help with bass pickups

[napier48]

i need help with bass pickups,
all I know is p-bass and j-bass, p-bass is more lower sound and j-bass has a brighter sound (like a slap bass sound)
i would like to know about other bass pickups like soap bars and other.
i have purchased a bass body and one square is drilled in middle for a pick up like a soap bar.
so i am thinking of buying a soapbar like a j bass, but i am worried it doesn't have enough of a "bassy" sound
so i am buying just one pickup can anyone recommend anything?

 

[Funkfingers]

Re: help with bass pickups

The bass guitar sound on "Whole Lotta Love" by Led Zeppelin is Fender Jazz Bass neck pickup only with roundwound strings. Does that go deep enough for yez?

Post either a photograph or the dimensions of the pickup cavity and where it lies between the bridge and the end of the neck.

How do you feel about active pickups and/or control electronics?

 

[DrNewcenstein]

Re: help with bass pickups

Description of the route doesn't say much. Could be a MusicMan style or a Rick, or an "active-mount" J-style, or a soapbar (which actually looks more like a Baby Ruth, but whatever).

If it's just a body, I'm guessing Warmoth with a MM style route, though centered would seem a bit odd to me. Or is it a P that was routed out square? Typically you see the MusicMan near the bridge, but anything's possible.

Then there are older Jackson models that had an actual guitar-sized humbucker bridge route.

 

[Funkfingers]

Re: help with bass pickups

These days, to simplify production (and, allegedly, to ensure pickup through pickguard fit), many J style basses come with a rectangular neck PU rout. Tantalisingly, this is slightly smaller than an EMG-35 or SD Blackouts For Bass dual coil "soapbar" pickup.

I concur with DrN that the single PU rout is probably in the MusicMan Stingray "sweet spot". Candidate pickups include the afore-mentioned SD/Basslines Blackouts For Bass humbucker and all variants of the EMG-35. The -35DC is supposed to work like a Musicman pickup. The EMG-35 P4 sounds good in this position.

Passive pickups are available in the 3.5" soapbar format. The obvious candidate is the SD/Basslines NYC Soapbar.

It would be easier to make potentially helpful pickup suggestions after seeing photographs of the actual bass body.

 

[napier48]

Re: help with bass pickups

 

[napier48]

Re: help with bass pickups

this is the bass I'm going to paint it black and the neck is
and i'm thinking of using this pickup from ebay

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Metal-Rail-...332795?hash=item2364e127fb:g:uh8AAOSwgApW~PDp

I plan on using flatwound strings cause i don't like the "slap bass sound of the j bass" but i want something different from a p bass.
i want to make more of a lead bass sound (um, like Jack Bruce, not metal) but not a j bass

i have also just bought this neck for it

 

[napier48]

Re: help with bass pickups

I want more of a hotter sound than a soap bar, but not metal or a p bass.
flat wound strings to take away from the "springy" sound of the j bass
I think i have what i'm looking for but but sugestions on the pickup would help.

 

[Funkfingers]

Re: help with bass pickups

Looking at the body photograph, the positioning of the bridge fastening screw holes strongly suggests a short scale length instrument.

Your neck appears to have a slanted heel. The neck pocket on the body will need to be reshaped to accept the slanted heel.

Mock up the overall length of the finished instrument. See how close to the edge of the body the bridge will finish up.

With the neck fastened in the pocket, mark the revised location for the bridge. (Measure the distance from the nut to the twelfth fret. That same distance from the twelfth fret is approximately where the saddle for the G string should go.)