ERB Pickup

[Bass_Maker117]

I am planning on making a true 12 string bass and i need to make a pickup that will get the extended ranges from the deep .195" C# to the high .004 Ab. Any suggestions on magnets, wire guage and so on? The length of the pickup will be around 6 3/4". Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Bass_Maker117]

any ideas at all would be helpful. i was thinking of doing a humbucker design. so if anyone has any advice for a person that hasn't built a pickup EVER, just post it here...

[David King]

First question is who makes and sells a .004" string??

As long as you are sticking with even numbers of strings you have it easy because you can split up the coils and end up with humcancelling and coils that aren't too unwieldy long to wind. I'd go 4 groups of three strings each or 6 groups of 2 string each, that way you can balance the string to string strength and play around with different magnets to try to make the thing sound somewhat musical across the range.

I still want to know what the attraction is to adding more and more strings to a bass? Are you all just compensating for ugly sheep?

[David Schwab]

I still want to know what the attraction is to adding more and more strings to a bass? Are you all just compensating for ugly sheep?

I've been wondering that. I started building again in the 90's because I wanted a 6 string bass, which I never ended up making, and when I got a chance to play them it was one of those "oh, ok" moments. It only gets 4 notes higher than my 5 string... but you do get to play across the strings. So obviously it's not about that much more range.

I guess I don't need my bass to play in the guitar range because I can also play guitar.

I did design an 8 string bass that combined the range of both guitar and bass back in 1978 or so... I called it an "Octar."

You lost me on the sheep part.

[David King]

Ask Shed about the sheep, it was just a backhanded comment about penis size.
No doubt we won't understand this extended range bass thing until we try one for ourselves. I see that others are making a living off the folks that feel the need to own one so I suppose they need to be taken seriously. Why is 12 better than 9? If there is a .004" string then go for it but I've never seen one for sale or a decent bass string over .136". I'm currently building a headless 9 string, even that seems highly impractical but the client already has 2 of them.

[David Schwab]

There is a maker of guitar strings that makes a high A string (over the E). I have no idea what the gauge is or how long they are, but I doubt it would be bass length.

I thought the "true 12 string bass" thing was funny... as opposed to a false 12 string bass, which is of course a "three course 12 string bass" which is not the same as a "three course dinner"... of course...

I have heard some very good players, like Yves Carbonne, who plays a 10 string bass, and then there's Al Caldwell who plays an 11 string bass (and is probably related to my wife on her dad's side...)

But when does a bass stop being a bass and become something else? Same goes for tapping. There's that guy that has the ERB and plays the Mario theme on YouTube, he's very good at it, but that's hardly a technique you can use in real life situations, and it more of a gimmick in my opinion. It almost never sounds good... always thin and plinky. Stick and Warr players are an exception.

[Bass_Maker117]

Thank you all for your replies. i like the idea of dividing it into six sections of 2 strings each. i don't know when a bass stops becoming a bass, i just called it what i had heard it called(which is an extended range bass) but to me the idea sounded good and i've discovered that if i do it right it will have the range of a grand piano so i'm all for it. the .004" string is music wire. no one makes a string that small but i found music wire that is and it comes in lengths that are plenty long enough. my next(hopefully last) question would be do you think pole or bar magnets would be better and what the disadvantage of just making one really long pickup would be?

[David King]

I've never made a bar pickup so I'll recuse myself on that one.

I would definitely go out and get some of the .04 "music wire" and string it up to pitch at the intended scale length. From what I've heard, there are no alloys existent that can tune to that pitch at that scale length. In fact .008" is pretty much the limit on a guitar and that's only an E string and the scale is only 25" not 34".

Some sleazy guy did call me once from an unnamed southern state to offer me shares in his new .005" strings made from some hitherto unknown alloy expressly for this purpose. I told him I wasn't willing to invest in his invention and didn't mind missing out on the chance of a lifetime to get in on the bottom floor of a nonexistent building even if he was a devout, self-proclaimed "Christian" missionary.

I happen to have a piano right here and the highest octave of strings are between 3" and 1.5" long and they are all .032" in diameter -just to give you a sense of what is tried and true.

The lowest string is about .220" and nearly 6 feet long.

I personally can't think of any advantage to one long, single coil except that you only have to wind one coil, even if it does take you all week.

[Phil m]

There's a nice thread for me to reply to

I built a fretless 9 last year, the lowest string was C#, 0.195". The pickups I built were pretty much just a set of Jazz type humbuckers made to typical Jazz bass pickup specs with Formvar 42AWG and Alnico 5 rods. The main pain in the ass in winding it is making sure the windings are tight enough. The extra weight of the bobbin and wire also burned out my winder's motor. The pickups sounded pretty good too, so really, I see that as just another typical pickup but slightly longer than normal

[David Schwab]

I remember that bass Phil! That neck pocket is crazy.

What are the wires for coming from the holes near the bridge? Piezos?

[Phil m]

Nah, individual bridges string grounding.

[Manlius]

That bass is crazy! How heavy is she?

[Phil m]

5kg, i.e. 11 pounds. Funny enough, the neck was the same weight as the loaded body. The top horn was long enough that with using a strap there was no neck diving at all.

[Manlius]

that is a managable weight, I thought it might be a little more. And looking at the pics, I can see how the upper horn will balance it. I imagine it is a world of fun to play! Good on ya, that is a nice piece of work!

M

[David Schwab]

That's not a bad weight. I think my 5 string is heavier!