Sherl & Roth 3/4 Fiberglass Bass--Anyone ever Use One Of These

[michaelc]

I'm looking for my first double bass. I don't have a lot of money to spend, so most of my options are cheap plywood chinese basses. One of these basses poped up on my local craigslist and I'm thinking about it. I know everybody starts with a really cheap bass anyway, but I feel like this bass might be really cool for lugging around to outdoor shows and other less than ideal enviroments in the future when I can afford a nice bass.

Anyone ever use one of these? What's a fair price to pay for one of these?

[Marcus Johnson]

Originally Posted by michaelc

Anyone ever use one of these?

Started out on one, back when Fred Flintstone was still alive. It got me started, and that's about all I can say about it.

"Lugging around"... boy, that's the correct term. They are heavy mofos. Not too loud in my experience. On the plus side, you don't need a luthier nearby, just a boat repair shop.

[peterpalmieri]

The idea of a cheap chinese bass never sounded so good!

[BPeder]

My old/spare instrument is a Scherl and Roth. I bought mine back in the mid 80s for $500.00 with a stand and a gig bag. It was a spare at that time for my main ply bass but it saw front line service too after I let the ply bass go. Mine was stock when I found it and the the color of the fiberglass was an ugly flower pot terra cotta clay red. Shine a flashlight in the F hole and see what color the material is. Mine does have a sticker so I suppose it could be researched but I went to the Scherle and Roth site http://www.glaesel.com/ and information there was pretty thin. I was playing in a rockabilly band at the time so of course it got painted gold sparkle, then black with white perimeter and F hole stripes. Mine has fairly heavy brass plates and machines with steel pegs and brass keys, one of which broke off and I replaced it with a Sacagawea Dollar. It's a 3/4 Gamba with a 41" + change scale length. I don't know when it was made. Maybe it doesn't matter. If you get many responses to your post, I think they will be mostly of the "those basses are crap" flavor, and some guys will even complain that they smell bad! Let me remind you that even a crappy bass will cover certain repertoires just fine if it's set up OK and that you can make a bass sound decent by the way you play it. Also many bass players have a certain aroma about them too so let's not talk about odors!

So, it's a fiberglass and plastic constructed bass that was OK for the type of banging on and around it got on the road and in the trenches all those years in the rock band. I just stuck an old junked out "P-Bass" pup on it and as long as it went "whack" followed by some sort of deep "boomp" that was fairly predictable and with relatively good intonation, I didn't ask much more from it. The bass was in kinda rough shape after those years of war and when I started playing it in the acoustic groups during peacetime, it became clear that I would have to do something about it. The finger board had begun to de-laminate from the neck so I took it all the way off. The neck was like a canoe inside, with a bar of aluminum sitting in the bottom and covered with a long, ugly blob of fiberglass resin to hold it in place. I filled this hollow space with high quality epoxy and clamped the FB back on. I got lucky. After trimming and sanding the squeezings, the FB sat pretty darn well and I don't have any really terrible issues with buzzes, twists, warps or wolf tones. I guess it wasn't all luck, I did take exquisite pains before the epoxy set, to place the dozen or so clamps as carefully as I could. I then cut a new bridge, taking two days to do it and put a new set of medium Erurosonics on it. My bridge is a pretty good amateur job if I do say so. I really took my time and did not wus out on it. I am too chicken to mess with the sound post however. Luck again, that it stayed in place throughout all the other repairs. I wish there was more overstand though. The bridge is very short.

OK, that's a medium/long story with a medium happy ending. My bass sounded twice as good as it ever had. Louder and better tone and I no longer was afraid that it was going to fall apart on stage like the Three Stooges car. It's really a good slap bass. The plastic fingerboard makes a nice click and it has good low end. Plus, it's bullet proof. I did a lot of cruise ship gigs and I always joked that I had my own private life boat. Water and humidity or the lack thereof and extremes of temperature have no effect on this bass which is why it was popular with schools I think. It was probably a bit more expensive initially than a ply bass but less problematic in the long run. If you are looking at the same bass I have, you have a tough playable instrument that will, if cared for, give you many years of faithful service. Don't let the guitar player stand on it, the sides are very thin. Also, as I have discovered, Black may not be the best color choice. Full-on sun won't harm the bass, but the body will expand up faster than the strings can stretch and they will go out of tune sharp. You have an excellent garage bass, That's where mine is right now and I live in Minneapolis.
I love my Upton Hybrid and I won't be bringing Blackie out on many of my acoustic gigs, but the occasional Rockabilly call comes in and I'm glad to have the old girl. Good luck with your bass whatever it turns out to be, and don't let people tell you it's a piece of junk. decide that for yourself and if you do, there are sure a lot of fine basses out there you can look into. Cheers!

