J945 pickups output issue

[Tim Bishop]

Originally Posted by Amit Shtriker

Hi,
I've been playing a BSR4J-MW for 4 years now, and since I got it I noticed that the output of the pickups is relatively low, at both passive and active modes. I always connected it to the "Passive" input on amplifiers that had seperate inputs for active and passive, as though I used it with the preamp in active mode, most of the time with EQ boost. I always had to use a good amount of gain to bring it to a good level, and the output is always lower compared to other basses (passive and of course active).
This never bothered me as you can see because I sounded a lot better then those basses even at a lower volume..

Lately I started wondering that maybe there is someting wrong with my electronics. Are the J945 pickups supposed to have a relatively low output (and there is nothing extremely wrong about it), ot it's just my pickups that have some kind of a problem?

Thanks a lot.

Amit,

First off, I never assume much anymore, however, I will assume that you know there is a big difference between "Passive" and "Active" as far as the output goes. Given that......

A couple of questions and possible solutions that come to mind:

1. Is the battery fresh? If no, replace and test-drive. If yes, go to #2 below.

2. Do you have a p/u gain adjustment? If yes, maybe it is not adjusted "hot" enough to match your amp output. If you do adjust p/u gain adjustment, be sure not to adjust too "hot" as to overdrive the amp!

3. If #1 and #2 meet satisfaction, check your p/u height relative to string height.

Let me know what you discover.