molan

I've been watching these based on that really low US price. Only about £400 if you buy out of state. Even importing would only make it £550 or so. Not sure about the tone shaping but just thought it might make a nice power amp

Click on the 'completed listings' button and you'll see what's been listed and what's actually sold - or just click on the 'sold' sub-section to see only sold items

[quote name='machinehead' timestamp='1472155199' post='3119012'] Off topic - apologies. I'm enjoying the Steinberger so much that it got me thinking about a Status Streamline as my main gigging bass. They seem to tick a lot of boxes for me. I'm off for three weeks in my campervan tomorrow. I'll be looking into the Streamline when I get home. There seems to be only one or two a year changing hands on basschat. Frank. [/quote] If you were nearer I'd say to borrow mine for a bit and see how you get on. Only issue for me is that I can't really play them, comfortably, sitting down. Could just be me though! Mine tends to sit in reserve as a backup bass for more important gigs where i feel like I need a backup

[quote name='machinehead' timestamp='1472117166' post='3118601'] My (recently acquired as a travel bass) Steinberger XT-2 has the strap button at the 20th fret!! Try reaching for the money frets on that. I'm making a folding carbon fibre extender to move the strap button to the 12th fret. That should cure it. Frank. [/quote] Last time my shoulder was badly screwed up I bought a Status Streamline for precisely this reason - the top of the body extends right out so the stretch isn't as long

[quote name='mybass' timestamp='1472098206' post='3118461'] Look at where the top 'horn' and strap button are situated ... On the Fender the top horn end sits around the twelfth fret and on many 'modern' style basses, such as Warwick, that top horn hovers above the 14th fret. Long Scale on both basses at 34" but the Warwick will feel a longer neck. [/quote] This what makes all the difference to me. It always feels like a 14th fret strap button bass has a neck about an inch longer than a 12th fret. I simply avoid all basses where the strap doesn't fall above the 12th fret. My favourite scale length is actually 33.3" - I can definitely feel the difference in scale when playing up around the first 3 - 5 frets (where the "money" is, lol). 33" is fine too - as far as I know Jens Ritter is the only guy who makes 33.3" and I'm not sure what difference the extra .3" really makes in everyday playing.

[quote name='Cosmo Valdemar' timestamp='1472058100' post='3118114'] Thank gawd for that! I'll proceed with confidence! Thanks for the good advice. [/quote] I'll PM you

[quote name='Cosmo Valdemar' timestamp='1472056412' post='3118092'] Uh oh... Alarm bells? [/quote] Quite the reverse - he's great! Super helpful and knows his stuff

[quote name='Cosmo Valdemar' timestamp='1472049382' post='3118015'] Thank you. I'm thinking of buying from a retailer on there, based in Japan but an English chap so comms haven't been an issue. I'm prepared for the fees! My main concern was if it all goes horribly wrong, am I protected like with eBay. [/quote] Is his name Danny by any chance? I'd probably use PayPal for the best level of protection.

They have various help and assistance options if you are careful with payment. Using PayPal gives a lot of buyer protection. Sellers are a mixed bag. A lot of them are retailers which 'ought' to add a bit of confidence. Biggest issue for me is that so much of their inventory sits in the US so you've got all the usual import duties to pay for on top of both sales price and the shipping charges.

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1472037321' post='3117863'] The VAT bit was where I lost you. Bass Direct are VAT-registered, so AFAIK have to charge VAT on the entire price. On a sale at £1500 the VAT included is not £80 but £250. The shop has then paid £1100 for a bass which they are now selling for £1250, a GP of £150 (or 13.6%) before allowing for any overheads, or treatment of the bass. This looks like pretty normal business to me. Am I missing something? [/quote] VAT on used goods is chargeable on the gross profit made not the full sale value. EG buy in a product at £1,000, sell at £1,500. Profit is £500 and VAT payable is 20% of £500 = £100.

