Maude

I actually get annoyed with myself that I buy all these very different sounding basses, and then EQ or modify them to sound the same, ie, my sound. What's the point? But they do look perdy! 😁

No redrilling at the heel. Or shortening, which would be the only other reason to fill part of the neck pocket if the bridge hasn't moved. The binding is intact and original. The neck has been refinished, albeit I'd say a long time ago as you can just tell the lacquer has been on there a long time. The tuner screw holes have been plugged and new holes for the Schallers drilled but it's all very aged. Even the mark from the sticker at the top of the headstock rear that had a number on, looking at images of others, is still there under the 'new' lacquer. I actually don't mind all the visable mods as they're so old they are now part of the bass, it's history if you like. It's certainly odd though.

It's a spray booth/oven for painting cars. The floor grid is filtered extraction. The entire ceiling is the filtered inlet for heated air. The sheeting on the wall is masking sheet to try and keep the overspray at bay, just replace when needed, which was about a month ago 😁. You can get a sticky coating for the walls but it tends to go brown with the heat unless regularly changed. There's room in this one for three cars at a time and it'll happily get to a toasty 80 degrees. Not for the bass though, the heat will expand the air in wood and pop little air bubbles in the finish, plus I don't know how hot you can get celluloid inlays before they start to melt, or worse. It just had a lovely 50 degree bask. 🙂

I know, I can't make sense of it. If you zoom in on the first picture of the body sanded down you can see the brownish filler used to fill all the 'original?' cavities. There was a central one and a matching outlined bridge one which you can just see the edge of below the musicman style later route. But the central pickup doesn't tally with any twin pickup Hofner of this style. The body shape and dimensions seems bang on even the slightly less than average thickness. Also why has the neck been moved? The bridge saddle hasn't been redrilled and from nut to bridge is bang on 30". I was hoping something would come to light when sanded but I'm still none the wiser. There is a route towards the neck so maybe if the neck pickup was surface mounted then that its wire route, and the central pickup route was another mod again. The bass could be over fifty years old so who knows what's happened in its life? I might be wrong but I feel sure it's the original body and neck.

It looks like it, and a few other reasonably high profile tribute acts playing decent sized venues. Hopefully he'll get the boot from them as there's probably quite a few honest bass players that like those gigs. Unfortunately I get the impression that he actually runs these bands.

Righty o, here we go. I managed to spend some time on the Hofner this week. I sanded the body down to see if it revealed any more than I could see through the tell tale sink marks around the filled cavities, it didn't really. There was a central pickup as well as the bridge one, and the route continued towards the neck for some reason. The shape, construction and age seem right for these Hofners. From research not all 185s had a top and bottom veneer, maybe the vinyl covered ones didn't get a veneer as the thickness of the vinyl would equal that of the veneer and as it would never be seen it wouldn't need a veneer. I'll never know so it's time to move on. I sanded the body down using a block to get the surface flat. The purple paint wasn't very even, not in coverage but just a bit bumpy, my guess is a mechanical sander was used and not kept flat. I couldn't remove all the old paint using a block as I was at risk if breaking through the sanding sealer to the raw wood, which I didn't want to do as then you get into the unnecessary grain filling to get back to a smooth surface. It's absolutely fine to paint over the existing paint as long as it's keyed sufficiently. Once flat I feathered the edges of the old paint with a sander using an interface pad. This is a 10mm thick foam backing pad on the sander before the sanding disc. It allows you to sand the rounded edges without risk of squaring them off, it basically just follows whatever shape you already have. Then it was primer time. The back held no surprises thankfully. The headstock got the same treatment but threw up some issues. The head did have a veneer and edges splintered in places sanding it. I filled these areas with a fine filler and got ready for primer. A quick blow off with compressed air to remove dust from the grain blew another piece of veneer off from the centre. I superglued that back in place and primed. I wasn't overly worried as the head will be getting a cover, more of that later. Once primed it looked terrible, the even colour of the primer revealed more little splintered edges. I filled these and used a heat gun lightly to dry. Even the low heat lifted the veneer so off it came, much better. A quick scrape to remove the glue and a sand and it was ready for primer, again. There was quite a bit of damage under the veneer, whether this is from the factory or the bass was used before the veneer was applied at a later date, I don't know either. That's better. The body and head were wet flatted using 800 grit ready for some colour. I've gone for a very off white, coupled with copper brown/bronze scratchplate inspired by the cream pearl and brown tortoise shell neck inlays. It's too cold to paint at home so I popped it in this little oven to keep warm 😁. All painted ready for a quick polish, then onto the hardware.

