Bassassin

It looks OK - I really don't know anything about the brand, the [i]Guru's Guitar Guide[/i] (geek bible) just says good quality mid-80s Fender copies, so no idea who made them - or where, to be honest. Most Japanese factories weren't exporting copies in the mid 80s. J.

Ten quid for a cardboard box? Music shops fling thousands of these things in the bin every day - go to a different shop. And how, in any sane world, are you competition to them? In what way has your private sale on BC demonstrably deprived them of a customer? In my experience guitar boxes are usually pretty flimsy, when I've used these I've always felt I needed to add more reinforcement anyway. Go to your local Lidl & grab 4 of the flat, open boxes they have fruit & veg in, get a hot-melt glue gun & stick them together to make a bomb-proof bass/guitar box. Pack it out with newspaper & cover the holes with gaffa tape, bubble-wrap the bass, neck removed if it's bolt-on. Jon.

[quote name='fillerbunny' post='241776' date='Jul 17 2008, 02:22 PM']Oh, and to avoid posting to three different threads about the same basses and to contribute to the porn content - your Matsumocker project isn't the only one with discolored binding. I was just offered the bass in the attached pic for a very reasonable price but decided to go with the Fernandenbacker in the end. Looks identical to yours, complete with a fake RIC trc... [attachment=10908:matsumocker.jpg][/quote] That's the twin of mine - I've even got the toaster to go in the neck position now! Don't know if you've seen the thread about mine in the builds forum (still not put it together yet - lazy sod!) but mine was sold as a genuine Rickenbacker, to a friend of the guy I acquired it from, dressed up in real Rick parts & truss cover. Wish I had some way of knowing what brand it was originally sold as, but I've seen these under dozens of different names. J.

Heerby was a Kasuga brand - Japan only as far as I can tell, sometimes the Japlish translates it as Herby - which is even stranger! I'm guessing the catalogue you've seen is the one with the lunar landing scene on the front - seems to be the only one out there! Good to get a decent look at what appears to be the through-neck version of my bass. You've done the right thing getting that Fernandes, I think, it looks stunning! It even has "proper" knurled Rick-type strap buttons - never seen that on a copy before. J.

I've had two of these - been quite impressed with the pickup on both. very authentic & pretty powerful. You'll probably have to shim the neck to get a decent string height - you may find that as well as the massive 6-screw neckplate, there's glue holding it in too - so be prepared for a bit of a scrap getting it off. Don't worry, though, you won't break it! These are the most solid basses I've ever seen, they are massively heavy, and the neck's a weird sort of ply known to vintage guitar geeks as "strip mahogany" - about 90 layers of wood... I'd also recommend a proper bridge - these are fitted with crude 2-saddle things, more agricultural folk-art than hardware! Even if you can get decent action & intonation with it, there are 4 evil, sharp, ragged overlong screws, waiting to take a chunk out of your right hand... Not sure these are technically JapCrap - neither of mine had any country of origin - but one of these was on Ebay a while back described as made in Taiwan - seems it had a sticker. Anyway - you won't find a more robust vintage P copy for £45! Jon.

Ooh, I'd have been at that like a rat up a drainpipe... J.

[quote name='Geddys nose' post='240469' date='Jul 15 2008, 11:17 PM']Did anyone get the £95 BIN Aria SB1000? I was half tempted even without the actives installed.[/quote] Err... [i]what[/i] £95 SB1000?? J.

These are the best-looking current copy imo - have you seen the other finishes? [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?s=&showtopic=270&view=findpost&p=180460"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?s=&sho...st&p=180460[/url] I particularly like the white with tort plate - :brow: and I like the fact they have [i]nearly[/i] full-width inlays. J.

[quote name='fillerbunny' post='240028' date='Jul 15 2008, 01:59 PM']Any info is appreciated! Thank you and feel free to delete or move my post if necessary.[/quote] That's stunning - buy it! :wub: OK - knee-jerk reaction out of the way - thanks for posting the pics, I've never had the chance to get a good look at a Fernandenbacker before! Going from the catalogue info I have, I think your deductions are right, it's an RRB-80, and it's probably from the early/mid 80s. I think the colour's stunning, and the fact we can see the construction's interesting, too. Lack of a skunk stripe doesn't suggest corner-cutting - Rickenbacker introduced the 4003 in 1979, and it has no skunk stripe, this may be copying that part of the design. However it has the narrow neck pickup spacing (widened to one inch on real Ricks from about 1974) and it also has a toaster pickup - these were phased out on Rickenbackers in the early 70s. It's likely that the pickup & narrow-spaced scratchplate were used here simply because the parts were available. Interesting choice of tuners too - they're either Schaller M4S/Grover Titans (they look identical) or copies of same - they're original, they are on the black one and also on the catalogue pic I have. This solves another little mystery - because I've seen the occasional unidentified copy with these before. I would be fairly confident that this was made in Japan - apart from the colour, it looks identical to the early 80s catalogue examples, and I assume Fernandes was strictly MIJ at that point. What are your concerns about the wood? It's worth bearing in mind that this is a 25-year old bass (or thereabouts), the woods will be seriously well-seasoned by now, and any issues of construction & stability would have shown up long ago. I'm no expert on wood types, but I'd have assumed it's maple, since it's ubiquitous on Rick copies - and very common on MIJ basses in general. Anyway, I think it's gorgeous, if I had the opportunity of getting it (for a sensible price, of course!) then I would, without hesitation. Oh & thanks for the link to the info site - not seen that before. The timelines are interesting, but not strictly accurate from what I already know of some brands - but there are some useful insights. And no problem (as far as I'm concerned!) posting here - I've always felt this thread should be more broadly about discussing Rick copies & genuine Rickenbackers, and would be better off in General Bass Discussion. It's not like there's a noticeable number of Rick copies on FeePay anyway! J.

