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NBsD - Stingray Edition

A few years ago I had a 1990s Stingray, but I didn't really gel with it. At the time I was very much a P-bass with flats purist and I couldn't make the Stingray sound enough like a P-bass.

Fast forward to June of this year and I see a Dropped Copper Stingray Special for sale locally for a reasonable price so I go check it out and I love it. The weight is right, the roasted maple neck and finger board feel great. I buy it, take it home, and I can't put it down.

Then I see another Stingray Special for sale in the classifieds in Candyman (red), also a good price but this one has an ebony fingerboard. I like that even more than the roasted maple. Then, again through the TalkBass classifieds, I pick up a '96 Stingray (I had to see how the originals compare to the Specials...), then my lowball Reverb offer on a BFR Slugger is accepted, and just today I received an old Smoothie.

View attachment 7560806

Clockwise from top left...
  • 2019 Dropped Copper Stingray Special
  • 2024 Candyman Stingray Special, I swapped the tort pickguard for white
  • 1996 Natural Velvet Stingray
  • 2016 40th Anniversary Old Smoothie
  • 2022 BFR Slugger Stingray Special 4HH
I guess you could say I'm a convert to Stingrays. Also I think it's time to stop buying them for a little while :)


If you contact EBMM customer service, you should be able to purchase a mute kit for that '96.
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Double Bass Sonores Gut Strings by Gerold Genssler

For the curious here is a solo from a recent show using Gennsler's B-Roque set with a gamut Pistoy D switched in. I think after my shows this weekend I am going to finally put on the BoM set that is sitting my closet. After 5+ years this set is still doing great. Especially with the bow.

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Sick playing as always!!
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Legit 1960 Fender bass cabinet, and worth $99?

Here we are years later. Glad I never got rid of this. Just wanted to say I have ported the cab and it is tuned to around 39-40 hz as far as i can tell from doing some low level testing at the port exit using vibration and visual inspection of the material being vibrated (trying to word that correctly). All I can say as this cabinet is sounding great. I reinforced the inside a with some corner bracing. Added two 4 inch diameter ports and I have to say it sounds beautiful. Playing this through a fender Bassman 100 for the last 3 months now at 8-10 volume. Play 3-4 times a week for 2-4 hours. With hearing protection :). No problems and it sound glorious.
Remember that for bass guitar with a 35Hz HPF, those drivers are good for no more than ~150 watts RMS each. They are also very expensive to recone.

Do I need to replace this nut?

I've never bought a nut but that makes sense. you can always cut down, you cannot raise up. Well, you can raise an adjust-a-nut.
A nut can be shimmed. On the whole though if the nut's as messed up as the one in OP's photo it's probably better to start over.
Then go with the black Tusq - BLACK TUSQ XL - NUTS
OP should double-check dimensions before ordering. Nuts for Ibanez Soundgears (the GWB series is kinda-sorta Soundgear) are different than Fender nuts.
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Headless hardware

Another Nova-inspired feature which I despise: The entire assembly is bolted to a mounting plate. To adjust intonation, you have to slacken / remove the strings, loosen the bolts, jostle the assembly into what may be the correct position, re-tighten the bolts, tune to pitch, check intonation. Lather, rinse, repeat. Nova actually revised the design so the saddle "slug" moves independently within the the channel a la ABM.

Riis
Unfortunately a lot of them seem to work like this, especially the less expensive ones.
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Pro vs Amateur

...I'm not real likely to take a weekend gig but for a few exceptions..... I'll do week night gigs because I'm in town all day, but weekends come a premium for me.
Around here weeknight gigs are super rare. No bars clubs have bands during the week, or very rarely.
Good point. This topic has veered a little from my original observation, which is: IMO, if you want to play the kind of high-profile gigs that are booked by professional event organizers and booking agents, you need to be available....
Oh, no doubt about it. Also here is the added fact that several musicians are in multiple bands, or sub with multiple bands. I'm in two bands but there was a time when I was in 5.

Acoustic bass fetish club Part 2

How's it going folks, some time ago there was discussion on this thread about contrabass balalaikas falling under a broad ABG label. I came across this group called Russian Renaissance on YouTube, balalaikas and an accordion, with a contrabass balalaika for the full group. Superb musicianship and great to see an ABG-adjacent instrument being used.

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P-Bass 4-ways, Wiring Verification.

Bookmarked for future reference. A clearer indication of what goes where on the blade switch terminals would be appreciated. Great stuff
When I get it all put together and figure out if the bass cut is worth it I'll post a cleaned up diagram, but it's pretty much WYSIWYG the wire bridging between the pickup sides goes to the commons on the switch and if the jumper (blue) touches a terminal it gets soldered.
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Cheap pickups for a cheap bass

I got a set of these in a 5-string split P configuration as a proof of concept to test on my J bass. I agree with the general consensus in that they are perfectly okay. Not terrible, but also not something to write home about. I would say they are better than something you'd find in a low-end squier, about on-par with higher end squiers and lower end fenders. It didn't have any weird hum or gremlins, tone is very warm and favors the low end which is about what I expected for ceramic. I found the high end to be really lacking, but that might just be how I have it set up and I'm still experimenting with them a bit.

QC left a lot to be desired though. Wires were soldered on by a wish and prayer and snapped off almost immediately after taking it out of the box. I think I got someone's return because most of the contents were loose and the box was taped together with painter's tape. Not a huge deal if you know how to solder, but just something to keep in mind.

For the price, I really don't think they're all that terrible. I think these are great pickups if you like to experiment with custom wiring, pickup swaps, build a lot of basses, stuff like that. I wouldn't really consider them an upgrade over most cheaper stock pickups, more of a side-grade if anything. Wilkinson's guitar pickups are really great for the price, but their bass pickups seem to be merely fine.

Strangely enough, I also had an offset in magnet size between the B/E pickup and the A/D/G pickup, the former was larger than the latter, but not quite as dramatically as your J. Regardless, I have to agree that I think its probably intentional considering how much beefier it made my B & E strings.

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