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broken thumb

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I'm wanting to gut my thumb nt, and install a completely passive direct-to-output system. This bass is only used for recording these days and I've got no need for on board eq. I've also heard that this set-up is the best way to achieve the purest tone from an electric instrument. Does anyone have experience with this type of mod? Any recomendations for the ultimate passive jazz pups? Ive heard that Nordstrand, Bartolini, Duncan all make great passive designs, but I have no experience with them. I am looking for something with a strong well ballanced signal, and must be dead quite. Thanks JJ
 
I would prefer MEC active Js directly to the jack... should be killer for recording.
 
the direct mec hook up sounds like a ggod idea as you already have everything and it should sound great.
 
broken thumb said:
I'm wanting to gut my thumb nt, and install a completely passive direct-to-output system. This bass is only used for recording these days and I've got no need for on board eq. I've also heard that this set-up is the best way to achieve the purest tone from an electric instrument. Does anyone have experience with this type of mod? Any recomendations for the ultimate passive jazz pups? Ive heard that Nordstrand, Bartolini, Duncan all make great passive designs, but I have no experience with them. I am looking for something with a strong well ballanced signal, and must be dead quite. Thanks JJ
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I dunno if there really is such a thing. Passive pickups arent going to dead quite.
My advice is to first try doing it with the pickups you already have, before spending hundreds of bucks, based purely on the opinions of others.Or just pull on your volume pot & bypass the preamp.
Trust your ears.
 
Depends what you mean by ultimate jazz pickups. Imo Nordstrand make the best pickups of any type and they will give you the most balanced signal out of all the pickups mentioned. MEC's to my ears are really voiced with a lot of mid and a bass and treble are very compressed - not that i'm saying its bad just the way it is - and really gives the warwick sound imo.

Word of warning due to nordstrands being passive and very sensitive your bass will more than likely need some shielding done to it. Once a passive bass is shielded the hum and all that is close to the same as actives in my experience. especially if the pickups themselves are hum cancelling. I'd get the nordstrand nj4sv jazz pickups or the one of the spilt coil 5 strings pickups(if your playing 5 string).

You can just attach the output from your pickups straight to the jack np - saves having to take out the preamp and all that stuff. Or i'd recommend having a Volume for each pickup. Still gives you a pure tone but allows for a lot of flexibility in tone shaping that might be needed in the studio. This is talking from experience i've just spent 3 weeks in the studio with my sb-2 - all passive vol/vol bass and the independent pickup volume was super handy as it can be hard to eq in specific characteristics from the bass. Far better to get the vibe or tone you are after from the bass then eq as the mix needs it.
 
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Callum said:
Word of warning due to nordstrands being passive and very sensitive your bass will more than likely need some shielding done to it. Once a passive bass is shielded the hum and all that is close to the same as actives in my experience. especially if the pickups themselves are hum cancelling.
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Do you mean shielding with conductive paint or copper foil?
 
I was wondering which is better, paint or tape...
 
Either works. I used self adhesive copper foil because it was cheap. Warwick shields the electronics compartment with paint but not the pickup cavities - this is where i needed to shield (along with the pickups themselves) to get the nordy's to be playable, the electrics in my house are really bad! Just need to make sure each section of the shielding is connected to ground.
 
Would you choose a active or passive J pickup if you wanted a more compressed pickup? I am trying to have almost even output while playing fingerstyle and slapping, my fingerstyle volume is much lower than slap. I have to play harder with fingers which I dislike, also at the same time slap more gently which is not near as bad. I have MEC gold active Js atm on my Streamer, do you think passive pickups would be more compressed?
 
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