ossyrocks

That looks lovely. Did you do the refinish yourself? I almost did a strat body myself last year, but I decided it was not worth it in the end and bought a replacement body already finished in nitro. It’s still a skill I’d like to have.

Rob

I saw him play in the summer in Buxton. He’s the new bass player with The Impossible Gentlemen. He is definitely worth watching. 
Rob

11 hours ago, Bill Fitzmaurice said:

You probably wouldn't be able to tell them apart. Back in the day we all found it odd that you couldn't hear any major difference between a Bandmaster, Bassman, Twin Reverb or Dual Showman when played through the same speakers. That was long before we knew about decibels and logarithmic hearing response. 

That’s fairly true to an extent, they do all share the same basic circuits. What often differs are HT voltages, the size of the output transformer, and the speaker configurations. I also have a 1966 blackface Bandmaster head, which I currently have for sale. It’s a lovely thing for guitar, but it has a small output transformer and really doesn’t work that well for bass. 

@Reggaebassthanks for that. I like that tone, hopefully mine will give me something like it, but I know I won’t have the headroom of a 100. 
 

I’ll be using mine with a pair of Mark Bass 2x10’s. What I’m planning to do is an A/B or side by side test with my Mark Bass Little Mark III. The LM3 is really quite loud and it will allow me to see just where it’s at, and if it “could” be useable at a gig. 
 

I just need Martin to finish it! 
 

Rob

@bassplayer76 I've sent you a message.

So, my first foray into playing bass with a band has fizzled out. The band leader has decided she has too much on to keep it going and has put the whole thing onto the back burner.

However.......

Last month I attended the Jazz Jam in Lancaster and was really impressed by the standard of musicians that showed up. I approached the bass player who spent most of the night backing up all the musicians and asked if he'd consider giving me some pointers on jazz standards. He said he would, and on my first lesson, he said "you can play!". On the second lesson he told me he was intending moving to London in January and would I mind if he passed my details onto the bands he plays in with a view to me being his replacement! 

The upshot of this is that I have an audition on Wednesday for a jazz band, most of whom attend the jam, and it's jam night this Friday too. So', I'm going to nail four or five tunes from their set for the audition and hope they like me, and play at Jazz Jam on Friday too!

Buzzin!

Yee har!

Rob

Tempted by this one, it’s a very good price. Good luck with it.

3 minutes ago, bassplayer76 said:

3.06 KG

Whoa! It can't be, can it? I've PM'd you back.

1 hour ago, Shaggy said:

Yup, good luck with this, and that amp is going to be so much more special to you when done than something you bought ready to plug and play.   IMHO those old silverface Bassman amps are the best looking amps ever made. 

 

Around 20 years ago I was lucky enough to find a Bassman 135 silverface head in a local junk shop.   Got it for £50 as it was dead as a doornail, but - as I’d hoped - a new set of power valves brought it back to life.   That amp with an old H/H 2x15 cab was my gigging rig for many years - long gone now, but missed.

 

Update the thread after the restoration! 👍

 

Thanks. I love the look of old Fenders too, and I’ve had many (for guitar) over the years. I’ll post some more about it when Martin has done his work.

Rob

2 hours ago, BigRedX said:

Good luck with the restoration.

 

But consider that having it tweaked for bass might affect its resale value (if that's important to you) as IME the majority of users these days are guitarists.

Yes, a lot of guitarists like these, and I bought it from one. But it was so far away from original inside already that it made my decision much easier. If it had been pristine original inside then I may not have proceeded with this plan.

Rob

8 hours ago, msb said:

I suspect that after being restored , and tweaked for bass , it would be a lovely home rig with a small modern cab.

That’s the plan. If it could stretch to quieter gigs that would be a bonus. Martin seems confident he can do it.

@bassplayer76 Nice bass! What does it weigh?

@walshyhas just posted an absolutely gorgeous 72 Precision on his Facebook page. It’s not on the website yet, so I don’t know how much it is. If you’re listening Walshy, please give us some more info.

Cheers,

Rob

Hi all,

I thought I might start a thread about this amp which I picked up a couple of weeks ago. I've asked on here before about these amps, and some people like them and some think they are unusable. But, I don't (or haven't yet) played anywhere which requires a very loud amp, and I'm a sucker for valve amps, so I started looking for one. It's amazing how many you see when you aren't actually looking, so once I started actually looking, I couldn't find one anywhere! Then a couple of friends came over for lunch and I mentioned I was looking for an amp like his Bassman 50, and he said he was considering selling it, as he's gone digital, silent stage, in-ears etc for weddings and function gigs. Three weeks later I went over and bought it. Whilst the amp appears mostly original - transformers, cabinet etc, it has been extensively "worked on" inside (see pics below), so I thought the best thing to do was take it to the renowned Martin Garton (Gartone Amps) for a look over and to do whatever is necessary.

