During the past months I've collected some parts to create a new monster, I wanted something unusual, with low costs and with a fat sound.
Please, meet my "JazzBird", I thought it might be fun to share this with you
I always liked the idea of the Mel Schacher mod, but never had a bass to fit it in, because I also thought it should be in a Jazzbass, like the original. But when I stumbled across a Epi Thunderbird neck, I took up this plan of a JazzBird to fit this mod in.
Found an old reliced Jazzbody with a very tight neckpocket and an Epi humbucker from a EB-3. Perfect!
When assembling the bass, the first problem was that the neck didn't fit in the body, the Epi neck is much smaller than a regular Fender/Allparts neck. I've thought about different solutions, but in the end I just decided to not try to fix it, but just bolt it on and see what happens. Only the bottom of the neck connects to the body, on the sides is a free space of appr. 1-2 mm's.
After completing the bass, I came across the next issue: the output of the E and G strings was very low. Experimented a lot with pickup-height, connection of the neck, the wiring. The spacing of the pickup was just right under the strings, but very tight. Tried everything and than I got some help from some members on the Dutch bassforum, which inspired me to the following "genius" solution: I used some "tools" to extend the spacing of the magnets and it worked...such a simple solution, I just can't believe it was just thé perfect solution
In this picture, it looks like the strings don't match the poles of the pup right, but they do
Now I have an even output on all the strings, it sounds like a monster
The jazzpup on the bridge is a no-name, and very weak, so I have to replace that with a hot sounding pup soon. I also want to order an Artec Mudbucker to compare with this Epi humbucker, I suppose that Artec might sound even better.
