Can a Fender Custom 62 Pickup Make a Cheap Bass Sound Great? - Bass Practice Diary - 21st April 2020
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Can a Cheap Bass Sound Great by Adding a Good Pickup (Fender Custom '62 P Bass Pickup)? - Bass Practice Diary - 21st April 2020
Can you get a good P Bass tone out of a cheap bass with the addition of a good pickup? This week I'm doing something a bit different. I'm bringing a bass back to life that hasn't worked for somewhere in the region of 15-20 years. I'm literally changing all of the electronics, including the pickup, jack input and volume and tone pots as well as all the wiring. But the star of this is the Fender Custom Shop Custom '62 Precision Bass pickup.
Vester Stage Series P Bass Copy
The bass in question is the first bass I ever owned. It's a Korean made P Bass copy called a Vester Stage Series. My parents bought it for me in 1994 and it cost £150 when it was brand new. It's actually quite a good copy of a Fender Precision. So good in fact that they were successfully sued by Fender in the 90's and as a result, these basses didn't last long.
There's a lot on this bass that feels cheap. The original pickups are uninspiring sounding. The body is plywood, the scratchplate is cheap and flimsy and all the screws have gone rusty. But the main reason I say that it's a good copy, is because the neck is really good. It's very playable and it's really in good shape for a cheap 26 year old bass. Other elements on the bass which are good are the tuners and the bridge. So there is the shell of a good bass, especially when you consider that the pickups, scratchplate and screws are all easy to replace. Would a solid wood body lead to a better tone than the plywood body? Probably a bit, but I personally don't think that it would make a massive difference.
The Transformation
As I've already mentioned, the neck, bridge and tuners are in remarkably good shape for a cheap bass of this age, but the frets needed attention. So the first job, having removed the old strings was to clean the frets. A great trick for doing this is using 0000 grade wire wool. I would strongly recommend using electrical tape to protect the fretboard. You can get tools that go over the frets to protect the board, I have the tools but I don't find that they work better than tape. In fact, I've found I can be more accurate with tape.
After cleaning the frets with wire wool, I polished them with Frine Fret Polishing Kit and I cleaned the fretboard with a normal guitar polish. I would normally use lemon oil but I wouldn't recommend using lemon oil on a maple fingerboard.
Next I had to remove the scratchplate and the bridge. The bridge had to come off so I could remove the earth wire that runs through the body of the bass and attaches to the tone control pot. Having done that, the old input and volume and tone control pots were easy to remove. The old pickups were not easy to remove. The heads of the screws holding the old pickups in place were so rusted that no screw driver could turn them. It was very difficult getting the pickups out, I eventually had to break the old pickups to get the out of the bass and then get the screws out with pliers.
Installing the Fender Custom '62 Pickup
By contrast, installing the new pickup couldn't have been easier. I lined up the position by placing the old scratchplate in place. I made four new holes for the screws and then I fixed the pickup in place and soldered the two wires according to the instructions that came with the Fender Custom '62 pickup. You really don't need to be an electrician or even a DIY expert to do this. P style basses are really very simple to wire up.
If you want to do a similar transformation to your own P bass, you don't need to change the pots or the input as I did. I changed mine because lots of the wires were rusty, which was why the bass didn't work. And it's cheap and easy to buy ready wired input, volume and tone setups from guitar shops. The only fiddley job is connecting the earth wire from the bridge to the tone control pot.
To complete the installation of the pickup, I would strongly recommend setting the pickup height individually for each string. This is to ensure that you get an even sound across each string. I set my pickup heights by measuring with a metal ruler and then adjusting the heights by either tightening or loosening the four screws. The measurements I was aiming for were E - 3.9mm, A - 3.8mm, D - 3.7mm and G - 3.6mm. Although I wasn't trying to be too specific, I don't think my measurements were perfectly accurate. Those measurements were just a guide to get the heights roughly right, and the rest is done by playing and listening.
Would have been interesting to hear what the old pickups sound like on it by comparison.
It would have been, but as I mentioned in the video, the old electronics stopped working over 15 years ago. Also, I had to completely destroy the old pickup to get it out of the bass. I can describe what it sounded like in one word: cheap. 👍🎶
Sound beautiful.Those pickups from fender are the sweetest sounding.
Yeah, it's a great sounding pickup!
I have an old Sunn P-bass from the 90s that was my first bass. They were even cheaper than this Vester & I swapped it for an acoustic from my local guitar shop. It weighs about 10 tonne & the frets are brutal but it sounds amazing. It looks like this was worth you spending your money & time on - sounds good. Great vid
Thanks very much! Yeah I'm very glad I did it. The neck and bridge are both really well made, and now that it has good pickups as well, it plays like a good bass.
I also have a Sunn, build like a tank, incredible sustain as well! Although I think the stock pickup is nod bad at all, putted in a pure vintage 63's pu. Sounds huge! But this 62 pickup is really the best!
