wizbat

Well I,ve always thought 'whats the point of have one dream bass built' I have a habit of breaking strings (builders hands) and if at a gig I need to change basses, I don,t like the idea of having to use a different 'backup' bass then have to fiddle with the amp eq etc to get going again. Now I just pick up number 2 and carry on, it also means I can keep one at the rehearsal studio and have one at home for practice as I sometimes go to practice on a motorcycle. See the 'who rides a bike thread'

Well spotted my good man! When I asked jon to build them I said that as much as is possible I wanted them to be an identical pair so for example jon selected one piece of wood for the left side of the neck that was cut in half to make two left sides and so on, when it came to the quilted maple tops jon showed me a piece that he,d been holding onto for some time that had very straight grain thru it so that when it was cut the quilt was virtually identical. The fingerboards were again cut from the same piece as are the rosewood headstock wings and centre strip. The cream around edges is where the solid color stops and it does look like binding as it comes around the contours of the body, I chose cream or actually old english white as I wanted them to be a bit of a tribute to my bass hero Chris Squire and Wizard made the pickups as close to the original ric specs as they could. Oh yeah and the strings were made in the piano string stylee for extra 'Twang!!'. I,ve compared them against my ric 4003 and there is very little difference in sound on the E A D G strings,they have that loverly ric growl but the lower strings are just amazing, imagine a ric with a low B and F# and there you go!. They have dual truss rods and four carbon fibre rods in each neck for extra stabilty with my own headstock design so that all the strings run straight thru the nut unlike the original ric design, the sustain is ridiculous :-) .

Just replace the sponge with springs mounted below the pickup base. job done!

Speak to Bassassin (jon) . He can do ric style trc,s with any name you like except ric of course.

Go for it!! Go see mr S, I,m sure glad I did!!!.

They are strung F# B E A D G so it,s quite easy to adjust from the five string basses I,ve been using til now. They have a wonderful Growl on the lower strings.

I,m still stunned at being an endorsee,, I love the basses, jons a star and I,m walking round with a silly grin all the time!!. I don,t want to give away the cost in case the taxman is watching tho suffice to say I did get a discount for buying in bulk!!

Gordon Smith produced a few basses under the 'Gordy' brandname.

Hey smash, I,m in spalding in lincs which is not a million miles away from norwich and you,re welcome to come and try out my 4003 of you wish.

I can! Jon Shuker..

I,m absolutly chuffed to bits to say that the twins are finished!!, and that today I woke up an endorsee of shuker basses.

My new toy. I,ll add some more pics tomorrow.

Geddy Lee from Rush used to use a ric and he,s a big fingerstyle player.

That bass looks superb.

I have a mate with an amg merc sporting B11 SHT. :-)

That just about sums it up! Keep playing, keep looking and something will come up

My band is Lime Shark, www.limeshark.com We play original music and try to do it like bands used to.

What a result! More power to ya bro!! Make sure you,ve always got a sharpie in your pocket for signing autographs. Live it love it.

This is a great bass to play now that I,ve spent quite a bit of time levelling the frets and it now has a set of Newtone strings fitted. It also has a strap pin extension fitted to the top horn to sort out the neck dive.

There,s your answer matey!! Have a great tour.

[quote name='Ant' post='424695' date='Mar 4 2009, 12:49 AM']the back of my SVT II (non pro) is open and you can see/touch the valves, im going on tour in march and i was just wondering if there were any ways i can stop any accidents smashing all my valves, i cant afford a flightcase; so im thinking of some sort of home-brewed idea.[/quote] I can,t really suggest anything other than getting a rack case for it but keep away from moulded plastic cases such as SKB with handles in the sides as they can block the air passage to the fan air inlet. You really have an expensive and quality piece of kit there and the right case will keep it delivering the goods without hitch. I run a pair of svt2pros in the same case and they,ve been gunned insome of the hottest , sweatiest clubs I know and good ventilation keeps them happy.

Further to a couple of comments earlier, I think the mcartney bass associated with rickenbacker was the c64 4001 that is all mapleglo finish and construction similar to the Chris Squire model without edge bindings and there was a six stringed guitar made back in the ninties with a body shaped like a cadillac coupe deville rear wing but I don,t know wether a bass model was ever produced, the guitar had a tremolo fitted that also operated the brake light on the tip of the wing as I recall.