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2021 Charvel Pro-Mod San Dimas Bass
- Thread starter P Cheen
- Start date
What the heck kind of part is taking 3+ months to get in? Other than the preamp everything else should be pretty easily obtainable or possible to substitute for something name brand & nicer, I'd think??
Nice! Yeah I love mine. I have pulled the preamp out though, run it passive and have added a new 3-string tree like the 5er.
question for any others, the finish on my neck was lush when I first got it but has started to wear off and is rough in the middle Any ideas for a refinish?
it is something to do with electronics.. The guy said something about a board.. I am not a tech guy..
That's the one thing I was worried it would be. Everything else on the other than the body / neck is replaceable with an equivalent part from the original (or another similar) manufacturer, but if those preamp boards are a custom, Charvel specific item then you're kind of stuck waiting for one. You'd think they'd have SOME spares at their HQ? I just hope the recent layoffs at Fender didn't nix the people who could help.
Good luck!
- Aug 21, 2003
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Thank you...I was thinking about toying around with one of these for a backup for travel and now knowing this just ruled that out.
I appreciate it.
Funny enough, they actually use two different preamps in the bass. Some will have the exposed PCB, others are encased in plastic/epoxy. I don't know anything about the differences, but some folks had sent me pics of their preamp and some differed from what I had.
I had the epoxy encased in my 4 string and, ultimately, like you I swapped it for something else. I put a John East pre amp in and this is now my favourite bass, a definite keeper.
You wonder why Charvel don't put a better pre amp in and charge a bit more, they would sell well.
I still wonder that to this day. I call that preamp the accountant special lol. Even NO preamp would have been an upgrade. I don't think I've ever played a bass with a preamp that detracted so much from the instrument as with the Charvel. I do play on revisiting the Charvel early next year, and I'll snag one of the 'revised' ones with the newer finishes to see if they fixed anything. Fingers crossed!
I don't think there was ever an announcement. They offered new finishes (black and platinum pearl) and a 5 string PJ model sometime earlier this year, so I would consider those the 'revisions'. It appears that he newer ones carry a $100 premium over the original blue and green finsihes too for the 4 string.
Lighter was important to me as well. I got a PJ 5 string, fully expecting to modify it. I switched the stock tuners, which looked exactly like MIM Fender tuners, to Gotoh GB350s. I also changed the stock high mass bridge to a Hipshot B style aluminum. The bass now weighs right about 8 pounds and sounds stellar.
Oh wow!
That's pretty much spot on what I'm hoping for! I'd change the hardware out to something lighter too.
On the PJ-V, I was able to use the Hipshot B Style bridge with Fender mount as a drop in replacement. For the Gotoh tuners, I had to drill a single hole per tuner, and I used the existing bushings.
The challenge is to find as light a bass to begin with. Between the tuner and bridge replacement you can lose about a pound.
They seem to have raised the prices on all the models accordingly. In my neck of the woods, these basses have all gone up about $300 across the board over the last 9 months or so
