Wednesday 1 February 2012

Columbus EB-3 Copy - Taken to bits...

Took the EB-3 copy to bits today to have a look at the pickups and whether the neck pocket was shimmed.

Firstly it turns out the neck pocked was shimmed with a bit of folded copper. Columbus Neck Pocket Copper Neck Shim
(in the background can you can see how much I failed to keep the strings in place using a cable tie)
I've taken this out as I want to replace the bridge on this bass at some point (adjustable intonation FTW) and unless I bugger about installing a Tune-O-Matic style thing and have it set stupidly high I need the shim out so the neck sits at a shallower angle.

When I was over at Mr. Foxen's picking up the Woolly Mammoth clone he mentioned that a lot of cheap '60s knock off instruments featured single coil pickups under humbucker covers, which is something I was vaguely aware of as a friend has an LP copy with the same 'feature' So I took the pickups off and had a look at them and surprise surprise, they're both single coils masquerading as humbuckers.
Columbus Neck Pickup - Back Columbus Neck Pickup - Coil Bridge Pickup - Back

It's not something that's easy to see for the uneducated eye, but compare the above with pics of genuine equivalents.


(Not exactly the same style, but the bridge pickup is based on a Hofner humbucker and this is the closest gut shot I could find)

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