12 strings of sorrow

[Stondis]

1st up, not sure if this is the right place to post this:

I recently bought a Dean Rhapsody 12 string and took it to band practice last night (my bandmates and I had played it for about 15 mins the week before and all was ok)
It sounded sweet for a while but all of a sudden it made a pffffft noise and stopped producing sound!
I checked all the things like my lead, my amp, tried another bass and that worked fine (although the neck felt like a pencil!) so I deduced that there must be a problem with my axe.
I plugged it into my tuner and that was still picking up the notes so it must have been putting out some kind of signal right?
Then I tried running it through the passive input on my amp (gain very low) but still no juice...
Then I though it must be the battery, so I removed that.
It was VERY hot! Is this normal? (Never used an active bass before)
Then I tried another battery but still no joy.

Does anyone out there have any idea what could be going on?
Like I said, amp and leads are all A-OK.

Any help would be gratefully received!

(also posted on www.12stringbass.com)

[bassteban]

Sounds like some wires inside the bass touched, causing a short(more or less frying the battery & perhaps something else, hence the bass' not working). I'm no expert, mind you, just guessing here. I'd certainly take it back to where you bought it- don't be all pissy, just understand that stuff goes wrong & give them the chance to make it right. Of course this is all assuming you bought it new...