This is a 2001 Ibanez BTB510E and is from their upper end "Prestige" line at the time. It was made in Japan instead of Korea or Indonesia where most export basses are made now, so the quality is a good deal higher. This bass originally sold for $1200+. It was already a great bass when I bought it and then I put in some serious upgrades! I replaced the stock Bartolini pickups and preamp with Nordstrand Big Split pickups and an Audere Classic 4-Band preamp.
Here are the specs:
- Mahogany body with matching headstock veneer
- Maple/walnut 5-piece neck
- Rosewood fretboard
- Graphite nut
- Ibanez Monorail individual bridges
- Upscale Gotoh tuners
- Dunlop straplok strap buttons
- Neutrik locking jack
- Nordstrand Big Split pickups
- Audere Classic 4-Band preamp
- Weighs just a bit more than 9 lbs
- 34" scale
- Hand made rosewood thumbrest (stained to match body color)
This one is pre upgrades, but it's the only full bass shot I've got
Nordstrand is one of the best pickup manufacturers around and these Big Split pickups sound great! They are humcancelling split single coil pickups. The folks at Nordstrand rotated the pole pieces 45 degrees and this gives a wider frequency range. Here's a description from the website: "The Big Split offers single coil tone in hum cancelling pickups. They have a wide aperture with our angled magnet alignment and they have a lot of wire on a large coil. This makes them some of the biggest sounding pickup available anywhere. Full fat bottom, solid thick mids, and clean clear highs, these pickups have it all."
The Audere Classic 4-Band Preamp is an upscale preamp, handmade in Oregon. Pickups connect to the preamp in stereo so you get a true blend between the pickups. The volume is active, so you can turn the volume down without changing the tone. The controls are treble (1.92 KHz), upper mids (800 Hz), Lower mids (200 Hz), and bass (172 Hz). This gives you a lot of control over your tone!
Trust me - this is a LOT of bass for the money! There are two small dings. One is on the back and is a bit smaller in diameter than a pencil eraser. It didn't break the finish. The other is much smaller and on the upper part of the lower horn.
$350 shipped, CONUS. Will ship in gig bag.
