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If you use super glue you can spend happy huors picking it off afterwards!

I got a Kramer 450b last year and despite the fact that it weighs a ton and it's not exactly the easiest thing to play I love it. What I don't love is the colour of the body (and the less said about the wooden inserts on the back of the neck, the better). I don't know if it was originally a kind of orangey-brown or if it has changed over the years but I suppose it is 'period corect' for the 70s - i.e. nasty. It also has quite a few little dings and chips, but nothing serious. It's a 4 piece walnut body and the pieces match pretty well but they're not all that interesting, figuring wise. In the neck pocket where it hasn't been varnished the wood looks quite pinky-red and I am thinking of stripping it down to the bare wood and seeing if I want to keep it that colour or, if not, staining it black. With the ebanol board and the aluminium I think it would look pretty good. Certainly better than what it is now. I am hardly an expert at woodworking (a couple of pieces of furniture rescued and revived is my lot) and I have no decent tools but I think I can manage a sand down and refinish if there's no spraying involved. That said, I have a solid history of underestimating the difficulties of just about everything so before I mess it up completely I thought it best to check if any of you far more experienced lovely people have any advice / top tips / recommendations.

Interesting! On the old ATK's it was parallel - north - north with a treble cut (and the center coil activated in both single coil settings as a phantom coil).

Great idea! Good luck.

I am afraid that I have not read the complete thread, so forgive me if I am repeating what someone else has said. For me, an expensive bass is one where the difference between what I paid for it and what I sell it for is painfully negative. Brand new G&L and US Music Man Sub (stripped, painted and fully installed with Bongo electrics), I am looking at you. Given the BC long term loan, sell it for what you paid for it scheme, most basses are kind of cost neutral in my way of measuring expensive.

I’m on board with ‘simple’ but I do like to ride the tone control from song to song.

I would live to play my AVII enough that the finish starts to wear off it. Aside from that I like rotating basses, especially to rehearsals. Took my Epiphone Embassy to a rehearsal for one band. They couldn't believe its looks or sound and asked e to play it at every gig...

Glad to be of service!

Quality thumbing there.

Awful miming. Great song though. Think the bass is Chris' though although I have a recollection that it was stolen.

Any correlation between Chris' hand movements and te vass sound appear entirely coincidental...

That wasn't very Christmassy at all. Just crashing the thread I assume. Back on topic, I've been listening to Chris Squire's 'Swiss Choir' through December. Lovely arrangements of classic carols sung by a good choir of youngsters... with dirty great clanking Rickenbacker throughout and Chris' great voice too.

Expensive is, to my mind, linked to the concept of a thing being more than it's worth. A Warmoth Precision with woodwork coming in at around £600 with perhaps another £400 on high quality components, gives me a FCS level instrument at £1000, and IME I'd have to spend upwards of £3000 to get anything better from Fender. So, if I'm buying a Precision, anything over £1000 is not only expensive, but unnecessary expense

2x Vol is a Juggle, Blends often too Subtle or All or Nothing SR500 Passive, Vol and 3 way pup switch - simple and Hohner B2, Vol and 3 Way Pup switch. I'd give Simple a try.

Yes and maybe. If you wire two in series they may work at 9V, but these £2 cheapies rely on the internal resistance of the power source to limit current.

Oooooh, yes it does!

Oh no it doesn't! 😁

A Honer B2 is the equivalent of a Steinberger Spirit these days, which retail at about $400. We live in glory days of inexpensive basses.

Great looking bass and as mentioned perhaps one or two high frets I would get a luthier to work on it if you want a flatter neck and don’t attempt it yourself unless you’ve done it before

We've just come back from seeing Jack & the Beanstalk at The Hippodrome in Bristol. We had cracking seats and I sat just in front of where the bass player was in the pit (under the stage). How does it all work? Can the musicians in the pit see the stage performance on a monitor? I couldn't see any? I guess it's all IEM and that the musical director (the chap at the keyboard in front of the stage) speaks to the band through his mic? He also used what looked like a proper old fashioned phone handset. How on earth do they get their cues? Panto format deviates from script a lot, so I guess that you have to really pay attention. It's worlds apart from anything I've ever done and I'm fascinated to understand how it works. And in case he's on here, the chap on the SR5 did a cracking job and, guessing again, that he plays an SR5 because it just does what it does in that environment with 100% reliability. It would be great if some Basschatters that have done or do this could give some insight as it's so different from what most of us are familiar with.

They would still consider it expensive.

I'd certainly not want to be spending a months wages on a bass now!

To me, expensive means paying more than you need to. So I'm firmly at £1,000 as that's where the law of diminishing returnd really kicks in. These days you can buy a bass perfectly capable of the standard required for any stage in the world for comfortably under £1k. I paid over that for a couple of basses and a couple that would have been more new. The extra pays for things that aren't actually necessary that take them into the realm of being luxury items where you choose to pay more. 25 years ago or more, you had to pay proportionally a lot more to get something of the quality you can get for £500-£750 these days.

Could just be a tall fret.