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A pre-gibson Tobias Classic or not

#4
BassLand said:
My Guess is Pre Gibson.

Bob Lee
Tobias Guitars 1983-92
Click to expand...

And that is one heck of a well-educated guess! ;)

Bob, you may be familiar with my latest instrument acquisition (just came in today):

CASEEE.jpg


Tobias Basic 5, in Ferrari Red, with birdseye maple wings. Michael told me this was the unofficial "Jimmy Haslip model." Serial # 766.

Tom.
 
#5
mikezimmerman said:
According to the ad, the serial number is 1662, which would certainly make it pre-Gibson.

Mike
Click to expand...

Actually, that would make it post-Gibson, but pre-Nashville, I think. Here is a quote from Michael's current webpage:
[font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]
After several attempts to move the business to larger, better equipped facilities, I sold Tobias Guitars to Gibson on 1/1/90. The first Tobias Gibson serial number was 1094. At that point, Gibson was instrumental in moving us to a bigger shop in Burbank and setting us up with a great spray booth and dust collection system. We finally met So Cal safety codes. Basses built during 1990-1992 era were built initially by the same crew that had helped establish Tobias Basses as one of the most sought after basses on the planet. We added several people during 1990 and ended up with a great 10-man shop.

Business was still very good and we were not able to make anywhere near enough basses to fill the orders. Instead of trying to jack up production, we tried to get outside vendors to build for us. We had 110 "Model T" basses made for us by a very fine builder in New England, and then we got the Terada factory in Nagoya, Japan to make the "Standard" bass for us. This was and is a great bass, but the $/yen ratio killed the project. There were about 400 Standards.

Late in 1992, it was decided that in the best corporate interests, Tobias would move to Nashville. After much deliberation, no one from the original Tobias Guitars crew went to Nashville. The final LA Tobias/Gibson serial number is 2044. Despite Gibson's ownership of Tobias, all of the basses made up to 2044 were built by the my regular crew. The first production from Tobias/Nashville consisted of about 60 basses that were not numbered or finished by this crew.
Click to expand...

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#8
tombowlus said:
And that is one heck of a well-educated guess! ;)

Bob, you may be familiar with my latest instrument acquisition (just came in today):

CASEEE.jpg


Tobias Basic 5, in Ferrari Red, with birdseye maple wings. Michael told me this was the unofficial "Jimmy Haslip model." Serial # 766.

Tom.
Click to expand...

Is that the one I saw on EBAY?? looks nice! how does it play/sound?????
 
#9
Fire-Starter said:
Is that the one I saw on EBAY?? looks nice! how does it play/sound?????
Click to expand...

That was, in fact, on ebay, but he had previously listed it on bassgear.com, which is where I saw it. It looks far better in person, believe me! It plays like a dream. If you told me this bass was 6 months old, I would believe you! the finish is about a mile deep, and the neck just feels right. I am not really keen on the strings that are on it (not sure what they are), but I hope to clean it up, put some new strings on it, take some photos, play it a good bit more, and come back with a review! :D

Tom.
 
#11
BassLand said:
Absolutely a bass made by the original crew at Tobias in California. I have always considered 2044 to be the real Pre/Post Gibson dividing line. That would make it technically a Tobias bass but yes Gibson was in the picture at that point.

BL
Click to expand...
I agree as well. The #2044 would be the cutt off line. Post that number, you can definately feel a difference and hear it too. 3K might be a bit too much, but for a classic, I believe it is right there at market value for what it is. The earlier classic 6's were a bit smaller. My teacher had #850, and it was fantastic. I regret not swapping with him when he offered once he saw the basic 6.

I have #1751, which was delivered to my hands on April 13th of 1992 from Mike and the four or five other guys he had working for him in CA.
 
#12
I have post Gibson Basic 5 #2240 sitting right here and it's as nice a bass as I've ever played and one of the prettiest at that too!

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#14
BassLand said:
My Guess is Pre Gibson.

Bob Lee
Tobias Guitars 1983-92
Click to expand...

Bob, or anyone, do you know what the respective preamp controls should be on my Basic 5? One is obviously volume, one is pan, and then the bottom three appear to be treble, mid and bass controls, but they don't have center detents, and I don't know if they are boost/cut, boost only, or what. Also, I would have expected the mini toggle to be a midrange shift control, based on the current MTD layout, but it sounds like an active/passive switch.

Does anyone know for sure what these controls do? And if you knew the values of the treble/mid/bass controls, that would be helpful.

Thanks, Tom.
 
#16
Here is the diagram of the electronics.

[This invalid link has been removed]

BTW, the treble and bass are cut and boost and are of the shelving type of control (ie from the q freqency up or down). The mids were boost only with a complex two frequency tone center. We never could get pots with center detents to work right (ie wrong feel for such an exspensive bass) besides, the mid (flat) point is never physically in the center anyway (logrythmic controls). Anybody that tells you the center is dead flat is wrong but you would never know the difference anyway (how does "flat" sound?).
 

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