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black & blond P makeover (etc)

#281
With the silver/gold theme you got going I see a slight imbalance between the gold control plate and the chrome bridge (albeit with golden saddles).

Personally I'd go for chrome control plate with gold knobs, chrome bridge with gold saddles. The idea being to separate the gold hardware from the sparkle finish by a layer of chrome. And definitely keep the pickguard, separates the maple and the pickups from the sparkle, thus creating more contrast.

But no matter what you do: Killer bass!
 
#282
truebenjaman said:
With the silver/gold theme you got going I see a slight imbalance between the gold control plate and the chrome bridge (albeit with golden saddles).

Personally I'd go for chrome control plate with gold knobs, chrome bridge with gold saddles. The idea being to separate the gold hardware from the sparkle finish by a layer of chrome. And definitely keep the pickguard, separates the maple and the pickups from the sparkle, thus creating more contrast.

But no matter what you do: Killer bass!
Click to expand...

Thanks! Yes, once the box is opened… :rolleyes: - good reasoning though. Once the tuners are scrambled, another assessment will follow.
 
#284
…found a gold stacked-knob set for a good price ($13.95) so it's mix & match time! (the parts bin swells…) I'm not certain I'll go the chrome-plate/gold knobs route, especially with gold tuners but it's worth seeing and going from there.

Found brass machine bolts to replace my stainless steel ones. All they had was single slot heads (no philips head) but they chinch down just as tight with a nice crisp appropriate sized screwdriver so they will be ok. Thought about the (chrome plated) brass bridge plate attached with brass bolts into a brass bar and with brass saddles… just about as brass as one can get!

IMG_7632_zpsb607300c.jpg
 
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#285
As of now - I'm enjoying composing/determining the ideal silver/gold mix, which thus far has been pretty organic. As it is my preferred route, I will continue down this same path toward resolution. Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion to this journey of aesthetic pondering in the following week…
 
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#286
What a treat! Went to a "Fat Tuesday" private party in SF earlier tonight and Bobby Vega was holdin' down the PHAT part of this Tuesday on his '61 Fender Jazz as part of a rockin' top drawer ensemble covering New Orleans/funk/Zydeco ya'll.

me & Bobby Vega.JPG
 
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#288
rolandm said:
What a cool treat! All the vids I see of this guy show him to be a very humble and brilliant musician.
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I was told the band they get for this annual event (at a restaurant) was really really good and I knew he was a Bay Area cat but didn't consider the bass-player being the one and only BV! It's funny because we walked past the window where the band was rocking' away and I caught a glimpse of an old Fender headstock and thought, oh cool - usually I'd expect the bass player to be playing a 5'r, you know, something boutique-ie. We could hear the music as we filtered through the spaces (an indoor/outdoor affair w/spectacular food) and I kept thinking - man that bass player is really solid. (ha!) Brilliant is correct and just watching him and the other equally solid musicians (drums-vocal/guitar-vocal/keys-vocal) just having so much fun made a really fun night stellar! Needless to say, enthusiastic dancing was involved! :thumbsup: :bassist:
 
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#289
Ok… here's an update. All parts came today and a few issues related. The stacked knobs are the smaller version, not the '60 Fender Jazz stacked set - so, they won't be used here. Second, the gold bridge saddles are smaller diameter than the ones on the bridge - which I prefer.., so those aren't going on either. Lastly, the Gotoh tuners are exactly what I wanted, but… the large barrel bolts on the chrome ones will not budge - they are frozen in place. I will attempt to use the liquid wrench approach, but it can take a while to settle in the threads. Maybe a combination of that and a bit of oven time. Meanwhile, I did a fun mix & match which looks pretty cool/unique. Even if I can un-freeze the bolts on the chrome set, I may just swap gears/washers and bolts an leave the 2X2 setup.

IMG_7635_zpsab51cada.jpg


IMG_7636_zpseb26ea9f.jpg


IMG_7637_zpsa3a475f6.jpg
 
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#291
The chrome tuner bolts won't budge, even with overnight liquid wrench and heat. (roasted tuners?) I realized I have the same tuners on another bass and the bolts move easily. So a bit of swapping and here's the final silver & gold mix for the tuners and like miss-matched socks, I have another set just like it! May try both versions (4 in row w/silver plate/4 in a row w/gold plate) at a later date but for now I'm done fussing.

IMG_7639_zps6315d992.jpg


IMG_7640_zpsc67b5a12.jpg
 
#293
truebenjaman said:
The more I look at it, the more I think this bass is approaching perfection. I can understand leaving the pickguard off. If only the gold saddles would have fit!
Click to expand...

Yes, and not likely to find an exact match of my saddles in gold either. I've considered attempting to remove the chrome finish if in fact they are brass, but they could be stainless steel. They have a flat bottom so perhaps I can experiment there (out of view) …or not! And I do like the smoked pg, but in person it's very clean looking w/o it.

Now it's time to stop thinking about it and carry on playing it! :bassist:
 
#295
Sooo… the good news is, the saddles are in fact brass. For me, the er.., 'yet another detailed hands-on project' news is it's very labor intensive to remove the chrome plating. No easy way to do it other than starting with a very fine file, continuing with a series of emory-cloth sanding followed by steel wool and metal polish - all very small & hard to manipulate (hard on the fingers) ... and 3 more to go. Yes it is as near to perfect as one could ever want - even down to the grooves being silver. Yes it looks great especially with the matching polished bolts. Yes my poor fingers...

IMG_7644_zps49a75f5f.jpg


You can see in the shot below the grooves look sort of copper-ie compared to the chrome. That's because in the chroming process, there is a layer between the brass and chrome of nickel, which has copper as one of its elements. In the process of getting back to brass, I first removed the chrome layer and then had to continue to file/sand past the copper-toned nickel layer. In the shot of the saddle by itself, the brass colour de-emphasizes the copper and so they looks primarily silver. When chroming like w/spraying paint, edges and 'nooks' tend to not get as even a coating of the chrome - so the grooves are mostly a thin layer of the nickel base-layer.

IMG_7645_zps026c6c3e.jpg
 
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#297
rolandm said:
<koff>Dremel<koff>
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:) Dremel is a very useful tool, but like all electric tools you can easily go too far very quickly. With the saddle being a mostly round barrel-shape, I needed to work it in a flat side-to-side & rolling fashion on a very flat surface to not distort it. Now that I've done one the rest will go a bit faster, especially because on this first one I started on the flat bottom which I won't need to do as it is out of view. (saves a little time/effort)
 
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