I had heard little about Chinese bass guitar necks. I found a rosewood P-Bass neck with pearl block inlays on ebay for only $79 bucks so I decided to give it a shot. First off if you order from China on a good delivery it can take two weeks with little of no tracking information. It kind of drove me crazy but I have heard of horror stories where something took three months so basically if you order from China just forget about it. It will be there eventually. O.K. the neck arrived. The last P -Bass replacement neck I ordered from a place called The Stratoshpere. It was a Fender licensed neck from Ensenada Mexico. Same neck basically. Rosewood with pearl block inlays. A beautiful neck with not one issue but almost three times the price of this neck. Looking at the Chinese neck initially it was like wow! This looks as good as the Fender licensed neck but that was where the similarities ended. The peg holes that were supposes to be 18mm. Not. A hair under but not 18MM. It left me some reaming out o do. O.k. I can live with that. Better tight than loose since I had already purchased 18MM Fender 70's style tuning machines. O.K I did that. Bushing went in great. I went to put the tuning machines on and the peg holes were so closet to the top of the headstock the tuning machines overlapped and would have stood above the headstock. Yes I kicked myself for not checking first. O.k. not a total lost cause. I just needed a tuner that had less of a footprint. Luckily I had some Hipshot HB7's in 18mm. I checked those out and then found that the peg holes were not all evenly spaced. Not off by a lot but off. Some of the tuners touched. OK. I got my bastard file out and took some edges down. You can only tell from the back of the headstock that the spacing is off a bit but I know it. Next I had to shim the neck pocket. 1 degree under the neck and 1/32nds on both sides of the neck pocket. O.K. that's done. The neck was not the width at the heal specified on the site I purchased this from. The frets were the best part of this neck. Only two slightly high in spots. It's now on. It looks nice, but at the end of the day I wouldn't do this again nor would I recommend it. I initially wanted to return this neck. I was offered $30 in refund to just keep it. Of course once you do that the transaction disappears from ebay and you cannot give feedback and the Chinese know this. On any of the Chinese sites they will not let anyone write a review. If you have a problem they offer a discount. If you take that the transaction disappears and you cannot leave any kind of feedback. If you check the Chinese sites before you buy everything looks hunky dory but I suspect there are thousands of players like me that tried to do something on the cheap and got burned. It won't happen again. Oh...as I said it looks nice but I also suspect the materials are also inferior. Time will tell. BUY AT YOUR OWN RISK!
Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
CHINESE BASS GUITAR NECKS
- Thread starter cmuellemann
- Start date
-
- Tags
- chinese bass necks
Just to double check.
You purchased a neck for $79. It has issues. You're surprised and have been taken advantage of.
You purchased a neck for $79. It has issues. You're surprised and have been taken advantage of.
I've had far worse experiences buying from Guitar Fetish. Seriously. You want a parts supplier to avoid, start there. Nothing fits anything else and they don't do returns.
A bit of shimming and rework is to be expected when you're buying a part for a quarter of the going rate made in a foreign country that doesn't even use a twelve-tone scale. These are great deals if you have the skills to do the rework needed. If not, well, pay the going rate.
A bit of shimming and rework is to be expected when you're buying a part for a quarter of the going rate made in a foreign country that doesn't even use a twelve-tone scale. These are great deals if you have the skills to do the rework needed. If not, well, pay the going rate.
Not at all. The point of this was to check it out. These were my findings in case someone else is looking at making that purchase also.
Yes I have had a bad experience with them myself with a Strat Tremelo.. I don't make the same mistake twice.
Glad you double-checked. You missed the point of the OP entirely. Try again.
There are 'good Chinese' products and there are "no-holds-barred-cheapest-of-the-cheap-zero-QC-Chinese" products... I suspect you found the latter!
When I can't find what I need in North America or in Europe, I make an effort to procure Asian products from either Japan or Taiwan (Taiwan especially has some of the highest manufacturing quality standards anywhere in modern Asia...)
When I can't find what I need in North America or in Europe, I make an effort to procure Asian products from either Japan or Taiwan (Taiwan especially has some of the highest manufacturing quality standards anywhere in modern Asia...)
I have several Squires made in China. No issues there although I do a lot of modding to those anyway. I know that things made in Asia are not necessarily bad. Even in this case the product is useable though it did not come the way I would have hoped. This was just my experience with one product I was curious about.
I was working on a project and got some tuners from guitar fetish. They were $12.85 so I didn't expect much and didn't get much either. Lesson learned but I have bought items from there that we're nice. Their kwikplug pre-wired harnesses are nice quality.
BnB
BnB
I think places like Guitar Fetish basically warehouse their items and sell as ordered. I doubt they even know what is good and what is bad. They just sell. Junk in. Junk out. I have also received a few things from them that were good however. It's a roll of the dice!
I believe that. It is a life lesson however. Many times you get exactly what you pay for.
I have a neck that I bought from a guy on EBay that supposedly gets them from Japan, then nitro finishes them. I paid $79. It’s a really, really nice neck for that price point.
I’ve been wanting to grab up another, but I rarely see him post any more of these necks. I sold a cab to a bassist/sound engineer, dude offered $180 for the neck only.
Would I buy a neck from China? No. Japan? Yes. I bought a neck from China once, I used it to test the overall strength of a bass neck by smashing it against a tree. It was surprisingly stout, but cracked down the fretboard eventually.
I’ve been wanting to grab up another, but I rarely see him post any more of these necks. I sold a cab to a bassist/sound engineer, dude offered $180 for the neck only.
Would I buy a neck from China? No. Japan? Yes. I bought a neck from China once, I used it to test the overall strength of a bass neck by smashing it against a tree. It was surprisingly stout, but cracked down the fretboard eventually.
Anyway, if anyone wants a cheap neck, check out SamsGuitarShop on EBay. You can see minor cracks on the binding, but I consider it a minor issue. I mean, I paid $79 for it. It’s stable, it feels good, it looks good. I want to grab another, but he rarely sells bass necks anymore, mostly just strat necks.
Pictures suck. But, there it is.
Pictures suck. But, there it is.
Attachments
Last edited:
Yes I know deals are out there and few and far between. I would also take anything from Japan before ever go Chinese again. Thanks for the info.
There’s a lot of stuff you can cheap out on a little on a budget build, a neck isn’t one if them. I’ve bought my share of crappy Chinese Luthiery tools, and learned the hard way, like everyone else before me. The Chinese have the tooling and workforce skills to produce high quality instruments, but usually don’t, because they don’t have to.
so... you got a neck substantially cheaper than from a reputable source, and as a result you needed to do a little work to ensure it fitted well.
Tell me, what's surprising?
You say it looks nice and that it works. I'm confused. You really expected Stratosphere quality for $79?
