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1972 A Neck Help!

BigEee

Guest
Jan 8, 2018
11
3
Looking to buy a Fender 72 P bass neck "A"

Looking for what it's worth. This is the info on it.

"This is a fairly rare “A” width neck, meaning the narrower Jazz Bass width. The truss rod works great, but it appears someone tried to adjust it without removing it from the body, so there is an upper level crack, but only to the last (20th fret). A common issue and absolutely no affect on the functionality. Truss turns smoothly and does exactly what it should do. This was mounted to a body and played like a dream... great action, playability and tone.

I suspect the decal is a restoration decal, but very correct. If I had to guess, someone decided to sand off the cigarette burns they had caused (before they were cool) and just decided to rub the first few layers of lacquer off the face of the headstock. With that said, the entire finish does appear original, with no overspray and some wear to the back of the neck. The neck feels great.

There are a few dents at around the 18th fret, hard to spot and do not affect playability or the frets at all. I think the frets are original, but they are in surprisingly good condition for 45+ years old, so may have been refretted at some point?"
 
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I wouldn't pay over 400-500 bucks if I were not sure of it but then again that is me. The only thing that would bother me and it would bother me a lot is the unoriginal decal. Everyone adjusted Fenders without taking the neck or pickguard off for years (In fact I've only heard about that here) and I've never seen anyone split the end of the neck doing that, maybe cause a few dents in the pickguard but not split the neck.
 
Some pictures of it
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That's way over priced.
You can buy a much better neck (with graphite rods) and have a luther change the decal and clear coat over and have money left over.

Ironically I have a CAR 73's that appears to have come with an A neck.
The PO sanded off the original decal (leaving sanding markes and a lighter finish) and replaced it with a Pre CBS decal. One of these days I'll have a pro swap it for a copy of the right one and tint the clear to match the ambered neck finish.
 
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That truss rod nut has been seriously abused. The crack is not normal...again, that's the product of abuse. Adjusting without taking the neck off is 100% ok and ordinarily it's no threat to the fingerboard - usually I'm more worried about scratching the pickguard!

Yup I think it's been adjusted either a couple of thousand times or was done by a gorilla, probably both, I don't like that split either, too bad it's a nice neck.
 
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Notwithstanding the non-original decal, which is a big deal IMO, I'd be more concerned that so much tweaking on the truss rod meant that the neck wasn't stable.

I have 72 and 74 maple slab necks that are both extremely stable, have very low action, and never need the TR adjusted.

$975 is ridiculous for this neck IMHO but then again I shake my head at a lot of the prices on Reverb.