has anyone MIDIfied an Ibanez EDA bass?

Started by Tony Raven, January 31, 2014, 11:46:31 AM

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Tony Raven

Yeah, there's backstory -- a chronic condition. :-\ But I always worry I'll otherwise leave out some pertinent fact.

Two years ago, I bought an Ibanez EDA-905 five-string for $180. While good-looking, it had been played hard, poorly set up, & somewhat abused -- the knobs had gone loose, & three were twisted around hard enough to break a half-dozen wires off their lands. Despite this & a few other problems, it played surprisingly well, so I gave it shelter & did some fixes.

When I looked into the EDA, the feature that caught my eye first was the bridge system, which uses individual "Mono-Rail II" pieces:
http://shop.ibanez.com/p/2bb1mr2k-mono-rail-ii-bridge-cosmo-black-single-rail?pp=24
A few months before, I had tracked down the similar through-body Hipshot "Triple-Lock Down" & liked the idea of a modular "bridge" that could handle any number of strings, with flexibility of spacing & location, not to mention some acoustic isolation between strings, so it was nice to be able to give this a workout.

Having read some reviews of piezo systems, particularly the fragility of the individual leads, I didn't have much hope that the EDA's had survived, so I was delighted that it works great.

The EDx "Ergodyne" basses were experiments, using a Cort-developed cast plastic -- Luthite -- for the bodies. Far as I can tell, the EDA is one of the few Ibanez basses to have a piezo system, & likely the only model with Fishman saddles.

Each saddle's output has a back-accessible trim pot, which makes balancing 'em a breeze. The EQ system does a great job of balancing piezo against soapbar, so unlike some other systems (the Switch Ultima IV Piezo comes to mind) output is to a single 1/4" mono jack.

This'll likely be back-burnered for a while, as I'm just starting to wrap my brain around MIDI guitar -- but, hey, six strings & a factory-installed GK-2A, how hard is that? With the EDA, I've got to figure out how to install a 13-pin at the edge of a big plastic block, & how to run five lines from piezos... so, heck, if anyone's already run THAT path, I'd be glad to learn.

Elantric