Leaderboard

Clearly given the shape of the case, the guitar is a Mustang.

Received this from Tom at COG this morning, and it was too good not to share.

Yeah come on, own it!

HB PB-50 - v3.0 Becomes v4.0... *AUDIO CLIP* You'll be pleased to know that this will be the final reincarnation of this HB PB-50 Precision Bass. Yes... I know I said that last time - but Shoreline Gold, though a very nice finish, isn't really my thing. My thing is basses that are white. Or cream. Or aged Oly White. Or yellow, basically... you know what I mean. I was particularly taken with the new Player Series 'Buttercream' P bass - hence this refinish and reworking - saving myself £649. This one has a custom handmade Herrick dual-coil pickup in it - and very nice it is too... warm, taut and punchy, with the mid-range push typical of a 57-type split-pickup, but in a 51-type four-pole format. It's a beast... check out the audio clip. https://www.herrickpickups.com/ The previous version 3.0 bass is here. Now read on. Body refin in TV Yellow nitro Pickguard in Acrylic White Fender American Deluxe Bridge, Top-Loading or Through-Body Herrick Dual-Coil Telebass '51' pickup overwound to 11k ohms CTS solid-shaft pots, Chiclet cap .047uF, Switchcraft Jack in cats-eye side plate Fender Chrome '51' Pickup Cover Fender Tug Bar Fender dome-top knurled control knobs with grub screws Wilkinson WJBL 200 tuners La Bella 760FS Steel Flatwounds 45-65-85-105, Through-Body Stringing Is this really the final version..? I hope so, because I just don't have the time (or disposable bass tokens) for any more finishing shenanigans... I thank you!

@BrunoBass With the 1st templates I did,You didn't even need to line them up 😄 Plan was the run round it with a router and flush trimmer cutter. Once it dawned on me nobody was using a router the next batch I sent out were just cut vinyl 😂

I used an electric jigsaw and sanded by hand. I was quite pleased with the result. I got a Mike Dirnt template off the internet. Little tip, I found it easier to place the template on the back of the headstock as it’s flatter and the template sits better. Also i could line up the printed machine head holes through the drilled holes of the headstock.

The Warman MM style pups are monsters, I`ve had several including 2 in my Westone Quantum and I`ve just put a 5 string version in a deco HB 5 string ray copy and it`s transformed it.

Soak it up Christine - if you were nearer to me instead of cowboy country, i'd be asking you if i could watch you work ! These babies will be some of the nicest builds in this forum

I am sure that there is no aspect of this video that any of us will recognise.

https://reverb.com/shop/fxpedalrental

He said that they average about 8 pounds! 🙂

I love my Ric. I'm actually in the process of using it on a new recording project I am doing at the moment & it's the first time I have recorded on just one bass for a whole album. I bought secondhand as I didn't fancy the full on expense but I've really bonded with this one. The expensive bit is the furry security guard I have to employ because of all the haters!