Some added information: My bass has a nice ebony tailpiece and a wire type hanger with a cheap "ebonized" end pin. The fingerboard flexes quite a bit above the neck which makes triple slapping chancy. I don’t know if it could be planned. It records well with a fat tube mic placed low and a hot condenser up by the fingerboard. It had the "tubby" tone that others have noticed but the coats of paint simmed it down. It has a nice, even mellow tone these days. Finally, my Upton bass is most definitely not in the garage, just in case Gary or Eric happens to read this post... Peace-out

[Eric Swaim]

I suggest anything that is wood, Fiberglass is for boats, skate-boards and surf-boards. I fully carved upright and love it. I have owned an electric upright upright from Curruthers (spelling??),Wood basses include Kays, Romanian, German, and China made. My suggestion is buy something that you can afford first of all. I have had some students that come to me with a Palatino, (nice Italian name, but is actually cheap Chinese), that actually plays well and sounds well for the money they paid. As long as the bass can be set up properly, you may get lucky and get one that sounds half decent as well. Good Luck on your Journey

[Jake]

There's a good Shen PW in the classifieds.

[fdeck]

My junior high had one of those fiberglass basses. Over the summer in a hot store-room, the neck took a nose dive, and it was useless after that.

[Paul Warburton]

WHAT? Jake, I had no idea Shen had my model.

The original Roth fiberglass basses came from a guy here in Denver named Jerry Finch. The pattern he copied was from my Jacobus Hornsteiner German DB.
He sold the "thing" to Roth.

[Eric Rene Roy]

My first bass was a maroon S&R fiberglass bass too. I called it my Corvette bass. I think a Corvette sounds better, IMHO.

[Jake deVilliers]

Originally Posted by Eric Gene Roy

My first bass was a maroon S&R fiberglass bass too. I called it my Corvette bass. I think a Corvette sounds better, IMHO.

What happened to Rene?

[sjd007]

My aprilia motorbike is carbon fibre, and looks cool. Now if someone made a carbon fibre bass that would look cool.

Mmmm. Carbon fibre.




Probably sound like sh** but it would look cool.

[Paul Warburton]

Originally Posted by Jake deVilliers

What happened to Rene?

I think, maybe, he thinks you would ask him that question.

[Marcus Johnson]

Originally Posted by sjd007

My aprilia motorbike is carbon fibre, and looks cool. Now if someone made a carbon fibre bass that would look cool.

Mmmm. Carbon fibre.




Probably sound like sh** but it would look cool.

Quintus, Cosi, & Luis & Clark are some of the companies building composite double basses.

[Paul Warburton]

Originally Posted by BPeder

My old/spare instrument is a Scherl and Roth. I bought mine back in the mid 80s for $500.00 with a stand and a gig bag. It was a spare at that time for my main ply bass but it saw front line service too after I let the ply bass go. Mine was stock when I found it and the the color of the fiberglass was an ugly flower pot terra cotta clay red. Shine a flashlight in the F hole and see what color the material is. Mine does have a sticker so I suppose it could be researched but I went to the Scherle and Roth site http://www.glaesel.com/ and information there was pretty thin. I was playing in a rockabilly band at the time so of course it got painted gold sparkle, then black with white perimeter and F hole stripes. Mine has fairly heavy brass plates and machines with steel pegs and brass keys, one of which broke off and I replaced it with a Sacagawea Dollar. It's a 3/4 Gamba with a 41" + change scale length. I don't know when it was made. Maybe it doesn't matter. If you get many responses to your post, I think they will be mostly of the "those basses are crap" flavor, and some guys will even complain that they smell bad! Let me remind you that even a crappy bass will cover certain repertoires just fine if it's set up OK and that you can make a bass sound decent by the way you play it. Also many bass players have a certain aroma about them too so let's not talk about odors!

So, it's a fiberglass and plastic constructed bass that was OK for the type of banging on and around it got on the road and in the trenches all those years in the rock band. I just stuck an old junked out "P-Bass" pup on it and as long as it went "whack" followed by some sort of deep "boomp" that was fairly predictable and with relatively good intonation, I didn't ask much more from it. The bass was in kinda rough shape after those years of war and when I started playing it in the acoustic groups during peacetime, it became clear that I would have to do something about it. The finger board had begun to de-laminate from the neck so I took it all the way off. The neck was like a canoe inside, with a bar of aluminum sitting in the bottom and covered with a long, ugly blob of fiberglass resin to hold it in place. I filled this hollow space with high quality epoxy and clamped the FB back on. I got lucky. After trimming and sanding the squeezings, the FB sat pretty darn well and I don't have any really terrible issues with buzzes, twists, warps or wolf tones. I guess it wasn't all luck, I did take exquisite pains before the epoxy set, to place the dozen or so clamps as carefully as I could. I then cut a new bridge, taking two days to do it and put a new set of medium Erurosonics on it. My bridge is a pretty good amateur job if I do say so. I really took my time and did not wus out on it. I am too chicken to mess with the sound post however. Luck again, that it stayed in place throughout all the other repairs. I wish there was more overstand though. The bridge is very short.

