My first custom, help/advice needed

[Jobiebass]

Hey there,
Ive had my first "propper" bass for a while sat there not doing anything after I got my Fretless Jazz and after I took my scratch plate off my Jazz and got it sprayed by my dad whos an excelent car body man and painter into a metalic metal flake silver, it got me thinking about my old bass.

So far ive stripped it, and thats as far as ive got, now I need a few pointers where to go from here, its a £200 P-Bass looking thing in metalic turquiose with matching headstock.

1: is it worth spending time/money making a cheap bass look pretty and possibly make it sound better if I buy new electronics and get it set up right?

2: Ive yet to pick the colour, ive got some paint charts from my dad which are all pearlesent two tones, Im stuck between the
dirty pearl/blue
Deep Purple/kinda brown
blue/teal green
They all look really good and look great when they move in the light.

3: is it worth getting new pickups? and whats the chances of being able to get some p-bass pups that are the same size as the ones on it so I dont have to mess about with the scratchplate size? Im sure new pups would sound better though, its cheap pups in it, and the wires are cheap, but once again.. how far do I take it money wise?

4: neck, its pretty sticky and looks really dark, Im thinking about sanding it down to bare wood, then starting it again, might leave it natural but what lacker do I put on it? is there diffrent lacker to make the neck faster? do I need to rub the neck down with some gunstock oil whatever, If i could find some somewhere??

so thats it really, after the rebuild im gonna take it to my local bass shop and get them to set it up nice for me to get rid of any fret buzz and sort the action out ect. Im not really fussy how much I spend making it play/look nice BUUUUT Im not gonna throw loads of money at it if at the end of it, its just a crappy bass. As you can tell.. im a propper noob when it comes to all this, so any help/advice would be great.
If anyones interested in the build ill put some pics up and show you how its going.

[Jobiebass]

Anyone?

Or have I got this in the wrong forum??

[joeyl]

I usually consider a bass good enough to save and upgrade if (and that's just me)
1. the neck adjusts properly and stays comfortably straight.
2. the neck pocket or joint is well made so that a lot of time and costly efforts would not be wasted


all your questions are really personal choices, there are no wrong ones here so

1. Is it worth it? yes if you think so, no if you do not

2. I don't like teal, purple or blue, but you seem to like them so go for it.

3. We don't know how your pickups sound, but if they are unbalanced, weak or microphonic, just change them. I assume it has a P pickup since you did say it is a P bass copy, more info would help here. 40 bucks buys you a decent American Fender P pickup.

4. You can sand it down, and put some wipe on polyuerthane or tung/teak oil on there, it will feel faster but some people do not like it this way.

[Jobiebass]

thanks for that.

1. im not sure the end product will gain vaule but it would be nice to get a one off bass.

2. I don't like teal at all, but teamed with the dark blue it changes to, its quite standable. the purple is very much this colour changing to kindacolour, I think the pearl is really nice but I dont think it will really stand out too much. if its gonna be custom sprayed, it may as well be something wonderful, the deep orange turning to red was really nice but not much of a colour change. I dunno, im really gonna have to sit down and see what I like first I guess.

3. basicly.. they sound terrible, when the knobs are turned it makes a crackling noise for a start. they definatly arnt quality, but if pickups are only $40 ill just buy some good ones if they fit.

4. after the oil, do you put anything else on the neck to seal it? or will that do it fine?


thanks for your reply

[joeyl]

3. Noise from pots may just be dirty/cheap/bad pots, you will have to replace those also along with the pickups.

4. Tung oil has a lot of varnish blends in it, so you don't need anything. It will harden and offer "decent" protection. The good thing with oil is that you can steelwool it when it gets dirty or dry(I use synthetic non steel wool because I don't like the potentially messy bits of steel) and rub in a new coat of oil. For better protection consider one of those brush on/rub on polyurethane, here in the US, minwax wipe-on poly is popular among small builders to use on the neck, I am sure there must be a British equivalent

[Jobiebass]

awesome! thanks for that, sounds like its going to be a lot easyer to do then I expected. lets just hope the paint job goes well, Gonna get it rubbed down thursday after I pick my Stringray up (yes im excited and will prob just sit playing my new toy instead of rubbing down my first toy) and hopefully get it sprayed on saturday. Ill take some pics and see what you think about the paint.


ooo... Do I rub the oil in the neck before or after I spray the headstock?