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In this Discussion
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A salutary tale for modders everywhere
Bridgehouse
Frets: 24581
in Guitar
Decided to perform a few electronics upgrades on the Shuker Fretless. It's nearly 10 years old - and it's noisy (hum and white noise)
Upon investigation there are two reasons for this:
- A single coil Jazz pickup
- An older preamp for it, with an EMG PA2 gain boost going into the graph tech ghost piezo system - gain on gain on gain etc..
So. Bought a new posh noiseless Nordstrand Jazz pickup and a shiny new Delano 3 EQ preamp. Lovely. Also decided to go 18v for even less noise and more headroom.
Spent most of this afternoon and early evening ripping old out and putting new in. Result? Nowt. Nothing. No sound. Nary a single blip or squeak. Sigh.
Investigations revealed three learning points for the would be modder (in order of utter stupidity)
- It appears the ghost preamp only plays nicely with other preamps if you use the "AUX PWR" out on the board, and not a split line from the battery... (sigh)
- It is also true to say that you should string an instrument up before declaring it dead. It is silent. No noise or hum, and the faintest of hiss when the treble is cranked and the gain is well up on the amp. Plugging in and hearing no noise is not a sign you have wired it like a numpty.
- When converting to 18v you need another 9v battery. CHECK THIS ONE ISN'T FLAT BEFORE INSTALLING cos if you don't you really do look like a numpty when the missus strolls in and after much cursing at her about it she says "have you tried swapping the battery for another one to see if it's not dead?"
Upon investigation there are two reasons for this:
- A single coil Jazz pickup
- An older preamp for it, with an EMG PA2 gain boost going into the graph tech ghost piezo system - gain on gain on gain etc..
So. Bought a new posh noiseless Nordstrand Jazz pickup and a shiny new Delano 3 EQ preamp. Lovely. Also decided to go 18v for even less noise and more headroom.
Spent most of this afternoon and early evening ripping old out and putting new in. Result? Nowt. Nothing. No sound. Nary a single blip or squeak. Sigh.
Investigations revealed three learning points for the would be modder (in order of utter stupidity)
- It appears the ghost preamp only plays nicely with other preamps if you use the "AUX PWR" out on the board, and not a split line from the battery... (sigh)
- It is also true to say that you should string an instrument up before declaring it dead. It is silent. No noise or hum, and the faintest of hiss when the treble is cranked and the gain is well up on the amp. Plugging in and hearing no noise is not a sign you have wired it like a numpty.
- When converting to 18v you need another 9v battery. CHECK THIS ONE ISN'T FLAT BEFORE INSTALLING cos if you don't you really do look like a numpty when the missus strolls in and after much cursing at her about it she says "have you tried swapping the battery for another one to see if it's not dead?"
12
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Comments
My Trading Feedback | You Bring The Band
Just because you're paranoid, don't mean they're not after youI’ve never made that mistake.
Not since the last time ...
Been a long time since I wielded a soldering iron, but having discovered my ancient and battered Tele when moving house, I started tinkering again. First mistake was buying pots whose spline won't fit through the control plate. Gah…..
So, having repeated that error twice now, I resorted to buying a complete new loom and control plate......it will go in at some point in the near future, along with new pickups.
all this cos I love the neck on it...….
That won't work as well on this particular bass. It has a hidden pickup under the fretboard
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It seems the EMG PA2 was the cause of most of the consternation originally as it was noisy as hell. I def. wouldn’t use one again!
Doh! I'd picked up an old one ....
... as someone who is a total klutz with a soldering iron, on Saturday I managed to cleanly remove the pickups from my knock-off Tele and install the Oil City HonkeyTonk Angel set that had arrived on Friday and it worked first time. HA! TAKE THAT, FICKLE UNIVERSE!
As my only other recent soldering was knocking up some junction boxes to simplify the external connections from my pedal board I was immeasurably pleased with myself. Will doubtless now take on a project that will utterly defeat me.