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I always copper shield my guitars, to some it's a ball ache but I just zone out, I find it cathartic at times especially when the other half wants to watch The One Show (is it just me or does anyone else hate that intro music?) on the telly in the other room. I also find it incredible that even high end makes (slightly looking at you Rickenbacker but TBF not just them) neglect to shield their wares, I know it's labour intensive but with the prices they and others charge you'd want the moon on a stick. The only guitar I've ever bought with shielding was a Retrovibe, and I was a bit taken aback when I stripped it down to have a look inside (as we all do 😁) only to find out that David Konig the owner of RV had already done an excellent copper job on it before I got my grubby mitts on it. Copper tape is still cheap and IMHO one of the best and cheapest DIY jobs you can do to your guitar - shame other manufacturer's don't see it that way, but if you buy an £85 guitar you don't expect that level of detail. But for £85 that guitar is a stunner mate, it looks lovely particularly with the single knob, I reckon you got more than a bargain, and glad that they fulfilled it. Nice one. 👍

I wonder what its like trying to tune this latest 'creation' with the tuners furthest away pointing away from you if you are holding the guitar normally. Yet again, another Sharpie signature on the headstock to devalue it even more.

Ok, I’ve played on these a couple of weeks. They’ve settled in. I’ve played an hour or more on these most days. They have a great feel. Not hard to fret, very flexible. I like DRs for this a lot, the round core is a great feel. A lot of the high end has worn off for me. I didn’t expect them to mellow quite this fast. The tone is acceptable but they have a strange sort of dulled tone - it kind of sounds like they are wrapped in something. Which, I guess, the core wrap wire is. I’m not sure I’m convinced of these over other DR steels. They feel better than Elixirs - lower tension - but for my chemistry, they don’t seem to stay brighter any longer. I probably prefer Fat Beams overall. I’ve been doing a lot of string dating on other basses. Rotosound Ultramags 40-100s are wonderful sounding but very tense feeling on my left hand, much like Elixirs. I had to take them off, they were noticeably hard to fret. But they sound a bit like Swing bass strings, very crunchy and good low end. Bizarre how different they feel to Roto steels of the same gauge and reported tension. Rotosound SM66s (40-100 Swing Bass set) feel amazing in terms of tension and sound utterly amazing when they go on, but I seem to kill them off after a couple of weeks. They are acceptably mellow now but have kind of lost the magic of the beginning days. I guess I’d use these if I was going to change strings frequently and had more time and money. I literally have never heard my maple neck P bass sound as good as when these went on. Great sound. I’m either going to try DR Pure Blues 40-100 or TI Superalloys next. I think the Pure Blues ‘Quantum Nickel’ is probably type 52 Alloy, like the Ultramags and the Superalloys. It seems hard to get the magic triad of ‘sounds like steel, feels like nickel’, acceptable string tension, and tone durability. Ah well.

These are now taken

Depends what there vibe is... Best place to start but not a starter bass... 2nd hand Ibby SR300! - £160ish? Love 'em and love passive modding 'em. +1 on the HB PB50 - great as they are, at the price point they make for a loverly little personalisation tinker project, ideal for a dining room table over a few winter nights... 😉 Had a fun time modding mine. I've seen some basic Yams criminally cheap but i just don'g like the look compared to the Ibby

Looks like these are advertised in several places but stock hasn’t arrived yet! Or they sold out very quick!

Aah, the plan. I'm doing a Mark Hoppus-esque Jazz/Precision build in black. Jazz bass body, Precision profile neck. Kickass bridge (used elsewhere). Reverse pickup. I put a Tonerider P-bass pickup in a mate's bass and it was pretty hot, so am going that in this. I've got experience with all the parts, so they should go together without issue. Once Tim at Gig Ink gets the guard to me I can enlarge the neck pickup rout.

In terms of "Budget" I'm thinking prices up to £200. There is the criminally cheap HB PB-50 for just over £100 that in terms of fit and finish is remarkable, neck quality superb, and sounds great. I've also got the HB JB-75, but at just over 6 kilos, it's really heavy, but again fit and finish very good and the roswells are enlightening and sound much more expensive. I had the HB RB-414 body was great but was let down by cheap hardware and the bridge pickup was half the volume of the great little Artec neck mini-humbucker, plus I didn't like the wat it was wired in a gibson sort of fashion. I've recently scored a G4M Hartwood Satellite 32" which is another little stunner in terms of quality albeit styling is "left field" I love it. Many moons ago I bought my son a Squier Bronco which I've since inherited, and that little guitar never ceases to amaze me still to this day in terms of quality. All of these mentioned less than £200. Then since I'm such a cheapa$$ I'm going into what I call mid price (others may still call it budget) so up £400. This opens up a whole new set of possibilities. Squier and Epiphone lead the way for me ATM but that's only because of style, I have the Rascal and the Newport both shorties but similarly tricked out with 2 humbuckers each. Each is unique, tho the epi is a bit of a monster to tame when you're setting it up, due to it's bridge, but with flats one the 60's British tones you get out of it is as true as the original. Other notable mentions are the G4M 972 5 string fanned fret (orange guitar), the Retrovibe "Telenbacker" just nudging £400, and last but not least the Sire Z3, which in itself in terms of quality out does everything else with exception of the Retrovibe. I'm not going to say which one is best because all of them have been modded at least in part, but the 3 least modded are the PB-50 - headstock cut to Tele style, Newport - new strings only, and the Z3 - new strings only. I've no favourite make, as quality these days of all new guitars are a lot better than 30 or even 20 years ago.

All the bits are here aside from the scratch plate; it's been a while since I used a car filler product and had forgotten how heady you feel using it in an unvented room 😄

The saddles slide in the bridge assembly, locked in place with the allen screws.

Very nice. Always liked these. Congrats!

That'll teach me not to do mental arithmetic!!