Fender Jazz finish - mid '70s

[lozbass]

Hi all,

One for the many Fender experts on here. I bought an early '76 Jazz a few years ago. The finish is natural with a lot of playwear and a few bumps and grazes (the bass was imported from New York where it had clearly been played fairly intensively - no damage/major changes, just a well-cut and seated replacement nut: a fantastic player/sound after a fabulous set-up by Steve Robinson here in Manchester - much recommended!)

It's not a big deal to me (I'm not an avid Fender collector), but I'd like to know more about the finish if possible. The clearcoat on the body is very yellowed (a kind of deep honey colour - similar to the aged nitro finish on the headstock). It's also soft and quite worn in places - I think a previous player used a pick and wore some kind of bracelet. Where there's wear - very little of this goes down to the wood - there appears to be a harder (poly?) undercoat that is much lighter with a very slightly satinated feel/look.

So to the question, does anybody know what Fender was doing/using for its mid '70s finishes on natural basses? Was it a poly undercoat with a softer (maybe nitro or something similar) top coat? I've seen a few worn basses that look like mine but some that don't look as dark - if it's a newer, non-original overspray, no real problem, the bass is still a great player/looker but it would be nice to know.

Thanks in anticipation of your help.

Cheers, Loz

[BassBod]

I'm not an expert (thankfully..) but my old 73 mongrel Pbass was similar - as its natural, you never know if it was given a clear top coat later to cover surface damage, or whether fender mixed poly/nitro. For a 76 bass I'd expect it to be all poly? I know early 70's necks are often poly, except for the headstock face (they were worried that the decals wouldn't work under poly) so the headstock often yellows and cracks, when the back of the neck remains in better shape.

My Pbass seemed to be poly, but with a clearcoat of nitro - applied over "bare wood" wear in places - not a factory job. Unless they had a really bad day.

BB

[Musky]

Fender were only using poly in the 70's, except for nitro on the face of the headstock as BassBod says. Fender were doing two coats of poly over a clear sealer at this time, so it's possible you're seeing the first coat or even the sealer under the top coat.

Poly does age incidentally. I had the machine heads off my '74 P bass the other day, and even on the back of the headstock the covered areas were considerably lighter than the exposed area.

[lozbass]

Thanks BassBod and Musky - your responses are very helpful and accord with the bit of research I managed earlier (I didn't think of Talkbass before posting the question). It appears that nitro was used on the headstocks (to avoid transfer cracking) but poly elsewhere. As you suggest, what I'm probably seeing on the worn parts of the body is the sealer under the poly. According to views on the Talkbass site, the poly used in the 70s wasn't the same as that used today and can exhibit softness, significant yellowing and susceptibility to wear etc. I'm still not sure that my Jazz hasn't had an overspray, but it seems more likely in the light of what I know now that the yellowed clearcoat is the original poly. Thanks again - any further inputs very welcome!