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Won the Wal pickup on ebay!!!

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#82
SGD Lutherie said:
Ah! I see. And thanks.

That's where adjustable poles irritate me. Obviously for Wal, they just make the pickup to match the bass. If you are making replacement pickups, what do you make them fit?

There's a minimum string spacing possible due to the size of the coils, but I'll probably have to make at least a wide and narrow size, or make them to order, but that can get complicated as there are so many different basses out there.

That's why I changed from poles to blades on my other pickups.

So I'm not sure what the spacing will be yet, but it will be something that should match a majority of the basses out there... I hope.
Click to expand...

As long as they fit in a Musicman style housing, I'm good...and waiting with cash in hand to buy the first set with filters... :hiding:
 
#92
SGD Lutherie said:
Yes, I'll be doing a 5 and probably 6 string version. It can really be any number of strings, since the coils are the building blocks. :)
Click to expand...

Awesome. I've got a 5 string 1999 warwick streamer STD that I'd like to drop a better pick up into.

Would I need to drill a lot of holes into make room for more control knobs, as my bass currently only has a volume and a tone knobs. I don't mind doing surgery, as I could probably take it to a shop to get the work done, I'm just curious is all.

Definitely looking forward to seeing how your work turns out :D
 
#94
PilbaraBass said:
coolness...
I'll take a 2x2 split for my P-bass ;)

actually, that's not as dumb as it sounds....
Click to expand...

That's not a bad idea... It would need a deeper rout, but it would work.

Jazz pickups are too thin though.. would need smaller coils. I did do something like that back in '94 using some small solenoid coils. I stuck it in a Jazz cover for my Ibanez SoundGear 5 string.

I found it in a parts box recently. It's a bit busted up and looks crude, but it worked well. It needed a preamp.

Here a bottom view with one bar magnet missing.
 
#95
SGD Lutherie said:
That's not a bad idea... It would need a deeper rout, but it would work.

Jazz pickups are too thin though.. would need smaller coils. I did do something like that back in '94 using some small solenoid coils. I stuck it in a Jazz cover for my Ibanez SoundGear 5 string.

I found it in a parts box recently. It's a bit busted up and looks crude, but it worked well. It needed a preamp.

Here a bottom view with one bar magnet missing.
Click to expand...

I wanna try making a similar pickup using the coil from small DC relays...

Edit (more):
also you could fit your "wal coil" to a P1 soapbar (like the Bart MK1, or Nordie Big Single) and it would make for an interesting pickup...you could RWRP two strings to get humcancelling
 
#96
PilbaraBass said:
Edit (more):
also you could fit your "wal coil" to a P1 soapbar (like the Bart MK1, or Nordie Big Single) and it would make for an interesting pickup...you could RWRP two strings to get humcancelling
Click to expand...

I now have Bart BC4 and BC5 size cases. My regular pickups fit in those.

I got the try the real Wal out briefly the other day. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn't what I expected to hear. It's much darker sounding that I expected, and is very sensitive to the string being right over the pole. It's that thick Wal tone, and much clearer than you would expect for a 20K pickup. But it doesn't sound like that Tool sound, if that's what people are thinking.

But I have to do a better test... it's on a five string bass, and the strings were too close to the pickup, since it's quite deep... the routs in the bass were not deep enough for the pickup.
 
#98
WarriorJoe7 said:
it could be the 2 pickups mixed and scooping out some of the sound and cancelling some of the lows.
Click to expand...

Probably. I get the same thing with my neo pickups, when I mix both pickups, it lowers the impedance and raises the resonant peak. Gives a nice piano like ring.

Also I was trying the pickup unbuffered. I'm going to do a better test later today if I get a chance.

It did sound nice though. Doesn't sound like anything else.
 
#99
SGD Lutherie said:
I got the try the real Wal out briefly the other day. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn't what I expected to hear. It's much darker sounding that I expected, and is very sensitive to the string being right over the pole. It's that thick Wal tone, and much clearer than you would expect for a 20K pickup. But it doesn't sound like that Tool sound, if that's what people are thinking.
Click to expand...

That's the rub...Tool is not what a Wal typically sounds like.
Listen to the Cranberries...Now that's what a typical Wal sounds like.
 
#100
Caca de Kick said:
That's the rub...Tool is not what a Wal typically sounds like.
Listen to the Cranberries...Now that's what a typical Wal sounds like.
Click to expand...

Oh I know, and Colin Moulding on a few CD's, and Tony Butler on those couple of Pretenders songs, Mick Karn.. etc. That was always what I associated with the Wal sound.
 
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