I love the Basswitch - it's a real 'get out of jail' preamp as well if an amp goes down on a gig. The FeLix is such a pure sounding little thing. Personally I'm looking for a bit more warmth to my pre-amps but I can imagine that, in the right hands, it works beautifully with an upright. The Goliath looks really cool, must investigate that a bit more I like that it doesn't have too many knobs to fiddle with. In fact one of my favourite bass pedals is my Alleva Coppolo Kah Boom. It has bass, treble and a bypass switch, that's the lot, not even a level setting, lol.

Looks like good prices in certain strings but not on others I checked my favourite sets and they were 25% more expensive than UK local pricing

£1,100 to a list price of £1,650 isn't going to be desperately profitable. Let's say the buyer haggles to get around 10% off and settles on £1,500. That's an initial profit of £400. VAT wipes out £80. Credit card or PayPal fees could easily be another £50 (there are operating fees over and above the base commission). Now we're down to £270 profit. May well have needed new strings, a professional clean and a set up to go with the strings. Including some time for labour that's another £50 gone. Net profit now sitting at £220 without allowing any costs for time involved in photography and by a sales person in store looking after the customer. Overall margin is just under 15% on the £1,500 sale price or a 20% mark up on the cost of purchase (all assumptions based on it coming in at £1,100). In the long term that's barely break even for any sort of specialist retail business that doesn't have high volume of sales to offset against basic staff salaries, rates, rent, power, accountancy fees, phones, broadband etc etc. Oh, and if there is any profit left after all of these have been paid then good old corporation tax can hit you for another 20% or so on the end of year net profits. Of course - there's a lot of hypotheses involved here in terms of initial cost of goods coming in and any haggling on the final sales price but you can begin to see that selling pre-owned gear in a specialist retailer isn't desperately profitable a lot of the time

All you need now is a Grace FeLix to complete the set

Sometimes. Quite like Fodera strings and the very light gauge (used to be the Wooten sigs) work really well on 4 string Monarchs. Ritter swordsteels also work well on Jens' basses. He has some interesting gauges as standard fit items. Oh, how could I forget Status. I love 30-90 Hotwires on my Streamline!

I had an immaculate '67 B15 for a couple of years. Sounded lovely but not really useable for anything other than home practice or recording. It now resides in a studio where it belongs I did get to try one of the new, top of range, models once but only for about 5 minutes before I got hustled off by Darryl Jones, lol. It was a thing of great beauty but I couldn't really tell how different it sounded from my original.

I've owned three (I think). Always loved them but just too heavy for me. Sound great with a DB410 - but I can't lift those either any more!

Plenty of speakon to jack connectors out there these days. Some speakon amp sockets will accept jack cables as well but I can't remember exactly which ones off the top of my head

[quote name='Chienmortbb' timestamp='1471904100' post='3116931'] I have been offered it for £80. Couldvprobsmly get it for £70. [/quote] Sounds about right, Last one I saw was £75. Just make sure you give it a really good check over to be sure everything is working first.

They've been around for ages. Nice little amps but don't go very loud, nothing like some of the 'modern' small combos. Not giggable on its own unless you're in a small jazz type band. Can work well with double bass but still relatively low volume. They often pop up very cheaply on the used market but be sure to check them over first as some of them have a habit of blowing the power amp section if pushed hard.

I've seen him in a 'backing band' for Bootsy and he was a complete funk God He's also a genuinely nice bloke, once asked me very politely if he could have a go on one of my basses, lol.

Guitarist in my band did something similar with his Epiphone Les Paul. It was a very pretty flame top model but never quite had the tone of a really classy LP. We got our luthier to fit some Fat Boy pickups, all the pots, caps & switches etc were replaced with 'proper' high quality ones and it totally transformed it. Sounds amazing now and better than many Gibsons I've heard I love it when this sort of stuff comes together!

[quote name='sifi2112' timestamp='1471802014' post='3116004'] Cheers Molan .... the AC combo is top of my list, so do I wait for a 2nd hand one or bite the bullet & order new lol [/quote] There are some deals on these if you hunt around enough. Prices rose a while ago after the £ first started dipping but some people snapped a few up before the price rises went through