I sensed that the volume on one of my strings was unnaturally loud. I'm going to play/adjust my pickup height and see if that brings everything in line. Listening to you play lets me know that I chose the right instrument to play, the bass as I had utterly failed at guitar.
Yeah, adjusting the pickup height should sort that out. 👍🎶
I have a Westfield P Bass that I got 20 years ago. It’s still all original parts except the wiring, very solid and never goes out of tune. Only now am I thinking of changing the pickups as I play so hard they seem to buckle under the demand and just pop. Great video!
You just convinced me to buy those 62 precision pickups. I'm working on upgrading a cheap $62 got last year from Ebay. That bass sounds awesome, I hope mine will turn into the same; Thank you Sir
Thank you! I think it's a great sounding P Bass pickup. 👍🎶
I'm about to do the same thing with my old Vester bass. It's a thin-body, not a P or J-style. It was built with (1) P style and (1) J-style pickup so I'm gonna stick with that rather than take a router to it. It still has a nice black finish. Just bought a Bartolini B-Axis PJ set. Planning to get the Trick Fish IPA preamp soon. I was gonna go with the Flex Core but the body cavity is too thin for those modules. It will end up having more money in electronics and pickups than it cost new. Looking forward to the project and getting a solid backup bass for gigs. Thanks for this video. It's nice to see these Vesters are still being played. Mine was also my very first bass, so the sentimental value makes it worth more to me than anyone else. I'd rather upgrade it than let it go.
That cheap bass sounds so good. It's very musical. I have the same pickups and am very happy with them.
Most of these old copies of well-known brands were really well-made. I believe that back in the old days, people took care and pride in their work. Nowadays, except for the most expensive instruments...and even then, it’s no guarantee...you don’t find the quality of vintage instruments. Same for amps. Give me a REAL 60’s Fender Bassman or Ampeg SVT, and not the cheap quality modern ones. It’s just MHO.
Hi, thanks for your comment. Yeah, there are good affordable instruments around now, but there's definitely something different about older and vintage instruments. The genuine old Fender and Ampeg stuff tends to be extremely expensive, but you're right, the copies that have survived in playable condition tend to be pretty well made.
Aria made amazing P-bass copies back in the 70s. I have a Japanese Aria Pro II P copy, and I put the EMG Geezer Butler pickups and holy hell it's amazing
@@elansleazebaganno I have an Aria from the early 2000s - I bought it off a friend as my first bass and it's still doing me solid duty. I've owned it for 13 years now and it's probably 17 years old already :D
I had a Vester Strat for a while back in the 90's, they weren't a bad old thing at all.
Awesome, I didn't even know Vester made guitars as well as basses.
There's really something to be said for decent 80's and 90's copies of branded guitars and basses and just using what we have so easily to hand now.
I've got a few old copies that I'm hotting up using modern parts and the outcomes are really pleasing. One of which is a Hohner Arbor Strat that I'm putting a H-S-S loaded scratchplate into with a split coil for added Gilmour. The guitars from that era had great fundamentals but now we have so many choices with electronics, prewired pickups, on board preamp setups plus knowledge available online for modifying these things. It's fantastic.
Thanks for the video, the bass sounds fantastic by the way. I was really surprised how well it was finished under that scratchplate and into the routing
Thank you! Yeah, I completely agree with everything you say. You can end up with a really nice guitar or bass. And those instruments that have survived in playable condition for over 25 years are usually pretty good, otherwise they wouldn't have survived.
For a "cheap" P-Bass copy, it seems pretty well made - the intonation sounds perfect when you played those high arpeggios and the general tone you got from the fretted notes and harmonics sounded very high end, indeed. Are you going to do a follow up video with this bass if you ever use it on a session or a gig?
@@Ronno4691 Yeah, I think the neck is really good, it plays like a neck that you'd find on a much more expensive instrument. The bridge and tuners are also really good which helps with the intonation and tuning stability. I'm planning to do a little recording demo with the bass in next week's video.
@@JohnnyCoxMusic Excellent. Looking forward to it.
I recommend using painters tape instead of electrical tape which has a very goopy adhesive that can leave stubborn residue on the fretboard.
That's true, you do need to clean a bit of residue off. I've found that painters tape is a bit less resistant to the wire wool and it's easy to rub through the tape. But maybe I just need to find better quality painters tape.
I just ordered this pickup for my Squier Classic Vibe. amazon $63
Wow, that's a great price. It's a good upgrade to do. 👍🎶
I’m about to do the same, did you notice a difference?
@@JamesCorbettMusic5000 yes theres a difference but not a whole lot...still the squier is awesome bass, go ahead and do it...
