Late NBD - Cort Curbow, including shaggy dog story about a modding adventure

[neepheid]

As I went down the road to the SE Bass Bash in November I stopped off en route to purchase a bass for the hell of it, a Cort Curbow.  I had always been really intrigued about them, what with their use of man made materials and I always thought they looked pretty neat in some finishes.  I spied one for sale, a sunburst one and figured "what the hell?"

 

 

So, I like how it looks, and I like how it feels to play.  Unfortunately, whilst sounding fine in headphones, it was utter garbage live with the band.  Where are my mids?  This thing is so scooped by default that they're barely noticeable.  I had to crank the mids on the preamp AND crank them on the amp just to be audible, seriously, it just disappeared.

 

Well, I picked it up for a tasty low price so I figured it was worth modding.  I procured a Bartolini Classic Bass soapbar of the appropriate size and shape (MK4CBC) (thanks @Bass Direct) and someone on here sold me a Glockenklang 3 band preamp for a decent price (cheers @Fettsman) and got to work on the mods.

 

Fitting the pickup was a piece of cake, the only thing of note I had to do was accomodate 2 screws on one side instead of one.

 

 

Then I replaced the stupid "slap switch" (which scoops an already inherently scooped bass some more - WHY?) with a much more useful parallel/single/series switch and fed the pickup into that.

 

However, fiting the preamp was another matter.  This body is thin, and to compound the issue, the knobs are sunk into the top.  There was no effing way that Glock was going to fit in there as supplied.  I mean, I was modding it anyway - don't need a blend control on a single pickup bass after all.

 

First problem - the body of the push pull volume control was just too tall, even if the shakeproof washer was eschewed.  So out with the drill and the forstner bit to remove some material from the cavity to sink it down enough so the lid will go down...

 

 

Just made it!  Not a lot of material left, but this luthite stuff seems sturdy so I think it'll be OK.  Then onto the main board, which was way too tall.  So, to scheming.  Thankfully, while the control cavity in the Curbow may be shallow, it is thankfully quite wide.  Lots of dead space above where the bass pot would go...

 

 

So to cut a long story short, I turned it through 90 degrees.  The pot legs wouldn't bend enough while it was mounted, so I had to desolder the pot, bend little 90 degree nubs on the ends of the terminals then resolder it thus:

 

 >>>>> 

 

Did a test fit (the small board attached to the mid pot was able to be bent sufficiently with the pot in situ)...

 

 

Yas, the lid closed.  So I soldered up the rest of the wires...

 

 

Cheeky little single connector block thing for the myriad ground wires I had to connect together...

 

Great success!  It now has mids when the preamp is flat!  I took it to a subsequent band rehearsal and praise be, I was able to hear myself with the preamp set flat.  MIssion accomplished!

 

I hope you enjoyed this shaggy dog story and if you only take away one thing from this, is that it's usually true what they say - where there's a will, there's a way...

Edited Monday at 21:12 by neepheid

[Mottlefeeder]

My first foray into 5-string basses was a Cort Curbow, but I quickly took it back and exchanged it for a Yamaha RBX 765 (which I still have, about 25 years later). The problem I heard was booming bass through a Fender 100 watt 15" combo amp, but your assessment of missing mids from the bass (and the speaker) makes much more sense.

Enjoy.

David

[Mrbigstuff]

It seems you can teach an old dog new tricks (the bass not you)

[MoonBassAlpha]

My old luthier's wife had one. He said the neck was so susceptible to changes in humidity he could use it as a hygrometer. He put it down to the wood/ebanol fingerboard neck combo.

[HeadlessBassist]

Nice to hear a story about mods that actually improve the bass for you, Neephid. I always liked the look of these, but only played one briefly in a shop many years ago. Those Glockenklang (always loved their name!) preamps are fantastic - I had one in the prototype Enfield Lionheart I had for a few years. Lovely job!

[lemmywinks]

Had the 5 string version in the gold leaf finish, always had a bit of a soft spot for them. Really nice design, mine looked like this:

[neepheid]

1 hour ago, MoonBassAlpha said:

My old luthier's wife had one. He said the neck was so susceptible to changes in humidity he could use it as a hygrometer. He put it down to the wood/ebanol fingerboard neck combo.

 

The thing that puzzles me about this one is that I don't think the fingerboard is ebonol - it's not jet black, I can see grain in it (and in the light), pretty sure it's a wood of some sort, if not rosewood then some other dark wood.  And the grain on the back of the neck looks a lot like wenge to me.  I have no idea what the "AL" in "CURBOW 4 AL" on the back of the headstock means, but maybe it's a clue?

[dub_junkie]

Had the pre Cort version, the Tanglewwod Curbow in deep red finish with Mighty Mite pickup and also a Tanglewood Canyon 3 fretless which used the same body shape. Always had a soft spot for them too

[lemmywinks]

6 minutes ago, dub_junkie said:

Had the pre Cort version, the Tanglewwod Curbow in deep red finish with Mighty Mite pickup and also a Tanglewood Canyon 3 fretless which used the same body shape. Always had a soft spot for them too

 

Mine was a Cort but also had the Mighty Mite pickup, as did my Cort C5P. They were probably all just Cort built basses tbh.

[kodiakblair]

9 hours ago, dub_junkie said:

Had the pre Cort version, the Tanglewwod Curbow

The "Pre-Cort" version would be those made by Greg Curbow in Atlanta. 

 

Greg teamed up with Cort to gain a wider audience for his ideas on ergonomics and synthetic materials.  His own place was only building 10 guitars/basses a month but Cort's facilities could really ramp up production 🙂 That was around 2002. Greg passed away 2005 and Cort kept production going for a couple of years longer.

 

I don't know how Tanglewood ended up with the design, they did a bloody good job, but it was post-Cort 🙂

 

Thought I'd a photo of my two together but nope.

 

 

 

Cap on the Tanglewood was nuts 🙂

 

[lemmywinks]

Also the Hudson Project bass

 

Edited 1 hour ago by lemmywinks

[AndyTravis]

Always wanted the cort. 
 

never actually owned one.

 

The fretless 5 in “bubinga” on here a couple of years ago would’ve been perfect.

 

missed out.

 

BAH

 

 

[dub_junkie]

 

 

1 hour ago, kodiakblair said:

The "Pre-Cort" version would be those made by Greg Curbow in Atlanta. 

 

Greg teamed up with Cort to gain a wider audience for his ideas on ergonomics and synthetic materials.  His own place was only building 10 guitars/basses a month but Cort's facilities could really ramp up production 🙂 That was around 2002. Greg passed away 2005 and Cort kept production going for a couple of years longer.

 

I don't know how Tanglewood ended up with the design, they did a bloody good job, but it was post-Cort 🙂

 

Thought I'd a photo of my two together but nope.

 

 

 

Cap on the Tanglewood was nuts 🙂

 

I worked in a music shop that was selling Tanglewood Curbows in the late 90s - red or blue with ebanol boards, singple pickups with slapswitch and matt hardware. I definitely didn't see any Cort branded Curbows until a number of years later. 

 

Read that the UK model was initially branded Tanglewood and later changed to Cort which would explain the situation. So Tanglewood being "pre Cort" is about right from my experience even though worldwide they were likely released at the same time, just not here in the UK. 

 

 

 

 

[lemmywinks]

Right you all need to stop now as I'm getting GAS for one of these, especially you with that bubinga one @AndyTravis