I think it's original - the auction pics aren't great, but the one on that bass looks the same - tight spacing, same screw arrangement as far as I can tell. It's quite a strange bridge - a "normal" Fender type has top & bottom pairs of saddles, facing opposite directions, this one's all go the same way. Probably why it's so tight. It's surprisingly common to find misaligned neck pockets/pup routs/bridges on old Oriental stuff - probably because a lot of it pre-dates the use of CNC routers. I've become quite adept at repositioning bridges! J.

I like that. Very understated. First of all, Hondos are [i]predominantly[/i] Korean - the brand emerged in the early 70s, coming out of the Samick factory. They upped their game quality-wise in the late 70s/early 80s, and some were made in Japan, Matsumoku was definitely used, and some allegedly came from Tokai. It's worth bearing in mind that by this point, the Korean factories were pretty much on a par with the Japanese - so it's really hard to tell which Hondos were MIK & which were MIJ. Matsumoku ones have giveaways, like the MMK pickups, or even Mat neckplates. I wouldn't like to guess about yours - at least you now know the model number (HD850) from the auction. The AB at the end refers to the colour, Antique Brown - yours is probably N - Natural. Yours may never have been "a Hondo" - like most 70s brands, it was just that - the same bass would have been sold with different names, or like yours, unbranded. Speaking of which - your Silver Series logo won't fool anyone! The Ibby logo looks wrong (crap scan/photo, perchance?) and Silver Series Ibanez were [i]very[/i] accurate 70s Fender copies. If it was mine I think I would replace the tuners (Hondo hardware seems to be notoriously rubbish) and probably the bridge & nut, too - the string spacing looks way too cramped for the fretboard. Still - very attractive & unusual bass! J.

It's one of these: [url="http://www.yamaha.co.jp/product/guitar/eg/database/sb/sb-1c.html"]http://www.yamaha.co.jp/product/guitar/eg/...e/sb/sb-1c.html[/url] And the only other one I've ever seen is one that appeared on UK FeePay about 2 years ago. Don't remember what it went for, probably about £200-ish. I suppose by "very original" he means it's still got all the usually thrown away bits like bridge cover & finger rest, and it's not had a P pickup jemmied into it. And I'd say it's pretty rare, yes. Jon.

I think it's just Japlish! All of those little Aria Pro abbreviations are like that - I have an RSB Deluxe, which apparently is a "Rev-Sound Bass". Wha? I doubt if there's any difference between Tri-Sound & Thor Sound beyond the sticker - but you could ask on the [url="http://www.matsumoku.org"]http://www.matsumoku.org[/url] forum - someone there will probably know. Jon.

Weird one, that. Hard to get a proper look, what with the B&Q Exterior Gloss slapped all over the body. Don't think it's Jap/Far East, perhaps another Russian/E.European freak, or maybe German. I'll have a look at Cheesyguitars.com when I get a minute... J.

"Bass Tourettes" - classic, and absolutely on the nail! There was a local indie band I saw a couple of years back, whose bassist, though technically good (I suppose) played odiously inappropriate slappy-tappy stunt bass through the entirety of each & every one of their 4-chord strumalongs. As well as doing that idiotic spin-the-bass-over-your shoulder-&-catch-it trick every couple of minutes. Knob. I've not seen them around for a few years - probably the rest of the band beat him to death with his 'Ray. :ph34r: Jon.

[quote name='joegarcia' post='238820' date='Jul 13 2008, 10:47 PM']That really is creepy. 'Her name is Toby.' - Amazing. [/quote] That entire "description" just makes me cringe. What a w@nkstain. Jon.

You do need an "all my gear is cheapsh!t garbage" option. Jon.

I've done this a couple of times - I was in a rock covers duo about 13 years ago, we had backing tapes (on an old 4 track portastudio!) for drums, keys, rhythm guitars. Using a multitrack allowed us to mix a bit for different rooms. My current original band has played a few gigs when we were "between" drummers, using the programmed drums from the original demos, recorded on Minidisc. When we first put the band together, it took ages to find a drummer so we rehearsed like this for months. It really is an incredibly rigid way of performing - and if the monitoring's not great, or you lose it for any other reason - it can all go horrifically tits-up in a nanosecond! :ph34r: Jon.