Distortion/Overdrive for bass

[polifemo]

Right now I´m working with a bassplayer that now - after seeing some of my builds - wants to build an Overdrive/distortion pedal for bass.

As he´s rather new to this I´d like to know if there are any "bass overdrive/distortion kits" out there?

/Peter

[ambulancevoice]

there is run off groove's Flipster (i imagine if you put a good booster in front of it, you could push it into distortion)
or Christian's Bazz Fuss (experiment with the diode to get an overdrive distortion, run off groove notes that an amber led can get that sound)

http://www.runoffgroove.com/flipster.html
http://www.home-wrecker.com/bazz.html

i cant remember if any of those come as kits

but GGG (general guitar gadgets) sell a kit for the Big Muff
a very nice distortion/fuzz for bass

[Renegadrian]

Circuits I personally found good both on bass and guitar (I play both)

Bazz Fuss - SHO - Valvecaster

[col]

Flipster, Bazz fuss both really good. Not DIY but lately I tried a Marshall DRP-1 recording pre-amp as it had been suggested by one of my friends and I happened to have one in the cupboard. This sounded awesome. I suppose there must be a schematic out there for one and you could miss all the unnecessary stuff off for the headphone in etc. I looked at it to do a schemo but there are over 120 resistors and 120 caps so I decided against it. The pre-amp emulator seems to use two 3mm red LEDs to produce the distortion and I have had good succss with them in the past, simply replace the stated diodes with LEDs.
There have been a lot of threads asking this and similar questions before so it'd be worth while doing a search

Col

[gutsofgold]

Circuits I personally found good both on bass and guitar (I play both)

Bazz Fuss - SHO - Valvecaster

I've been between the SHO and an LPB-1 as a bass boost. How does that SHO sound, does it keep all the low end?

[Gus]

Not enough information in the first post.
Things that will help

What is wrong or what do you want to change?

Active or passive bass?

Round or flat wounds?

4 string 5 string and tuning (low string)?

Type of bass P, J, stingray, etc?

Amp?

Speaker size brand, cab?

Or combo speaker size amp and power?

EQ older sound with no highs or slap or.......

Home or stage volume?  This is very important

Bass can be tricky to get the OD EQ you want with an effect added.  Things to try if you have some guitar effects try them, a tube screamer can sound good a D+ can sound good(as noted in a post above) a FF a EQ like a bass parametric or other OD dist FF types,
try a few and hear what might work or work and report back.  FWIW I have built bass effects that sounded good on one setup and not so good on another so IMO what you read on the web and mags might not work for you.

[Renegadrian]

How does that SHO sound, does it keep all the low end?

Well, I tend to keep amp EQ quite flat, and I usually am a bit "midrange-y" so no bass at 10...
The SHO did quite good, I played it for a while to add some punch at the original bass sound...
Try it, after all it's such a small circuit to build...

[polifemo]

Not enough information in the first post.
Things that will help

What is wrong or what do you want to change?

- Nothing is wrong, he just wants a distortion/overdrive to kick in now and then.

Active or passive bass?

- Passive.

Round or flat wounds?

- Round

4 string 5 string and tuning (low string)?

- 4 strings with the lowest one beeing "E" (or sometimes "D")

Type of bass P, J, stingray, etc?

- P bass

Amp?

- Varies...

Speaker size brand, cab?

- Varies...

Or combo speaker size amp and power?

- Varies...

EQ older sound with no highs or slap or.......

- He´s a pro so he uses the sound that is neded for the song but I would say that his sound is more of the "older" school.

Home or stage volume?  This is very important

-  Stage.

Bass can be tricky to get the OD EQ you want with an effect added.  Things to try if you have some guitar effects try them, a tube screamer can sound good a D+ can sound good(as noted in a post above) a FF a EQ like a bass parametric or other OD dist FF types,
try a few and hear what might work or work and report back.  FWIW I have built bass effects that sounded good on one setup and not so good on another so IMO what you read on the web and mags might not work for you.

[Gus]

Passive P with round wounds but not knowing the amp and speaker makes it harder to help.

Maybe The best thing to do is try a few stock effects.  Try a stock BMP, TS9,7 etc, FF type circuit, Dist+ and EQs with different amp/speaker setups.

[polifemo]

Thanks. I´ll recommend him to do that.

[ubersam]

I second the BMP, try it with a clean blend, same idea as in with the VL Sparkle Drive. Speaking of which, try that one too. Its essentially a TS type OD with a clean blend.

[Gus]

This type question is sometimes hard to give a good answer.

  This is what I do when a friend wants a distortion etc.

I have them bring the bass/guitar and amp and speakers or combo that they use on stage or in the studio and a few effects.  We then try the setup with different effects and note what they like or don't like.  We will often take a stock effect and change the EQ things like more the high pass or low pass frequencies adjust the clipping diodes for headroom.  Now it helps to do this in the middle of the day when your neighbors are away so you can tune at higher volume levels like what the stage volume might be.

A lot of so called mods are simple filter frequency adjustments

  There is often a difference in stage or bedroom/basement adjustments.  For stage level to keep the bass from getting muddy sometimes I will roll off more bass, this is more important for vented bass speakers and open back guitar cab/combos

More mids less mids?
More highs less highs?
Speaker sounding funny or bottoming out in the lows? move a HF filter higher or use a higher order filter

For a FF type I find the input cap value to be the most often adjusted tuning point with a passive bass to a FF type
Sometime a stock out of the box TS will work fine with bass or a D+ or other effects people have posted.
Try a few stock effects to find what type sounds good sometime stock out of the box works and don't limit yourself to "bass" labeled effects sometimes "guitar" effects work well.