Sparky Mark

Just bought a pickguard from Daniel. It arrived in quick time and was very well packaged. Many thanks again Daniel

This photo courtesy of Andy Baxter website:- I believe the neck plates were made using an automatically indexing punch, so not individual punches by hand.

Funnily enough, if I had to choose a fake, I'd pick the one on left due to the misaligned digits.

Apologies, I'm not able to at the moment.

Headstock from my L serial number 1964 J. Looks like decal is under the varnish to me. Although looking closer at the photo (bass is a bit harder to look at ATM) there is a chip off the decal, so maybe it's on top of varnish?

Why does a graphite neck need a truss rod please? I thought it would be rigid enough without one, like the pre EB Musicman Cutlass 1 basses?

I have three pieces that I can't imagine parting with:- 1. My first dream bass, a 1980 natural Stingray bought with my first student grant check in 1981 from Peter Cookes, Acton. 2. My 1993 Thumb NT bought from Coda Music, Luton in 1990ish. I chopped in at least 6 basses to reach the near £1k price tag. 3. My Hartke AH3500 head, bought from a pro bassist living in Holmfirth in the mid 90s. I'd seen a bassist playing a Thumb through a Hartke rig in a Sudbury (Suffolk) pub and knew that was the sound I wanted. It's probably only worth about £100, but it served me so well for 10 years that I just can't let it go. It's the superior (IMO) MOSFET, Transient Attack version.

I've owned many Tech 21 pedals, including BDDI and VT (which is great for Ampeggy tones), but my fave due to its flexibility is the Para Driver DI. It does everything I need from a preamp/DI.

20th century Trace Elliot equipment was built for real men!

I had a look at the Trace Elliot brochures thread on here to see if I could find the combo this came from. No luck, but I think it's a bit of a shame the original 12ax7 valve preamp was removed in favour of a solid state version.

Agreed it's a good price. Not sure what fixing up is either necessary or possible though? Other than a missing EQ slider tip it all looks fine. Depending upon the fixing centers, it could be a candidate to ditch the heavy wooden sleeve and mount in a lightweight ABS 19" case?

Interesting conversion of a combo head. I particularly like the apparently redundant addition of the UV lamp grill underneath the stainless steel front panel. I wonder what the cable ties are securing on the rear panel?