OK, that's a medium/long story with a medium happy ending. My bass sounded twice as good as it ever had. Louder and better tone and I no longer was afraid that it was going to fall apart on stage like the Three Stooges car. It's really a good slap bass. The plastic fingerboard makes a nice click and it has good low end. Plus, it's bullet proof. I did a lot of cruise ship gigs and I always joked that I had my own private life boat. Water and humidity or the lack thereof and extremes of temperature have no effect on this bass which is why it was popular with schools I think. It was probably a bit more expensive initially than a ply bass but less problematic in the long run. If you are looking at the same bass I have, you have a tough playable instrument that will, if cared for, give you many years of faithful service. Don't let the guitar player stand on it, the sides are very thin. Also, as I have discovered, Black may not be the best color choice. Full-on sun won't harm the bass, but the body will expand up faster than the strings can stretch and they will go out of tune sharp. You have an excellent garage bass, That's where mine is right now and I live in Minneapolis.
I love my Upton Hybrid and I won't be bringing Blackie out on many of my acoustic gigs, but the occasional Rockabilly call comes in and I'm glad to have the old girl. Good luck with your bass whatever it turns out to be, and don't let people tell you it's a piece of junk. decide that for yourself and if you do, there are sure a lot of fine basses out there you can look into. Cheers!

Some added information: My bass has a nice ebony tailpiece and a wire type hanger with a cheap "ebonized" end pin. The fingerboard flexes quite a bit above the neck which makes triple slapping chancy. I don’t know if it could be planned. It records well with a fat tube mic placed low and a hot condenser up by the fingerboard. It had the "tubby" tone that others have noticed but the coats of paint simmed it down. It has a nice, even mellow tone these days. Finally, my Upton bass is most definitely not in the garage, just in case Gary or Eric happens to read this post... Peace-out

Possibly the longest four paragraph post in TBDB history that I don't understand.
My bad. (maybe).

[Eric Rene Roy]

Originally Posted by Jake deVilliers

What happened to Rene?

Good Question!

I had asked Paul to change me from "eroy" to my full name. Looks like he missed a letter...

[LeslieD]

I guess there's SOME value in getting any kind of bass that gets you started and keeps you playing. I think the Suzuki violin method has kids starting with a cardboard violin with a stick on it. This is definitely a transitional kind of bass for most players, and even BPeder moved on to something nicer. I understand why BPeder has some emotional attachment to his fiberglass bass (I've never been able to part with my first plywood bass--it's an old friend!). Personally, I've never warmed up to fiberglass instruments, cars, or boats since the main materials are essentially inert (i.e. were never part of something that lived). Yet maybe the slaughter of innocent trees justifies the existence of a fiberglass bass! Maybe there's already a thread about this filed under "TB bass philosophy" or "Existentialism and the Bass Player?" I'm just being silly here...of course.

[Jake deVilliers]

Originally Posted by Eric Rene Roy

Good Question!

I had asked Paul to change me from "eroy" to my full name. Looks like he missed a letter...

Ah. I thought you'd maybe joined a new tribe or something!

[Jake deVilliers]

Originally Posted by Paul Warburton

I think, maybe, he thinks you would ask him that question.

I thought I did.

[Paul Warburton]

You two should take your act on the road.

[BPeder]

"Possibly the longest four paragraph post in TBDB history that I don't understand.
My bad. (maybe)."

Ouch. (maybe).

I was just trying to toss out some discussion of this particular type of bass for the OP to chew on. Basically, telling him what I know about these basses based on my experience playing mine, repairing it and setting it up. If he is looking at a bass like this, he is likely cost sensitive. So he might benefit from what I discovered when I did what he is probably going to need to do himself.

Also, anytime these SR fiberglass basses come up for discussion here - there seems to be mucho bashing and not much helpful input. Again, if the OP is looking at this bass which admittedly, is not a great instrument, he may not be able to pay for a decent entry level Upton, Shen or any of the other good starter basses. I'm sorry if my post was verbose and not well written. But it hopefully gave the OP what he was looking for - information or at least a good soporific...