fender P = Fender J= Ricks=

Hi All, I'm Sarah and I play bass. Sounds like an introduction to an AA meeting, but without the guilt! You don't want to know how old I am or any of that boring stuff, but if you are curious I'm sure you can Google me and find out. I started playing bass when I was about 13, after my Dad bought a Beatles greatest hits album (the red one, 1962 - 66), and I was blown away by McCartney's bass sound and the way bass made the song 'whole'. After a lot of nagging I persuaded my Dad to get me a bass for Christmas; he got if off his mate who had been in a band years before and since stopped playing. It was a 1965 Hofner Violin bass, which I dearly wish I still had, but I sold it years ago for a ridiculously small sum. Anyway, I joined a band and had a ton of fun. Not long after that, we broke up and other life things happened; marriage, kids, house moves .... all the things that happen during a lifetime. I stopped playing and didn't touch a bass for around 20 years, until my current partner surprised me with a bass and a little amp for Christmas in 2009. That started me off again and I started from the beginning, teaching myself to play the thing properly this time. I soon sold that bass and started trading up; I went from the Agros 'Starcaster' Jazz bass to a Vintage V940, then to a Peavey International, a Washburn Taurus T25 and then made the jump to a Mexican Fender P bass. I wasn't much impressed with the Fender, so I traded that for an Ibanez SR300, which I kept for about 4 years. During this time I started making bass cover videos on Youtube, which earned me a bit of a 'following' both in the UK and around the world, notably in South America for some reason. I still do the videos when I get time and the inclination hits me, and the videos I already have online (about 70) still get comments and views on a daily basis. These are almost entirely 1970's pop hits; there are a couple of 60's and 80's songs in there as well, but I've just chosen to cover songs that appeal to me or mean something to me. Then, about 4 years ago I fancied joining a band, so I advertised myself on Joinmyband.co.uk and got no serious offers, just a few time-wasters so I quickly shelved that idea. Then, 2 years later someone unearthed my advert and contacted me to say that their bassist was leaving their band, and would I like to join? I sent them some links to my Youtube stuff, we met, chatted, jammed and before long I was in! So the first thing I did was upgrade my bass (again) and I bought a beautiful Ibanez SR1200 Premium. Not long after that, things started to get serious and I bought and Ibanez SR 5000 Prestige as well! Realising I was spending far too much on basses, I sold the SR 300, the SR 1200 and my SR 300 DXF ( did I mention I had one of those as well - lovely fretless bass!), and spent the lot on a Rickenbacker 4003s! So those are the basses I have now, the SR5000, the Ricky.... and a Fender American Standard Jazz bass which my partner and I decided to go halves on about a year ago. I'm not buying any more now (unless a Rickenbacker 4001 comes up at the right price!), I'm just keeping what I've got as investments and for the gigs we play now. My band plays pubs around the Leigh / Atherton areas of Greater Manchester; we do covers of 60's 70's and 80's pop hits, a little bit or rock and generally feel-good drinking music! People seem to like us and we have a lot of fun doing what we do and entertaining people. So that's me. probably more than you need to know, but what can I say... I talk too much !

It's basically there to give the surgeons a laugh when they're fixing my hernia for the fourth time...

Yes, but that would have made my 'may contain nuts' scrotum tattoo bitterly ironic.

I love Welcome to my Nightmare, must be time to dig it out again

Ooooh good jimi track, ooooh good jimi track, anymore like this?

Well... that might work with a hard case. 😉

I would have used a router, but I'm really not comfortable with power tools since I nearly sliced my balls off with a circular saw during a cab build. Just sayin'.

My Kala as it came from the factory had an issue with the pickup not picking up the E string. The piezo pickup is glued (actually looks like black epoxy) to the bottom of the saddle instead of lying on the bottom of the saddle channel. Kala's "fix" was to loosen the strings and tilt the bridge saddle towards the tail of the bass, which made the already shitty intonation even shittier. To actually play this thing anywhere near in tune I've had to experiment with changing strings - 4th set were best, the ones that came off the HB Uke. Other than sharp fret ends (it's an HB Deko after all) the HB was perfect out of the box. Adding Pyramid tape wounds was the icing on the cake.

Having rewound a lot of Rick pickups I've found (by actually measuring the wire diameter) that contrary to what Rickenbacker have maintained, the 8k ones were wound with 43awg wire which roughly gives you 8000 turns. They now use finer 44awg wire ... and because of the higher resistance per foot of the finer gauge, the 8000 turns gives you 13.5k. Exactly the same power, because it's turns that equal volume, not resistance. The 44awg wire just gives you more mid punch.

I have read people on Talkbass saying that the 115 Traveller works with the102p, hence my interest. I didn’t consider that EQ might be an issue, but now I am. I do like the sound of 10” speakers for sure.

What do you mean by "well"? Do you mean accurately or faithfully, or do you mean efficiently? I'd say the enclosure (or lack of) is just as important as the size of the drivers...

Aaaaaghh!!! Overhang OCD alert! Overhang OCD alert! *Runs away and washes hands 20,000 times*

Trying playing through those to an audience.

Air movement is Cone Size linked with displacement - how much the cone can move forward and back in the chassis. A really wide cone only moving 1mm won't shift as much air as a smaller cone that moves 10mm

In which case that's a bit of a killer point you've raised. However folk do regularly mix cab sizes - so is this just a particular feature of the Markbass 2x10s and 1x15s?

