Modify a Les Paul Tribute Jr DC bass with a Hobbit Pickup......

[Grog]

I ended up taking about .250 out of the depth of the pocket. More than I anticipated. I’m looking forward to starting the electronics. I just need to add an opening for the HI/LOW impedance switch in the pick guard. I don’t have any way to engrave it, so up will be high & down will be low.

[Grog]

I started working on the electronics today, one thing led to another & I had to see if it would work as planned.







Everything seemed to work, the TONE didn’t really make a huge difference. It worked well in low impedance with the transformer chord. I’ll mess around with it more in a few days......

[amptech]

Looking good

[Basvarken]

That is coming along nicely! 

For me that impedance slide switch would be in danger of accidentally getting hit when I play with a pick.
I think I would have placed it closer to the volume pot. And more horizontally so that it won't switch unintentionally when it does get hit.

[Grog]

That is coming along nicely! 

For me that impedance slide switch would be in danger of accidentally getting hit when I play with a pick.
I think I would have placed it closer to the volume pot. And more horizontally so that it won't switch unintentionally when it does get hit.

After the “Point of no return” I started thinking it was a bit too close. I distanced it like the two pickup guitar version with a pickup selector switch evenly spaced from the two pots. I positioned it somewhat upright so up would be “HI” & down would be “LOW” since I had no way to engrave it. I did think about the way you engraved the serial number on the headstock of your Les Paul Professional bass with a nail! I’m not that artistic.... As it worked out, I had to route relief for the bottom tab & the transformer clamp just barely fit between the switch & the pickup using the top screw.
I’m looking forward to trying it in my 2-15 amp next week. Also, I’ve been using a Boss WL-20 wireless system. I’ve never tried it with low impedance. If I can find enough adapters to connect the transformer to the amp end, I can’t see any reason why it wouldn’t work....... We will see.

[Basvarken]

I'm quite sure it will sound awesome as those pickups are great.
With the short scale and the solid mahogany body with set neck it should sound like a Les Paul bass, which of course is superb (as far as I'm concerned anyway  )

[Grog]

I tried it for a while last night and it’s growing on me. The tone switch does kind of smooth out the tone a bit, from a little raspy to smooth. I’m kind of a “Set it and forget it” player, at least with the Hobbit & the sound suite me fine. I might mess with the tone down the line, but I would likely set it about like it is. Having the impedance switch where it is it works nicely as a “Kill Switch” The sound goes down enough so it is barley auditable. I ordered an adapter to go between my Sure A59U and my Boss WL-20. The adapter is suppose to work for both balanced & unbalanced 1/4 jacks, we will see.....

[Chris P.]

Great!

[amptech]

I tried it for a while last night and it’s growing on me. The tone switch does kind of smooth out the tone a bit, from a little raspy to smooth. I’m kind of a “Set it and forget it” player, at least with the Hobbit & the sound suite me fine.

I recall, from the low impedance EB0 project I did a few years back, that going up or down on the cap value had a lot of effect.
I think I ended up with a value that had some sort of mid 'boost' effect in when the pot dial was at 5, had quite a lot of fun with it!

[Grog]

I compared the Les Paul Triumph, the Les Paul Recording & the L5-S. They are all a little different. The L5-S is probably the closest due to it’s simplicity. An EB-0 would be nice to experiment with, just remove the back plate. My beast has to be completely disassembled.  I was thinking of extending a few longer leads under the pick guard to try different caps someday.

[Granny Gremlin]

Nice.  Obviously I support sticking a low Z pup in anything, especially a DC style bass.

[Grog]

After trying several combinations of pots (1K &2.5K) and a couple caps for the tone control, I ended up going with the 2.5K & 4.7uf. I changed the wiring a bit & that helped. I have some 3.3uf tantalum caps coming sometime the first week of Sept, I’d like to try one of them before I seal it up for good. That’s what was used in the low impedance version of the L-5S with only a volume & a tone. Both the Triumph & Recording use the same pots & caps in their circuits.

The adapter I was waiting for to try the bass in low impedance with my wireless setup came today. It works! It’s output is a bit lower than in high impedance but it works well & quiet. I used a short chord instead of the 1/4 plug adapter on the amp end. It would have stuck out quite a bit coming straight out of the amp.

[slinkp]

I suspect the adapter after the wireless isn't doing any good!
It seems to me that the impedance of the bass can't affect the impedance of the wireless receiver's output.

[Grog]

I wasn’t sure what to expect either. I figured it was worth the $7 to find out. There is no signal loss in high impedance, just a slight loss in low. I have been using that Boss WL-20 for about 18 months.

[Pilgrim]

I suspect the adapter after the wireless isn't doing any good!
It seems to me that the impedance of the bass can't affect the impedance of the wireless receiver's output.

It can't. What you get from the wireless is the output of the wireless.

If it sounds OK it's because the wireless is serving as a buffer/adapter between the instrument and the amp, which would not be surprising at all.

The adapter would only be used if you're going direct via cable.