Disappointing new bass day...I would appreciate some opinions.

[PaulThePlug]

We are yet to see the headstock...

Are the tuners in line, or has 'our man who shall not be named' has moved abroad? 🤣

 

Serious Q.

Why not a Squier (or Fender) Jaguar and an Electronics Mod?

Edited 20 hours ago by PaulThePlug

[Kev]

3 hours ago, N64Lover said:

The bass is gone now, this is the only other photo I have taken from his bench. The bridge doesn't have adjustable string spacing.

Unfortunately, from the various angles in all 3 photos, it consistently looks like the bridge is a tad too far to the right of the neck, you can see it from how the E string doesn't align with the pickup and the general look of the strings across the neck, but probably most obvious when looking at the truss cover.

 

It's an awful lot of work that is going to be needed to get all of this right, before he lifts a finger I would ask for a full schedule of the works he is doing, if you're insistent on going through with the repairs and not demanding a refund/heavy discount.

[walshy]

4 hours ago, N64Lover said:

UPDATE:

 

Thank you all for your input! The bass is on its way back to the builder at no cost to me and I have been assured that it will be repaired and made perfect.

 

I only shared the ugly aspects of it but it's not all bad, the bass plays really well and the neck is beautiful. It also looks awesome as long as you don't look too close. 😅  I'm not making excuses for him because obviously it should all be perfect.

 

I am giving him a second chance because I did a lot of research on this guy and have spoken personally to someone who owns one, for some reason it seems like I got unlucky. I really want this bass and if it's not perfect I can always send it back again for a full refund although I pray that it doesn't come down to that. If I had a feeling that he was consistently putting out shoddy work and scamming people it would be a different story. He seems to be keen to make amends so fingers crossed.

 

 

 

 

Yeah the bridge does look a little too far to the right @Kev

[binky_bass]

1 minute ago, walshy said:

Yeah the bridge does look a little too far to the right @Kev

Most things are these days...

[Burns-bass]

7 minutes ago, binky_bass said:

Most things are these days...

Bravo

[Chris2112]

The bass looks really poor, I have to say. It's not just one issue here but several, which is what tends to convince me that the overall workmanship is poor and the builder doesn't care. Letting a bass go with one flaw and hoping it wouldn't be noticed is lazy and unacceptable but to send something out with a number of flaws like this, all of which are quite obvious, just shows contempt for the customer and the £2300 spent. The binding is stained. The paint is flawed. The fret ends look ridiculous (is one of them casting a shadow in one of those photos?). The scratchplate looks like it's been hand cut with an old tin opener. The neck and bridge are out of alignment, and the OP didn't even notice that! 

 

I am guessing the OP is in the UK given that he stated what he'd paid in £. I do often wonder if UK customers now are given short shift at times because of their apparently meek nature and the additional issues and costs with shipping in and out of the country. In this case, we once again see an OP tip-toeing around the issue of naming this botch-jobber in the hope that this would give him some bargaining power to get the bass fixed, unaware that bending the knee at such an early stage just signals defeat. FWIW, I wouldn't want such a sloppy bass back; I wouldn't want an ornament of insult sat around my house reminding me of the episode. OP, you're the customer and you're supposed to get what you want when you're spending the thick end of two and half grand. Grovelling and hoping the builder will deign to fix his issues is just... not what I would do. It reminds me a bit of the Letts bass saga, or the handful of posters on Talkbass clutching at straws and hoping Joe Zon would finally build them the bass they had paid for a decade ago. 

 

We've had it here before with dodgy builders like Cristian Grosu and Grosmann basses, where builders were named for sending out subpar instruments and it saved the community plenty of headaches in the process. Not here, but on Bass Upfront and groups like that, I was able to warn a few people to read up on some of the horror stories about Grosmann including one on this very site. I'd like to think I saved a few people some cash and some disappointment. OP really should name the builder in this instance to prevent others going through what he has had to put up with. 

[Mastodon2]

30 minutes ago, Chris2112 said:

The fret ends look ridiculous (is one of them casting a shadow in one of those photos?)

 

I don't know about casting a shadow (except perhaps in a metaphorical sense) but at least one of the fret ends has blown clean through the binding. You wouldn't accept that on a £500 Epiphone.

 

[Dood]

15 hours ago, Burns-bass said:

The relationship of the strings to the poles on the pickups is utterly irrelevant to the sound.

 

Hey Burns-Bass  You'll have to excuse my mammoth sized pendatry 🤣 

Not only will the string be quieter when further away from a pole-piece, it will have less 'transient' tone and lack more frequenices often described as 'punch'. (I'd say mid-range, but it can vary). You can test this by lowering your pickups in to the body as far as they will go and then record the bass (adjusting for overall volume drop). It will sound different.

Adjusting for transient response (making it more even) is why Leo Fender moved from a single-pole piece on a 51/54 style pickup to two per string as per the Split-Coil as an example. This change in construction also changes the tone of the pickup too, but that's not what's being discussed. For bassist that bend strings, the distance from the pole-pieces makes a huge difference. I'd demonstrate with a bass I have just recorded video for, but it is all boxed up already. It was really noticeable when the string moved out of the direct field of the pole pieces - which, is why i personally much prefer rail or bar pole pickups. The transient response is much more controlled offering a better, (louder in comparison) "bloom" of the note and therefore a richer tone. 

