The Mudbucker's in the Tequilabird, George... (PARENTAL ADVISORY)

[Highlander]

PARENTAL ADVISORY

The shorts are out... much to my wife's disgust... 

Well, as a swansong for the original colours, and prior to the demolition of my shed (the veggie's lair, where many a vegetable has met it's fate...  Demolition...? yep, roof is barely up, and sides are bowing out... new concrete plinth over the next month or so, and then a nice metal hell-hole to work in...), and as I have a rehearsal tonight, I thought it was time I tried to get a little space to do the deed...


yep, an utter tip... I have no excuse... there will be no proper work until this is sorted...

The first issue I had was that the MB was too big for the existing hole, which had been adapted for a DM EB replacement a couple of decades back, but long gone - could-not stand the thing, so I had to freehand-rout (Gawd only knows where most of my gear is in this dump) out the hole to suit the pup.


I need to do a lot of finishing off, but as I intend to do a complete strip down, I will finish off then...

Bottomed out the space and then shimmed under the pup to suit, oh yeah, had to reshape the lower mount plate, as you can see... also had to rout away a section of her body (about 2/10"-5mm) to accommadate the cover, which would have been far too close to the strings...


A little packing was required front and rear


Well, she's in... the screws are doing a nice temp job of pinning the pup in place...

Finished off the temporary wiring today and fitted the original gold pup switch with one pot, hmm... a 6.5K RDA pup and a 30K Mud pup, straight through one standard volume pot...

So as it was so nice (and I may as well go hang myself as well as be dumb enough to run-up indoors) I set up outside in the garden (near 70f/20c) and run her up...



Bl**dy H*ll...! That IS Loud... there is no way I can run this through my fragile old Celestions, but have been doing some pricing up for a full set of 50w bass speakers to fill the Marshall cab, around £150 for Celestions, but still researching... The initial view is quite stark - quite simply AWESOME...! The difference between the pups is not subtle (the MB being so overpowering and the RDA being so clean, but where they meet is more than just interesting... I can't wait for this evening now when I can run the Hiwatt through a good 200w Carlsboro 2x15, and see what she can do...



And btw, I definitely do not have Mark's legs...

That's all the time I have right now... gotta go... And George... muchos gracias... 

[drbassman]

I'm sure it sounds great.  Kinda like an old long scale EB-3 maybe?

[Highlander]

Never had the pleasure of playing one, Doc, although an EB3L was on the early wants list...

The rehearsal room has a variety of amps and cabs so I tried her through a modern generic 4x12 and an old ported Carlsboro 2x15 - neither could not tolerate the MB on it's own through my Hiwatt head (I suspect that the speakers are well past it) but the sound of the 2 pups paired was wonderfully full and bright through the 2x15- a truly rip-roaring sound - most pleased... 

My daughter is quite reticent about a refinish, but as I have clearly shown her, my 'bird is going to need some work - lots of cracks... the biggest area of concern is a crack in the paintwork across the neck where the head joins, also a crack along the length of the neck mid way, which I am hoping are just surface, also where the body has severely cracked where the controls are, there are numerous surface cracks which I am fairly certain are the original finish failing  - I am tempted to cut the control area straight through and laminate the top on both sides to bring the surface up to the same height as the centre section, as that would resolve several issues, but I will only know for sure when she is down to the bare wood...

When the strip begins I'll post...

[OldManC]

Hey, great work! I like how it looks. Very different but right in that off the wall Gibson way. I'm glad it's working out. BTW, you and I got the same legs, but mine are even paler!

[Highlander]

 

[clankenstein]

nice work ken.thats heading down the same road as my eb4l soundwise(see the eb4l live thread) i think,mudbucker in the back a bit from the neck position and a clear and bright humbucker at the back.should part your hair at 10 paces.

[Highlander]

They make an evil pairing, Tony, in a very good way...

Tried to listen to your latest posting but I may have a bandwidth issue at moment as it would just not open properly, even via the direct link... I'll try again in the next few days...

Still have not had the time to work on your 20/20 pup in my RD... as I noted elsewhere the pairing did not work out but she fills the "hole" perfectly, and as I also noted I have an EMG Select (same as my Hohner Jack) which was nice and loud but too bright when in the bridge position of the Tequilabird, but if I take great care removing the contents of your old pup, the EMG will fit the shell, so I still hold out great hope for your generosity... gotta sort the replacement shed before I undertake that bit of butchery...

[clankenstein]

are the rd pickups passive then?if you can get the emg guts in there it should look pretty cool.i have got 2 carvin blade single coils hooked up as the humbucker in the bridge position,im loving the tops and clarity it provides mixed with the ruthless extended fat  bass of the mudbucker.i put a trimmer pot between the vol controls so with both volumes on full the mix is what i like.in effect it cuts back the rear pup a bit.

