I have noticed a few Ric's with J pickups in the mute cavity. Jeff has one on his site. I have a few questions:
1) How does this change the sound? I'd think you'd get mostly hi end being so close to the bridge.
2)How is it hitched up to the rest of the bass? Is it wired with the other pickups?
3)Do you need to do any routing or drilling?
Thanks.
J pickup in mute cavity
Moderators: rickenbrother, ajish4
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jwr2
I think Bartolini came up with the mute pickup idea ... I have one of the bart mute pickups ... it requires some wood removal to fit in ... I don't like the sound of the bart mute pickup ... it is not bad but it just isn't good ...
ok the jazz pickup ... I started doing this with 4003s5 basses ... the 4003s5 has a 15k ohm high gain treble pickup ... so the S5 can be kind of fat sounding ... the jazz pickup adds a little bit of treble bite ...
I use a Seymour Duncan 1/4 pound neck pickup. I trim the bobbin so it will fit. It does not require any wood removal. This changes the sound a little, but not dramatically. I wire it into the neck pickup volume control. This provides humbucking and noise reduction. When to toggle to the neck pickup you get a toaster and the jazz mute pickup together. This sounds like a 4005 a little bit. I also wired it into a toggle switch and then into the neck volume pot on one bass. This provides more options. A logical way to wire it would be 3 volume controls and one tone control and no toggle, but I have not tried it yet.
On a 4003 with two 11k ohm high gain pickups the mute jazz pickup is not necessary ... the high gains get enough treble bite ...
If you remove the mute then you need to relocate the ground wire to the bridge/tailpiece ...
ok the jazz pickup ... I started doing this with 4003s5 basses ... the 4003s5 has a 15k ohm high gain treble pickup ... so the S5 can be kind of fat sounding ... the jazz pickup adds a little bit of treble bite ...
I use a Seymour Duncan 1/4 pound neck pickup. I trim the bobbin so it will fit. It does not require any wood removal. This changes the sound a little, but not dramatically. I wire it into the neck pickup volume control. This provides humbucking and noise reduction. When to toggle to the neck pickup you get a toaster and the jazz mute pickup together. This sounds like a 4005 a little bit. I also wired it into a toggle switch and then into the neck volume pot on one bass. This provides more options. A logical way to wire it would be 3 volume controls and one tone control and no toggle, but I have not tried it yet.
On a 4003 with two 11k ohm high gain pickups the mute jazz pickup is not necessary ... the high gains get enough treble bite ...
If you remove the mute then you need to relocate the ground wire to the bridge/tailpiece ...