NBD Hofner Club Bass - Ignition

[martyy]

I received a new Hofner Club from Thomann this week. Thought I would share some thoughts. First up, having read some other reviews I was expecting to have to do some work on the bass. However I wasn't expecting to have to fish out 3 screws that were rolling about inside the cavity! Also had to clear the burrs off the scratchplate and bridge. Really basic QA being neglected there.

 

Once I did that I replaced the (bad) stock strings with Labella flats. First time using this brand, very impressed. Intonation was surprisingly easy to do, and pretty accurate considering the limitations of the bridge.

 

Lovely bass to play. Makes the sounds you expect a Hofner to make. Brought it to rehearsal and it held its own and more, though it is obviously not an all-rounder. It definitely encourages pick playing.

 

The control panel is definitely a weird one. I found that "bass on" was great for picking, and "bass off" more suited to fingers, with some tweaking of bass volume to get some brightness back.

 

Although the hardware is a little cheap I don't think that matters to me too much and it's all replaceable anyway. I would love to try a Contemporary to compare but overall I'm very happy with the budget model. Looking forward to doing some recording with it now.

 

 

 

[police squad]

the ignition basses are hollow and do have THAT sound. I have a contempory 500/1 (violin) and they sound slightly different because they have a solid bit running through them. But with the La Bella flat on it, it goes thud (very nicely)

The Clubs do look cool though

[warwickhunt]

I have the same Club bass (in black) and I was pleasantly surprised it could intonate with a little bit of shuffling the whole bridge assembly.  

 

As for the controls... set them in the one position that has them switched on and then leave well alone!    TBH I've been tempted to just bypass the switches and junk the plate to put in my own plate with just a stacked control for the 2 volumes.  

 

I quite like the fact that you have to work with it at volume as your technique can get a good variation on 'that' sound.

[Maude]

On 21/12/2023 at 10:31, warwickhunt said:

TBH I've been tempted to just bypass the switches and junk the plate to put in my own plate with just a stacked control for the 2 volumes.  

I too have a black Club Ignition and made a new control plate and pickguard in plain cream as I didn't like the white standard ones. 

With hindsight I think you're right and I totally should have just converted to a stack knob volume/tone for each pickup. 

I kept it standard as that's how it 'should' be but it really would benefit from actually having a normal tone control I feel. 

I tend to leave both pickups switches on and roll the bridge pickup volume up and down to brighten or darken the tone. 

Edited December 23, 2023 by Maude

[Rayman]

Nice….. I have my eye on one too.

 

The burrs on the scratch plate is common with these, don’t know why, but it’s an easy fix. Great little basses once they’re tarted up a little.