[Highlander]

I run them passive, Tony, but they were the originals when the Moog board was in her, the damaged one now in the Peter Cook T'bird and the other still in the RD - both in the bridge position... they are both around the 6.5K mark and have a great sound...

I stripped down George's MB prior to fitting, as I was curious to find out how and where the coils were linked and have been tempted to tap-in a connection on the white pairs, to play with the sound... I agree with your option as I need to balance the pups, too, if only with a second pot...

One of my other concerns at present is what to refill my Marshall slope cab with and I'm trying to do some research re my 50w '68 "Smallbox" and my Hiwatt DR103 - both valve amps - and an ideal pairing for my cab, which I will almost certainly keep running, no matter how disgustingly scuffy and beaten to hell, but she will look much better when resprayed black... 

Anyone out there with experience of Mudbuckers, 12" speakers, and British valve amps...?

[clankenstein]

i had my mud bucker wired series/parallel /coil tap but i only ever used the full sound when i ran it with the other pickup so i took that wiring out.that said,i found the coils in parallel to be the most usefull sound and still humbucking.i using an ampeg valve preamp going to a jbl crossover- the highs go to one side -50 watts- of my marshall 9000(valve) power amp and the lows go to a warwick 4000 power amp(mosfet)bridged to 700 watts.this sounds great but my poor 200watt jbl e145 15inch on the low end is starting to complain...+btw the top end box is a hartke 4x10 at the moment but 12 s would be as good if not better i reckon.i fixed the link in the eb4l thread .

[chromium]

I stripped down George's MB prior to fitting, as I was curious to find out how and where the coils were linked and have been tempted to tap-in a connection on the white pairs, to play with the sound...

If it helps, I did a mod similar to that on my EB-0.  There are some sound samples in the following post, so you can hear the difference between coil-tap, and series/parallel switching between the two MB coils:

http://www.vintageguitars.org.uk/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=1810&p=9491&hilit=coil+tap#p9491

I found the effects to be rather subtle, and I'd venture to say not-so-noticeable in live playing.  I prefer the series/parallel switching to the coil-tap.

Anyone out there with experience of Mudbuckers, 12" speakers, and British valve amps...?

No 12s, but I use an Orange valve head with SVT cabs.  I usually play "choked" on my EB-3 (Andy Fraser-esque tone), but when I run the EB-2D with "full mud", I use an eq to cut the sub-lows out.  Keeps the 10" drivers from hopping out of their baskets, and makes the mids a bit more intelligible


Nice job, btw!

[godofthunder]

 I bet that sounds a lot like my Ibanez Destroyer ! Which sounds fantastic btw. Keep us posted on the progress !

[godofthunder]

I run them passive, Tony, but they were the originals when the Moog board was in her, the damaged one now in the Peter Cook T'bird and the other still in the RD - both in the bridge position... they are both around the 6.5K mark and have a great sound...

I stripped down George's MB prior to fitting, as I was curious to find out how and where the coils were linked and have been tempted to tap-in a connection on the white pairs, to play with the sound... I agree with your option as I need to balance the pups, too, if only with a second pot...

One of my other concerns at present is what to refill my Marshall slope cab with and I'm trying to do some research re my 50w '68 "Smallbox" and my Hiwatt DR103 - both valve amps - and an ideal pairing for my cab, which I will almost certainly keep running, no matter how disgustingly scuffy and beaten to hell, but she will look much better when resprayed black... 

Anyone out there with experience of Mudbuckers, 12" speakers, and British valve amps...?

I have a a bit of experience in that department I use 12s and 15s together. As far as watts and such I am not much of a numbers guy it's all I can do to match cabinet ohms. I have my tech work out what speakers and wattage to use. I am guessing but if you are using a 4x12 with the Hiwatt 100 you are going to want each 12 to be rated over 100w. All my Marshall cabs came with Celestions which I don't like so I loaded them with some Eminence that I like much better, and the cost wasn't to bad.

[Highlander]

Cheers for that Joe... That mods posting was most useful... A touch of the forelock in your direction... 

Scott... the hideous 4x12 you can see behind me is the beast in question... a 1970 slope that presently has 3 of the 4 original Celestion 30 watt speakers - originally all in series, so 120 watt at 8 ohms... I'm partly tempted to go for Fanes, as they are presently re-creating their 12's to Dave Reeve's original spec - I think you can understand that kind of temptation - just can't afford the fuul package... don't know about Eminence (I have listened to JS and like your sound, so...) but will check out - I have just received a bonus from work so have the spare readdies for a budget upgrade, and the replacement shed... 

Any other POV's are most welcome...

[godofthunder]

Your old slant cab is certainly worth keeping ! I bet that mudbucker is rattling those old Celestions ! Are you going to recover your cab? the material is available and it's a pretty easy job to do. Don't make excuses for your gear you are running a vintage Hiwatt after all !