I sold my BBG5s a few months ago. I bought it new in 1999 and it was my only bass for ten years. Then for various reasons I went back to playing four strings and it just wasn't getting used enough, but I just didn't want to sell as it's a far better bass than it's monetary value. I eventually sold it as the reality is I'll probably never play it again.

Memphis Soul Stew - King Curtis

This one is clearer, had to heavily crop to remove other people.

Here you go,

Looks like he's involved in The Carpenters Experience & The Phil Collins Experience too. This is taken from Brookside Theatre's Facebook page from last year, guess who the "band manager" is? Much to our disappointment, the "band manager" of THE CARPENTERS EXPERIENCE and ONE MORE NIGHT - THE PHIL COLLINS EXPERIENCE has pulled both productions at the very last minute. Any and all money has been refunded and we sincerely apologise for any inconvenience and disappointment caused - this was sadly out of the theatre's control and has proved costly to the theatre and War Memorial charity. https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1967307616689946&id=151775441576515

Run To The Hills - Ron Maiden

Another topic I know, but nearly every ad on Facebook (not from the marketplace) is a scam. Chinese companies, take your money, send the wrong item of a hugely lower value, then tell you to return it to China at your expense for a refund. Facebook simply cannot be niave enough not to realise what's going on but as long as the ad money keeps rolling in they don't care.

Tokyo Rose - UK Subs

Space - New Model Army

Me, Myself and I - De La Soul

Exactly. Went inside for obtaining property by deception, has ten prior convictions including counterfeiting and dishonesty offences, and has just been convicted of five charges of fraud and two of falsifying articles and was sentenced to 162 weeks, suspended for two years on 15th January this year. Yet this thread has tarnished his good name? There's not enough laughing smilies to try and express this clowns comedy genius.

This. I had a new LaBella flat snap at the tuner while setting the action and intonation on a floating bridge Hofner. As you need to repeatedly detune slightly to adjust the bridge, then retune to check action I thought it was maybe my fault. I messaged LaBella to see what they recommend as I didn't want to break another, they asked for a photo of the break. They came back to me and said it was a defective string and sent me a new one free and popped in a funky sticker. Happy days. 🙂

Call Me - Blondie

Saw these last week on the fb fakers page. Looks like a great improvement. I hate to jump on the Rick bashing bandwagon but the original saddle block is a terrible piece of design.

Be a Smurf. Apparently when I was very young my grandparents gave my brother and I a coin each to throw in a wishing well. I wished I was a Smurf while my brother kept the money as it was a waste throwing it in a well. Roll on nearly half a century and I'm not a Smurf and he's got more money than me. There's a lesson in there boys and girls.

Die Laughing - Therapy?

There was one on ebay a week or so ago, a bit rough though. I posted about it in the eBay section but wasn't aware how highly regarded they were. This video of Troy was posted and it sounds great. It probably wouldn't sound like that in my hands though sadly.

He doctored his own bank statements to prove he'd refunded his caravan customers. His 'proof of posting' is probably proof of nothing. Fraud then intimidation equals police then finishing his suspended sentence inside.

I have the Ignition Club bass, essentially the same as the violin but a different shape. It's a great bass, I don't think you'll regret your choice. 🙂👍