Grahambythesea Posted March 7, 2020 Share Posted March 7, 2020 (edited) This arrived yesterday having bought it on the net from a store and advertised as preowned. I haven’t owned and played a short scale bass for very many years and my last was a ‘66 vintage Gibson EB2. Most of the time since then I’ve played long scale 5 string basses and still do. i thought this may be fun and really light for those days when the shoulder ache nags. Judging by the state of the neck relief when it arrived, flat and choking around the 7th, I doubt this had actually been preowned, but perhaps buried in the warehouse. There isn’t a mark on it, but the gig bag looked and smelt filthy, straight in the wash! So a little time working on the truss today and the floating bridge ( a dreadful idea, how do you get the height right for all the strings?) and it’s playable and intones correctly if with a relatively high action. I think the nut has been cut wrongly so the G string is a little too close to the edge of fretboard. Will get a replacement and see how that is. Pickups are fine, kicking out a pretty strong signal, the short scale hasn’t caused me any problems when just noodling and I’m pleasantly surprised that the 15mm string spacing hasn’t tripped me up. (My 5 string basses are 19mm and 16.5mm). The logo is an inlay, which I think is better than the original which were silk screened initially and then a plastic stick-on badge. Some tea cup knobs would be nice and at some point before too long - flats. It weighs a ridiculously light 2.4kg (5lbs) but doesn’t seem to suffer neck dive. So far for a cheap Chinese made instrument costing a fraction of the prices of my others, I reckon it’s pretty good, time will tell. Edited March 7, 2020 by Grahambythesea Typos 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cosmo Valdemar Posted March 7, 2020 Share Posted March 7, 2020 Good score. I LOVE mine. It makes such a happy sound. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trueno Posted March 7, 2020 Share Posted March 7, 2020 Be careful... you'll end up selling all your long scale basses and going over to short scale... that's what happened to me. I had a Hofner Ignition Club bass... I don't know how they did it for the money. I f it doesn't have flats on... whack some on. And enjoy! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cosmo Valdemar Posted March 7, 2020 Share Posted March 7, 2020 40 minutes ago, Trueno said: Be careful... you'll end up selling all your long scale basses and going over to short scale... that's what happened to me. I had a Hofner Ignition Club bass... I don't know how they did it for the money. I f it doesn't have flats on... whack some on. And enjoy! Yeah, flats are a must. And remember the control panel works completely back to front... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rasher80 Posted March 8, 2020 Share Posted March 8, 2020 Absolutely love mine. Made me realise short scale is more my thing. The sound from it once I put flats on it was immense. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Highfox Posted March 9, 2020 Share Posted March 9, 2020 (edited) They are very good for not a lot of money. Got mine just before Crimbo. Flats are the way to go if you like the old school sound and feel. I only used mine at one practice session so far, but it really suited a few tunes. I have to make the effort to take it out a bit more, gets a lot of home use Edited March 9, 2020 by Highfox smelling Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grahambythesea Posted March 14, 2020 Author Share Posted March 14, 2020 Now changed to a much better ivory coloured nut and bought tea cup knobs which look so much more the part than the black mini top hats. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EssentialTension Posted March 14, 2020 Share Posted March 14, 2020 47 minutes ago, Grahambythesea said: Now changed to a much better ivory coloured nut and bought tea cup knobs which look so much more the part than the black mini top hats. Very nice. I have an Ignition Club. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grahambythesea Posted March 14, 2020 Author Share Posted March 14, 2020 1 hour ago, EssentialTension said: Very nice. I have an Ignition Club. My first ever electric guitar was a Club 40. I can get quite nostalgic about club basses although I have never owned one😞 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EssentialTension Posted March 14, 2020 Share Posted March 14, 2020 2 minutes ago, Grahambythesea said: My first ever electric guitar was a Club 40. I can get quite nostalgic about club basses although I have never owned one😞 Someone told me , or maybe I read it, that, in the early mid sixties, Hofner couldn't make Violin bass bodies quickly enough for the orders they were getting, but they had spare Club guitar bodies and bass necks so they married the two. Is it true? I don't know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grahambythesea Posted March 14, 2020 Author Share Posted March 14, 2020 4 hours ago, EssentialTension said: Someone told me , or maybe I read it, that, in the early mid sixties, Hofner couldn't make Violin bass bodies quickly enough for the orders they were getting, but they had spare Club guitar bodies and bass necks so they married the two. Is it true? I don't know. That sounds highly feasible. I was around in the sixties, my older brother had a Senator Bass and I remember seeing guys with Committee basses which we thought was very up market! I can’t remember any amateur bands having violin or club basses. I wonder if they were mainly in the German market so the bands like the Beatles & the Searchers who played in Hamburg got theirs over there? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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