Doing some refurbs on the new-to-me Ibanez bass.
Removed the old hardware and corroded electronics
Lined the pickup cavity and control cavity with adhesive copper foil shielding
Also added shielding to the back of the pickguard and control cavity cover to complete the Faraday cage
Installed new pickup height adjustment foam blocks, nice self-adhesive ones from Musiclily
Installed a couple of grounding lugs to run a wire from the pickup cavity to the control cavity to link both to ground
Removed the generic 5-screw Fender-style bridge and swapped in a Hipshot MassKicker, which uses the same screw holes, so no additional drilling needed
I got a secondhand Bartolini 8S Precision pickup (passive), new CTS pots, a PureTone output jack, and some decent Gotoh-style tuners from Guyker to replace the truly terrible ones that were factory installed.
I have some 0.047μf Orange Drop caps lying around so I’ll use one for the tone control.
Finally, a pair of cool “Cosmonaut” knobs I got from LoveMySwitches.com - black, minimalist metal skirted ones.
I need to enlarge the tuner holes as the original “vintage” types were a bit smaller. I tried using a cheap hand reamer off Amazon and ended up with a reamed hand, so I guess you get what you pay for.
Ordered a new one that has a standard ¼” shank so I can use it in my cordless drill, being sure to go slowly and gradually to avoid splitting the wood or getting chip-outs.
I originally thought I could find a step bit like the one I used to enlarge the switch hole on my Gretsch, but most step bits are for enlarging holes in thin material, so you can’t drill through a headstock without hitting the next size up.
