Sadowsky preamp in Stingray

[bacchuskid]

As a long time P-bass player, I am really at home with the neck and the built, comfort and playability of my new Stingray. However, after playing it for about a month, I feel like I want more sound from it although I am not complaining with the signature Stingray sound. It's legendary. I was a long holiday here in Japan so it's the right time to do some experiments on my Stingray. I have an old Sadowsky preamp board in my parts bin so I decided to try it out. Bought custom CTS pots A500k for volume, two A25k for bass and treble and Bourns A250k push-pull pot for VTC and switchcraft jack. I also used 0.1 µf film capacitor for tone and another 100pf ceramics cap connected to the preamp's input.
Here are my observations.
1. The signature Stingray sound is gone (honky, throaty, nasally tone) or at perhaps needs more equalizer settings on your amp to somehow replicate it but I have not done it yet.
2. It's easier the dial the right amount of bass and treble even though Sadowsky pre is boost only.
3. The VTC is the secret weapon. It's really really useful to tame the sound both in active and passive mode.
4. In active mode, the lows are tight and clear, not muddy or boomy. The highs are sharp but not ear-piercing. If the amp's EQ were set to flat, I can boost both bass and treble all the way up without experiencing distortion (although I don't do it, I set my amp's EQ permanently and do the adjustment if needed in the onboard pre).
4. The Stingray sounds FANTASTIC in passive mode! I read somewhere that some folks says the Stingray pickup is underwound so it needs the preamp or else the output is weak. Hmmm. there is no loss in output. In fact, if I switch from passive to active and vice-versa, the output is the same.

So far I am very pleased with the result of my experiment. The Sadowsky preamp is a very good preamp replacement for Stingray for more tonal options (and if you are not after the signature Stingray sound). I carefully kept and stored the original Stingray preamp in a sealed plastic box.
I am thinking of making some youtube videos to demonstrate the Sadowsky powered Stingray.

 

[RobbieK]

I've messed around with stingray pickups and tone-stack type fet pre's for years.

Stingray sound is gone

I see two main reasons for this. Firstly, AFAIK, the sadowsky pre has a (scaled, low z) fender tone stack for its treble ad bass controls. And when these are in the centre, you'll have quite a large mid cut. Whereas both the common stingray preamps don't have this. The other reason is a little harder to understand. It has to do with the way the pickup interacts with the pre. And this effects the treble response of the bass. The original circuit has the pickup directly coupled to the pre. But now you have a 500k vol pot and a 250k tone pot in there between the pickup and the pre. The 3-band stingray pre also has a 2n2 cap across its input. Because this is right across the pickup, it sets a resonant peak in the treble that to my ears, greatly defines that clicky stingray tone. I guess you could experiment with parallel caps across the pickup, but because you have those pots there, I doubt you'll get much of a resonant peak.

In the mid 70's, ic opamps were new, and expensive. Plus 9V batteries only had a fraction of the energy density that they do now. So that would've been the main reason Leo's pioneering pre only had just one active device. Virtually all modern preamps have a separate input buffer. Even the simple sadowsky pre has a fet common source amp at its input for this reason. Anyway, without that buffer there, the pickup realistically needed a low z design. And with two filters around that single opamp, there's no room for boost, so the pickup design had to be low z, and high output. So the coils are in parallel. And yes each coil has less windings than a typical jazz bass pickup, but OTOH there's two huge magnets for each string. That's why the pickup has (roughly) the same output as a P bass pickup, even though it is wired in parallel and has a fraction of the inductance.

 

[mouthmw]

I see you have a 3 bander there. What I would have done (and have done actually) - put a 2 band Stingray preamp in that baby and have THE Stingray tone. John East has a direct replacement for a 3 bander, with a fantastic mid/sweep module that gives it a lot of flexibility. But the tone is pure classic 2 band Stingray.

 

[Lou Bottini]

I'm thinking of doing this exact mod with a three band Sadowsky pre-amp. I would love to hear a clip of your bass. Any tips on using the stock Stingray pickup with a Sadowsky pre would be greatly appreciated. Roger says using the stock Ray pickup is no problem with his three band pre: V-P-VTC-B. What do you do with the pan on a single pickup bass?

 

[boogie8008]

I'm thinking of doing this exact mod with a three band Sadowsky pre-amp. I would love to hear a clip of your bass. Any tips on using the stock Stingray pickup with a Sadowsky pre would be greatly appreciated. Roger says using the stock Ray pickup is no problem with his three band pre: V-P-VTC-B. What do you do with the pan on a single pickup bass?

Bumping this dead thread to see if anyone has an answer to this question.

 

[eastcoasteddie]

I'm thinking of doing this exact mod with a three band Sadowsky pre-amp. I would love to hear a clip of your bass. Any tips on using the stock Stingray pickup with a Sadowsky pre would be greatly appreciated. Roger says using the stock Ray pickup is no problem with his three band pre: V-P-VTC-B. What do you do with the pan on a single pickup bass?

Bumping this dead thread to see if anyone has an answer to this question.

Bumping this dead thread again to suggest an answer to the question…

“What do you do with the pan on a single pickup bass?”

Take the Blend out of the circuit if you can, or wire up the two MM pickups like a Jazz bass…again, if you can. The MM Stingray pickup is hard wired in Parallel, so perhaps you may need to get an aftermarket 4-wire pickup.

The reason I found this thread is that I’m considering doing a Stingray-inspired bass using a VVT control with OBP-1 preamp (similar to the Sadowsky). I’m wondering if it would be worth its weight.