Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi again! I posted an earlier post searching for affordable 5 string bass bridges. Thanks to all who chimed in and helped. Now, I need to focus on pickups. A couple of questions first.
Are 5 string pickups necessary, or will standard pickups work? I'm talking Jazz and Precision style here. I would assume you'd need 5 string pickups, but I've never done this before, and I'm not as savy about bass as I am with guitar, so i thought I'd better ask.
Also, what about neck width at the nut and heel? Will standard 1 and 11/16" nut and 2 and 3/16" at the heel work ok?
And, finally, assuming 5 string pickups are necessary, anyone know of a source or sources for them in a price range comparable to GFS or StewMac's Golden Age pickups?
Thanks in advance for all the help I can get.

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Mike

The only thing nescessary for evil to thrive is for good men to do nothing.

Width is the big criteria, and type of poles.
If the pickup is a blade type (like Bill Lawrence), whatever fits under all 5 strings will work.
Otherwise - you need at least 5 polepieces - one under each string.
The rest is just personal preference.

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

when it comes to 5 string bass, standards go out the door
There are wide spaced bridges and narrow
And there are different polepiece spacings on the pickups (and with a Jazz the neck pickup is narrower than the bridge pickup)
You do need to match the bridge you choose to the pickups or vice versa.
I used a pair of wilkinson Jazz pickups on a 5 string bass I built a few years ago and was verry happy with them

Thanks, guys!

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Mike

The only thing nescessary for evil to thrive is for good men to do nothing.

As for the nut width and width of the neck at the heel. The width at the nut varies by manufacturer but 1 7/8" is a pretty normal number. As for the width at the heel, that all depends on the string spacing at the bridge and number of frets and the distance from the string to the edge of the fretboard etc. In the end I wouldn't cut any wood until you have all of your hardware in hand and lay it all out real well.

As for a pickup I just used one from a guy on talkbass.com named John Worrell (jworrellbass is his screen name on there). He winds them by hand and only charges $60 plus $6 shipping. He just needs to know what the spacing is from center to center of the outside strings and number of strings. He uses neodymium magnets and they're nice and hot. They sound great too and they are nice and quiet. It's a beautiful thing.

Many thanks to all who responded to this thread. There's a lot of great info here. Much appreciated.

_________________
Mike

The only thing nescessary for evil to thrive is for good men to do nothing.