@@zinhuilucan ok! I’m going to whack some flat wounds on it too, I find the ones that came on it? A bit metallic and zingy
@@JamesCorbettMusic5000 of course... i like labelle flats, let us know after u finish ur project good luck
My first bass was the same bass as that, black not red, bought back around 1991. Been trying to find another one for nostalgia reasons, but never seen another Vester Bass for sale.
Yeah, you don't see many these days. 👍🎶
Great playing. Jaco lives!
mate! what an absolutely wonderful video. ive been thinking about swapping out my Squier pickups for these 62 customs for a while now
Thank you! Hope you like the pickups!
If you are using steel wool for tidying up frets then get the neck off the body or mask over the pickups.
Very good job and video Johnny! Thank you
Thank you! 👍🎶
I can see why Fender doesn't want this around . It has a better tone than their 750 ( before tax and fees ) " player series basses " .
He didn't show what it sounded like originally, a good pickup goes a long way. I like souping squires for this though
@@steublanchet881 Yes, it sounded a lot better after I added the Fender pickup. The original pickup wasn't very inspiring, at least to my ears.
Just found your channel,,Johnny,,,thanks very much!
Thank you! 👍🎶
I was told by a really good Luthier years ago that he NEVER used lemon oil on fingerboard s because it is acidic ...he said to use boiled linseed oil...i have always used that instead for years.
Yeah, I've stopped using it on my rosewood fretboards now since I discovered the Music Nomad fretboard conditioner which doesn't use any lemon oil. The lemon oil is good for cleaning, but it does dry out the wood over time due to the acidity that you mentioned. 👍🎶
Sounds great!!! Thanks for sharing, mate. I have a set of 62 Reissue that I bought a few years ago. Planning to drop them in a Squier P Bass. What kind of strings do you have on your bass?
Thank you! In this video I had a set of used D'addario round wound strings. I've since put flats on this bass. Here is a little video comparison I made when I changed the strings. ua-cam.com/video/eUuDLCQeVx8/v-deo.html👍🎶
Nice video. Did you have to trim the brass base plate down a bit to fit? Thanks. The bass sounds very good from here...
Thanks mate, doing the same soon so this was really informative 👍👍👍
Thank you! 👍🎶
To be completely honest after all the work you put into this bass with the pickup changes and all . I would take this bass over any of Player Series Fender available without hesitation.
Thanks. I know what you mean. The Player Series instruments aren't bad, but I definitely prefer the sound of the Custom '62 pickup to a Player Series P Bass. 👍🎶
what are your pickup heights
You would have no idea that this wasn’t a Fender P Bass on a studio recording.
Is their a standard height for EMG pickups from the strings ?
This is very individual, it depends on the output of the pickups you use.
Swatch Watches and basses 👌
This is beautiful
TO HAVE A GR8 SOUND HERE'S MY ADVICE TO MY FELLOW BASSISTS : ALWAYS USE THE BEST STRINGS AND ALWAYS KEEP THEM FRESH...STRINGS ARE 50 % OF YOUR TONE...IF YOU USE DEAD OR LOW QUALITY BASS STRINGS, NO MATTER HOW GOOD YOUR BASS , PUPS, AMP OR PEDALS; YOU JUST SOUND RUBBISH...MOST BASS PLAYERS DON'T CARE ABOUT THEIR STRINGS AND JUST BUY THE CHEAPEST ONES AROUND...I ONCE TALKED TO A PRO PLAYER ( VERY FAMOUS NATIONWIDE ) AND ASKED HIM : WHAT BRAND OF STRINGS DO YOU USE ? HE RESPONDED : I JUST USE THE STOCK ONES !!! WUT ??? GR8 VIDEO BTW...
Hi. Thank you for the video. I'd like to buy a custom shop 62 or 63 pickup for my precision. Do you know difference between 62 and 63 pickups?
Where'd you get the ready to go electronics?
I’m doing the same with my old bass. Have you considered doing any relic work on the body?
It's got a few dings and scratches from it's years of service, but relic-ing is not really my thing. 👍🎶
Relicing is for posers
Cuantos dolares puedes estar un vester stage series y que origen son ?
Good job. Congrats!
Thank you!
the pickup cost like 10 times more
Are still vester basses being sold Any where?
I don't think they have made any Vester basses since the 90's. There is a story (which I think is true) that Fender successfully sued them for making basses that were too similar to Fender P basses. I think your only chance would be to buy one second hand, but I'm not sure how many have survived.
@@JohnnyCoxMusic thank you i Will keep searching 👋😎
What strings did you use?
I put on a set of used d'addario round wounds, 45-105. I prefer the sound of used strings on a P-bass.
It sounds warm n thumpy, sounds a bit like flats
Sounds like an old Fender
Johnny what amp and strings do u use on this video????
Hi. The strings I put on were a used set of D'addario round wounds. The amp is a Markbass Little Mark III.
Johnny Cox Music thank you for the info