notes arco, just to check my level and EQ. The pianist said "hey, that's the sound!" So I left the knobs alone the rest of the night and just played and we had a terrific gig. One of our best ever! Such a pleasure to just simply enjoy my tone again!
 
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#89
flatback said:
. I wish I had known about impedance back in the day. I went thru a lot of gear back then and prolly 90% of my problem was mismatched imp. This pickup likes it above 5Mohms.
Click to expand...

Well there's a definite learning curve with this stuff, thing is, I did know about input impedance in the 1980's because Walter Woods set all his amplifiers to 1 Meg Ohms after he had Don Underwood send him one of his pickups. So, at the time

I was a little ahead of the curve, until we found out later that the Realist really works better with 5 Meg. and the Full Circle needed 10. It's really a combination of things, so a Realist or Full Circle into a Walter Woods because of it's stellar preamp

and the 1 Meg Ohm input impedance.
 
#91
Mike Carr said:
Played again thru the big Ampeg SVT 3 Pro Amp with the 4 10 speaker box this evening. Straight in, no preamp. Right before we hit I played a few notes arco, just to check my level and EQ. The pianist said "hey, that's the sound!" So I left the knobs alone the rest of the night and just played and we had a terrific gig. One of our best ever! Such a pleasure to just simply enjoy my tone again!
Click to expand...

I think it sounds great arco
 
#92
I gotta say, I used to think that even the other band members were aware if I had high or low action or an acoustic rather then a pickup sound. What I have since found is that when i play with a pickup that enables me to play my best be heard kick the rhythm and interact authoritatively, they just think I am a better player suddenly. They have no idea other then that what I am doing. Since getting the K4 I keep getting the same reaction of smiles and "kickin it dude" like suddenly I got 200% better.
 
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#93
I can dig it man! The guys in this group are good friends of mine and we have been playing together a long time. They've witnessed and a few times have silently suffered some of my pickup experiments on my Czech Ease. For some reason that bass has been real hard to get a sound with in one venue in particular we play in. It's a busy place most of the time with lots of chatter and the air conditioning blower is nearby and plays an audible mess of notes that seem to be right in my range. A real drag! But it's a weekly steady Monday and pays well. The best part is the group. Superb players and we've been together for more than two years now so we are really tight. Wonderful repertoire and arrangements too. A joy to play with this group. But very cramped little stage with not really enough room to risk damage to my better normal sized bass which sounds great with it's Realist Lifeline. So after trying and retrying every one of my too big an assortment of pickups, preamps and blenders I opted to use my Clevinger EUB there. Better to use a great sounding EUB there than dealing with hassling with all of that. But the music we play really deserves a more acoustic sound than the Clevinger offers. But now that I've got the David Gage bass wired up with the K4 it's really fun to play it there again. I'm happy and so are my brothers in the trio!
 
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#94
I rented a Czech ease from David once when I was in NY for a gig and I didn’t dig it. Dave Holland uses one and honestly I way prefer his old 5/8 ths.
It’s all moot now though... my calendar just emptied out like a flushed toilet. Prolly won’t have a gig til next year. The fires hit the wine country two years ago killing that and now this man. My practice room is looking like a prison cell. Drove my kid over the hill to school this morning and there wasn’t anyone on the road. Maybe I should take that cruise gig... oh wait....
 
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#95
flatback said:
I rented a Czech ease from David once when I was in NY for a gig and I didn’t dig it. Dave Holland uses one and honestly I way prefer his old 5/8 ths.
It’s all moot now though... my calendar just emptied out like a flushed toilet. Prolly won’t have a gig til next year. The fires hit the wine country two years ago killing that and now this man. My practice room is looking like a prison cell. Drove my kid over the hill to school this morning and there wasn’t anyone on the road. Maybe I should take that cruise gig... oh wait....
Click to expand...
 
#96
Not everyone likes them but I've learned appreciate for what it is instead focus on what it's not. It's been my faithful pint sized sawed off little money maker for years now. But sorry to report that my calendar looks like Swiss Cheese now. Cursed virus is something we've been dealing with here in Hong Kong for a couple months now. Now the States and elsewhere are in panic mode. Staying calm, handwashing and common sense will see us to the end of it
 
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#97
Yeah man
I only tried one once( czehease) im sure they can be good... the beat up rental was not
But I’m really liking the Wilson. Way better then I thought I would. With the tube pre and MAS it sounds damn good and I keep plugging it in instead of the other...
 
#99
I'm fortunate enough to have not one but two Wilson K4 pickups. I'm planning on having one installed. My question is what's the deal with the twisting for different tones. Fishman full circle details this but how does it work with the Wilson's?
 
#100
You can only try.
It can be a sound and volume variation.

So you can control string volume to get a comparable volume output on each string. If the sound differs too much you can adjust all for higher or lower volume to get a more similar sound.
if you are not satisfied swap pickup elements and see if you can get better results this way.

Best start with only one element inserted into the bridge and play that string, turn it a bit, play again and repeat until you get an impression what happens.
Try the next element (number them if they aren‘t) under the next string (remove the first one) and try that string like the first one.
Repeat for the other ones.

Then use the quietest pickup string combination, dial in a nice sound and do with the next ones, one after the other.

That takes time but less than trying all together from the start.

The Full Circle is easier to explain and dial in.

Remember, a good sound is more important than a high output signal.
 
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