Martin had it on the bench last week for assessment and thought it best to ring me to discuss it. Basically, it's a mess inside, multiple mods and blunders. We agreed the best course of action was a complete rebuild. It's going to get mainly put back to stock, except the power supply and bias which will be improved, then tweaked from there to optimise it for bass. Everything will be about maximising clarity, volume and tone. I've supplied some NOS JAN Philips 7581A's for the outputs and a box of NOS & used but good preamp valves including 6 Telefunkens, some Bugle Boys, Sylvanias, RCA's etc which Martin will choose for best performance and tone.

This is not going to be an amp that I will ever recoup my money on, for a start I probably (definitely) paid over the odds for it, and I'm yet to find out what the rebuild will cost (although I know it will not be cheap). But in a way, getting one that needed rebuilding is a bonus, as it will allow Martin to do everything in his power to make the amp into the best it can be, and we won't be modifying a pristine original example.

I intend to use it through one or two Mark Bass Traveler 102P's, with my vintage P bass, but that's some way off yet.

I'll try to keep the thread updated as things move along. Anyway, here's some pics as it was when I bought it.

Cheers,

Rob

Quite the bargain! Wow.

I am looking at this bass multiple times a day. Please will somebody buy it. I know I said I prefer Precsions, but ……

Still here bump

I've decided to sell this bass and go for something more Precisiony, maybe a Sandberg as an alternative to my vintage P bass.

Classic colour combo. I replaced the original guard with something a bit more lively, but the original is included. I also added an aged tug bar just to finish off the look. The original guard has holes for a tug bar, but none were ever fitted from the factory. Comes with non original hard case, which is tatty but functional and all the latches work.

It's a lovely thing, plays nicely, with a low action. If you play with a heavier touch you may wish to raise the action a tad. Currently strung with recent La Bella 760FL flats.

It's very lightweight at only 3.6kg.

Collection preferred or can meet at a reasonable distance. I do have a box I could ship it in, but I don't really want to do that, but we'll see how it goes.

Cheers,

Rob

Now then, this popped up on facebook with Bass Monkey, and I think it deserves a thread of it's own! What a splendid Precision.

Is this @Clarkyor @walshy?? Sorry for not paying more attention!

https://www.thebassmonkey.co.uk/basses-1/p/1972-fender-precision-bass-candy-apple-red

Rob

Just bought Merton’s Barefaced One10. He packed it (extremely well) and shipped it the same day as my payment. 
Super to deal with, highly recommended.

Rob

11 minutes ago, Quilly said:

Question: had a problem with a faulty speaker cable , I’m afraid my valve amp was probably running with no load for a few seconds . Everything seem ok now tho. Do you think I should get the amp checked out ? Is it possible I may have damaged the OT?

A few seconds shouldn't matter if the cable was not connected or was open circuit. If the amp seems to be working ok now, then I think you have got away with it.

I think it's more serious if the cable short circuits, it might quickly emit the magic smoke at that point.

I’ve asked here before about Bassman 50’s and if anyone actually gigs one, and the responses were mixed. 
 

But I picked this up this week and I’m going to give it a go. After collecting it, I drove straight to Martin Garton’s place (Gartone Amps), and he’s going to go right through it. Martin is primarily a bass player, and I’ve seen him gig a few times many years ago. He was using a Bassman 50 at the time, but tweaked to be more suitable for bass. He’s going to tune this one for me too. It’s going to be a few weeks till I have it back, but I’m quite looking forward to trying it.

Rob

PM’d

2 hours ago, Reggaebass said:

I’ve got a soft spot for Olympic white basses, especially jazzes, I’ve had so many and my favourite at the moment is a 2014 US one, but when it comes to precision’s I think the sunburst with tort and rosewood just looks so good, I’ve been looking for a US 62 P for quite a while, there seems to be very  few around 

Ahh, olympic white, one of my favourites too. I've been watching this one, what do you think?
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/403932586924

Rob

Old thread resurrection.

I’ve been offered a 70’s Bassman 50, no price agreed yet, but it’s a mate, and not advertised elsewhere.

Some of you talked about the lack of headroom on these for bass. Yesterday I dropped a couple of other valve amps off with Martin Garton (Gartone) for service and got talking to him about the bassman. He used to play bass in a band called Cold Shot (SRV tribute), I used to go and see them 25 or 30 years ago and they were LOUD, and he told me he ran a Bassman 50 in that band with his 1960 Precision bass. However, he had modded/tweaked it for more headroom. He’s offered to do the mods on mine when I get it. 
 

So, watch this space! I’ll find out what the mods are too hopefully and mark up a schematic/layout with the details.

Rob