Yup. It was not a great choice. Too many EQ compromises to make the 15 sound great and the 10s sound great at the same time. If you like it and want more - then get more of the same. Get a 2x10 cab. No EQ compromises then and you get more of what you like.

Or just following the classic pricing model for any electronic gear i.e. high initial price for early adopters for whom getting the latest tech is a 'must have' and then subsequently cutting to flush out the more "reluctant" buyers? My Zoom B3n, which is ridiculous amount of pedal for the money, was £170 when I bought it when it first came out 15 months ago. Andertons are currently selling for £135. So a similar ball park discount of 20% to 25%.

It self-relics, too!

Yes I do!! 😁 But if it doesn't look good I can keep the pickguard black anyway

But it creates this wall of awesomeness

Of course, you could always stick a Jazz neck on it...

Not this again? Geddy's on record as having used his Jazz as well as his Ric to record with (on plenty of songs considered to be iconic to the Ric sound), and he's dropped the Ric completely...pushing forty years ago. Similar situation with Foxton and his Precision. I should have written 'didn't use them exclusively' with the studio recordings in my post above, so apologies for that, but the fact remains, however inconvenient. I've never played a '72, they may well have something the ones I have played (and owned) didn't have...and I've moved on basses by Alembic, Warwick, Status, Sei, and all the more usual suspects like Fender, Gibson and MM, and settled with what I like and won't sell. It's a nice place to be, and I'm glad your Rics are that for you. That brand new one I bought was still nowhere near good enough build and finish-wise for a £1600 bass. For the record, I was gutted.

We did a deal. She doesn't count my instruments, I don't count her shoes...

That would be enough for me I really must check out Blue Dot

Had the CMD and it served me well for five years. Couldn’t have asked for more - and I miss the tilt back function, great for hearing on stage. As for carpet finish, get a Roqsolid cover...

I've never owned a combo that has a tilt back capability but I have read they are really good for hearing what you are playing on stage. Although carpet covering requires a little more maintenance (brush/vacuum) I prefer it in the main to cheap Tolex (far east production?) that marks and tears way too easily

Given you've already bought the MB I'd stick with that unless you can return it and swap it out? If so the MB is still a better quality combo but I've heard good things about the Rumble 800 too. I guess you have to ask yourself which sound you prefer ( and don't forget what you hear is not what the audience will hear). I like MB gear and have a CMD 121P and when I tried the Rumble 500 did not like the sound but the Rumble 800 has lots of toys. Different strokes for different folks...

Tedeschi Trucks - take the Blues and do all sorts of weird and wonderful things with it.

I think if you're wearing the dress and wig most people will know who you are supposed to be. If you get time you could draw on some sailor tattoos as well.

Funnily enough I discovered the weirder end of jazz completely by mistake; I was DJing in Leeds in the 80s - mainly funk. And as there was no real means I knew of finding new music I'd buy stuff completely on spec. One day I saw an album cover with a sharp dressed black guy holding a Steinberger bass - it was an import costing £8.99 (this was 1985!!!) but I thought this looks like new funk, I'll play it at the Warehouse tonight! It was Jamaaladeen Tacuma's "Showstopper". I played it before sticking it on the dancefloor - didn't sound straight 4:4, there was weird repetition, there were too many notes, it just wasn't right. So I shoved it in the back of my record collection. A couple of years later I listened to it again, and somehow it just made sense... But it was a slippery slope, I craved more oddness, more dissonance, more crazy. Ornette and his harmolodics weren't enough. Through Shannon-Jackson I discovered Last Exit, Brotzmann, Bill Laswell, Sonny Sharrock, Steve Lacey, Lol Coxhill and the holy grail - Derek Bailey. It was like starting with a fag behind the bike sheds, graduating onto a sneaky spliff, onto white powders, bits of blotting paper, and finally, Free Jazz Improv. All other music sounded dull. After a long visit to the Betty Ford Clinic I was weaned back onto "normal" music, but thanks to this thread I'm hooked again. Cheers!

Yep, this! Ha! 😀 To the O/P, would you be willing to pop the chassis out and take a pic? It may be DFA control..

You don't know me! 😂

I rest my case

I've got an identical acoustic! From Thomann too, but it wasn't deko - I think it cost £110 so it's actually OK to post it in this thread