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Hi, had a really bizarre experience Friday, July 3.
I was playing a festival in Denver called the Michael Martin Murphy Mile-High Rendezvous with Andy Byron and the Lost River band. Now Andy's a performing songwriter from Boise, Idaho and he used to live in Denver back in the seventies, so he called his 2 week tour of Colorado the Thirty Years Late Tour of Colorado.
Anyway Friday we were doing the concert show at 1 pm and it was at least as hot as aich 'e' double hockey sticks in this gigantic tent (60' high at the center) with two gigantic ceiling fans that looked like helicopter rotors, a real first class facility with a great sound crew (thanks Jim, Jay and Jeff)
Well, I was playing my 1996 Precision (50th anniversary of Fender 1946-1996) SB/torty guard, Rosewood finger rest with covers and Rotosound Nylon Tape Wound strings when part way into the second song it ceased to produce sound. I thought it was the event backline provided SVT because the event amp a few nights earlier had quit on me in Fairplay, CO. After some panicked pulling and tugging I discovered it was the output jack and if I leaned the cable plug just so, it would work. Only thing wrong with that solution is that I only have two hands, so I played with my left hand only for a couple of songs. Next break between songs Jay brings me another cable (mine is an angled George L's) and it seemed to hold for brief periods and keep the 'short' from disconnecting the signal. This allowed me to finish the show with only the occasional drop out. Phew!! Damn it was SO hot in there!!!!
Right after the show I got on my cell and called my guitar guy, a brilliant luthier here in Denver ( Kenneth Scott Lofquist ) and told him what happened and did he have any time to fix it that day. I still had three more shows that weekend with Andy Byron. He did but right now,so since I was already on the freeway and half way there, no probolo.
Once there he opened her up and determined that the jack and solder joints were fine. He touched the solder joints up just to be sure. Now the jack worked until the pickguard was reinstalled then it shorted again. He knew instantly that it was the jack touching the sheilding paint on the inside of the control cavity and causing the short. A little tape over the solder joints and everything returned to normal, Hallelujah!!!!!!!! Scott went on and on about how first sheilding was added to prevent hum and the solution caused a whole new set of problems, so now they'll have to insulate the sheilding to prevent shorts, etc. etc.
I was thinking of why the bass had never had a problem until that day and the most logical reason my poor little brain could find was that it was so hot that the wood, the metal, the plastic, everything expanded to the point of making contact and shorting. Of course, stupid me, I didn't bring a second bass to the gig, because Precisions are so reliable, I thought............my bad. Of course I did bring a second bass for the rest of the shows. Fool me once shame on you,..............
Has anyone else experienced a problem like this? I hope this never happens to you, ALWAYS bring a backup bass!!
Sandy
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" ...........Twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe.........." -from 'Jabberwocky' by Lewis Carrroll
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