Wiring pt. 2: The special thing about the P bass Omnia

Wiring pt. 2: The special thing about the P bass Omnia


After learning about the Nova pickups five-wire system there's one more thing to know about the P bass Omnia.

Here’s what comes out of the pickup:

As always:
  • Ground wire –bare - Shields and chassis ground
  • Secondary Cold – blue - regularly wired to ground
  • Secondary Hot – yellow
  • Primary Cold –white
  • Primary Hot – red

These work in principle like the regular Omnia wires, but we recommend a different wiring approach.

Why?

After testing in a couple of different instruments and pickup prototypes, we came to the conclusion that an approach more focused on a few options would be more intuitive and better for customers seeking simple solutions paired with flexibility.

We don't recommend series wiring of the Omnia P.

It just doesn't sound like a P bass anymore - the result is weirdly high-mid focused and nasal.

So instead we've decided to approach this from a different angle:

The north coils are wound hotter and darker, resembling a more powerful and heavy classic P bass tone with the perks of the rail system,

while the south coils are wound with thicker wire and less turns, providing a more modern and crisp tone with presence and definition.

 

The different "coil recipes" paired with the position closer to the neck or bridge enhance said effects and provide a whole lot of tonal flexibility at the flip of a switch.

As indicated in the colors of the picture, we recommend connecting white to ground and using yellow and red as signal leads.

The The darker voicing is hot and heavy with a tad of tasty nastiness,

the brighter voicing provides a more modern and crisp tone.

If you want to get funky, you could try connecting both to signal - this resembles an almost scooped tone.

In general, we recommend replacing your tone pot with a push/pull or push/push pot so you can switch between the two voicings.

Yeah alright, but which pots?

In short, the lower the pot values and the lower the number of pots, the more top end you’ll lose.

(A 500k volume pot and a 500k tone pot are roughly equal to a 250k volume pot etc.)

We recommend 500k audio taper pots for volume and and 500k linear taper pots for tone control.
If you like really mellow, dark tones, try 250k.
If you prefer that extra attack and bite, try 1M.

 

Need help choosing a layout? Contact us here and we’ll walk you through your options.

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