 

TL/DR .. is relevant 😊☺️

[prowla]

1 hour ago, Dood said:

 

Hey Burns-Bass  You'll have to excuse my mammoth sized pendatry 🤣 

Not only will the string be quieter when further away from a pole-piece, it will have less 'transient' tone and lack more frequenices often described as 'punch'. (I'd say mid-range, but it can vary). You can test this by lowering your pickups in to the body as far as they will go and then record the bass (adjusting for overall volume drop). It will sound different.

Adjusting for transient response (making it more even) is why Leo Fender moved from a single-pole piece on a 51/54 style pickup to two per string as per the Split-Coil as an example. This change in construction also changes the tone of the pickup too, but that's not what's being discussed. For bassist that bend strings, the distance from the pole-pieces makes a huge difference. I'd demonstrate with a bass I have just recorded video for, but it is all boxed up already. It was really noticeable when the string moved out of the direct field of the pole pieces - which, is why i personally much prefer rail or bar pole pickups. The transient response is much more controlled offering a better, (louder in comparison) "bloom" of the note and therefore a richer tone. 

 

TL/DR .. is relevant 😊☺️

You can sometimes test it by bending a string so that it moves away from over the poles.

[Dood]

6 minutes ago, prowla said:

You can sometimes test it by bending a string so that it moves away from over the poles.

 

Yup, I mentioned that.  

[wateroftyne]

Every now now and then the QC with this particular builder seems to miss the mark... it's a shame, 'cos they make some beautiful instruments.

[ezbass]

12 minutes ago, wateroftyne said:

Every now now and then the QC with this particular builder seems to miss the mark... it's a shame, 'cos they make some beautiful instruments.

Hello, it appears that WoT is in the know as to the identity of the builder. 

Edited 3 hours ago by ezbass

[Beedster]

21 minutes ago, ezbass said:

Hello, it appears that WoT is in the know as to the identity of the builder. 

I'm pretty sure he and I are thinking the same, it's why the headstock was out of the pics

[Burns-bass]

2 hours ago, Dood said:

 

Hey Burns-Bass  You'll have to excuse my mammoth sized pendatry 🤣 

Not only will the string be quieter when further away from a pole-piece, it will have less 'transient' tone and lack more frequenices often described as 'punch'. (I'd say mid-range, but it can vary). You can test this by lowering your pickups in to the body as far as they will go and then record the bass (adjusting for overall volume drop). It will sound different.

Adjusting for transient response (making it more even) is why Leo Fender moved from a single-pole piece on a 51/54 style pickup to two per string as per the Split-Coil as an example. This change in construction also changes the tone of the pickup too, but that's not what's being discussed. For bassist that bend strings, the distance from the pole-pieces makes a huge difference. I'd demonstrate with a bass I have just recorded video for, but it is all boxed up already. It was really noticeable when the string moved out of the direct field of the pole pieces - which, is why i personally much prefer rail or bar pole pickups. The transient response is much more controlled offering a better, (louder in comparison) "bloom" of the note and therefore a richer tone. 

 

TL/DR .. is relevant 😊☺️

In extremis, obviously, but for most purposes it’s not relevant.

This was a contextual point. I’m talking a few mm here (from the pictures) but not the sizeable deviation you’d get from a severely misaligned pickup or a string bend, for example.

Pedantry appreciated but I’d say the pickups here were the least of the owner’s worries. 

 

Edited 3 hours ago by Burns-bass

[Lozz196]

46 minutes ago, Beedster said:

I'm pretty sure he and I are thinking the same, it's why the headstock was out of the pics

I reckon my thoughts are the same.

[binky_bass]

My God, someone just say it! 

[Hellzero]

It's ... Aaargh.

[RAY AGAINST THE MACHINE]

It’s Marley Denton ! 

[ezbass]

1 hour ago, Beedster said:

I'm pretty sure he and I are thinking the same, it's why the headstock was out of the pics

I have my suspicions too. Headstocks are often (nearly always) the giveaway.

 

16 minutes ago, RAY AGAINST THE MACHINE said:

It’s Marley Denton ! 

I call Skwire

[Beedster]

I was initially fooled into thinking it was the work of a small-scale/bespoke luthier but realised who (I think) it is when I saw the pics which immediately conjured other instruments built by the same (I think) maker. Either way, should be ashamed of letting that out in to the wild

[Kev]

To be honest, I still thought their instruments were much cheaper than that, I remember getting a custom for a great price was kinda the point at the start.

 

Not good.

[LeftyJ]

Oh, them. Got it now. 

[Chris2112]

I'm guessing Maruszczyk?

[Reggaebass]

Well I looked at the pictures pretty closely and I’m not sure who it is, just glad I haven’t got anything coming from Europe at the moment 

[RAY AGAINST THE MACHINE]

Mmm…it’s not Wall or Ringwal . Maroonczyk?? 🤔