I received this bass as a partial trade in for one of our basses. It's a 2018 custom order by TalkBass member CDBrewer from Oscar Prat of Prat basses. A long term illness suffered by Oscar stalled the work. After waiting more than 14 months, CDBrewer decided to take possession of the bass. It was at a place that I would describe as 85% complete. CD took it to a local luthier to have it put it playable form. He took reasonable good care of it during the 18 months that he used it on tour as one of his primary basses.
I've committed to what I consider to be the balance of the important work to get this beautiful instrument to the finish line.
So to be clear, this is not a 100% Prat completed build. It has a bit of the Buscanti Brothers mojo in it. But in my opinion we did the right stuff. So let me first list what we did and then I'll get to the rest of the specifications.
1. The bass did not have a Prat logo and Oscar wasn't in a position to send me one of his metal headstock logos. So I asked Oscar to send me a high res image of his logo. I then had someone locally laser etch the logo using a special machine operated by a software product. I filled in the etched logo with black stain and followed it up with 6 polyurethane coats to seal in color. That's the only place with a polyurethane finish.
2. The rest of bass body and neck were finished with 2 coats gunstock oil and 4 coats gunstock wax. This was the type of finish that CD had ordered from Prat. I decided to stay with that finish.
3. The bass did not have side dots or fret dots. I installed inlay dots on fretboard and top side of the neck. It looks perfect.
4. Neck was set a bit too high. So I routed down the neck pocket another 1/8th inch to make the bridge saddles centered and to establish proper clearance.
5. I custom designed a pick guard from European Ash wood which is dense and sturdy. I used water based black stain to match hardware and applied the same course of gun stock oil and wax. I liked the result so much that I decided to make a second pick guard in a dark walnut. So this bass now comes with 2 wooden pick guards.
Now for the specifications:
34” scale (Jazz profile neck)
Body wood: African Mahogany with Brazilian Redwood Top.
Neck: Maple with Ebony board.
Nut: 1.5" Brass
Headstock: Matching Brazilian Redwood Top with carved inset logo and ebony stain finished with polyurethane coats.
Electronics: Nordstrand Jazz and Noll CM-2 kit 9V 2-band pre-amp. Pull up Passive / push down Active switching on the volume pot.
Bridge and Tuners: Hipshot
Weight: 7 pounds 10 ounces
Fret Wire: Evo
Play wise it feels like a sports car. Comfortable fast and easy neck. Very lightweight. The electronics which I have heard for just first time ever in my life are off the charts. You'll never find the need to push the treble and bass to full throttle, but it's still there anyway.
Shipping is extra and I'll get quotes for anyone interested in buying this.
Comes with a fairly decent hard shell case.
Here's a link to the gallery:
Prat Classic IV - Google Drive
And here's one for the avatar:
I've committed to what I consider to be the balance of the important work to get this beautiful instrument to the finish line.
So to be clear, this is not a 100% Prat completed build. It has a bit of the Buscanti Brothers mojo in it. But in my opinion we did the right stuff. So let me first list what we did and then I'll get to the rest of the specifications.
1. The bass did not have a Prat logo and Oscar wasn't in a position to send me one of his metal headstock logos. So I asked Oscar to send me a high res image of his logo. I then had someone locally laser etch the logo using a special machine operated by a software product. I filled in the etched logo with black stain and followed it up with 6 polyurethane coats to seal in color. That's the only place with a polyurethane finish.
2. The rest of bass body and neck were finished with 2 coats gunstock oil and 4 coats gunstock wax. This was the type of finish that CD had ordered from Prat. I decided to stay with that finish.
3. The bass did not have side dots or fret dots. I installed inlay dots on fretboard and top side of the neck. It looks perfect.
4. Neck was set a bit too high. So I routed down the neck pocket another 1/8th inch to make the bridge saddles centered and to establish proper clearance.
5. I custom designed a pick guard from European Ash wood which is dense and sturdy. I used water based black stain to match hardware and applied the same course of gun stock oil and wax. I liked the result so much that I decided to make a second pick guard in a dark walnut. So this bass now comes with 2 wooden pick guards.
Now for the specifications:
34” scale (Jazz profile neck)
Body wood: African Mahogany with Brazilian Redwood Top.
Neck: Maple with Ebony board.
Nut: 1.5" Brass
Headstock: Matching Brazilian Redwood Top with carved inset logo and ebony stain finished with polyurethane coats.
Electronics: Nordstrand Jazz and Noll CM-2 kit 9V 2-band pre-amp. Pull up Passive / push down Active switching on the volume pot.
Bridge and Tuners: Hipshot
Weight: 7 pounds 10 ounces
Fret Wire: Evo
Play wise it feels like a sports car. Comfortable fast and easy neck. Very lightweight. The electronics which I have heard for just first time ever in my life are off the charts. You'll never find the need to push the treble and bass to full throttle, but it's still there anyway.
Shipping is extra and I'll get quotes for anyone interested in buying this.
Comes with a fairly decent hard shell case.
Here's a link to the gallery:
Prat Classic IV - Google Drive
And here's one for the avatar:
