new old bass day!

[el_crawfordo]

That dixon looks a lot like the aria and electra branded fakers. Id suspect they were mostly all made by matsumoku but at varying finish levels. If you look up fakenbacker (i think it is) on the forum you will see quite a few different examples. Some of them are drop dead gorgeous with figured maple and what not.

 

[Captain Chaos]

This is my clone ric.
Strung up with rotosounds
View attachment 3272078

It looks badass. What pick ups are those?

 

[GTHintz]

It looks badass. What pick ups are those?

Well I'm not sure what the 2 front ones are. The rear is from deep six. I don't know a lot about that brand but it's nice and loud though.

 

[el_crawfordo]

Well, while assessing the slight buzzes the suntech i realized that if i were to try and level the frets id practically have a fretless because the finish on the fingerboard is so thick. So i went to town on it and got all the finish off the fingerboard and about 99% of the pink coloration off the inlays. I think it was maybe a dye they used on the fb that somehow mixed into the inlay material as it apears to be “inside” the few spots where it didnt come off. I used a very sharp pocketknife (really) to popthe finish off the board, working from the spots around the frets where it had lifted, then used a second blade on the knife to very carefully scrape the surface between the frets, followed by a razorblade scraping, then i used 220-320-400 g sandpaper and 0000 steel wool followed by clarinet bore oil (one of my favorite hardwood fb conditioners). The results are quite satisfactory. Its actually a nice thick chunk of some sort of rosewood? Maybe?

More importantly the frets are actually quite tall, and im hoping a simple crown job will fix all the rizz. Plus it looks much nicer i think.

 

[GTHintz]

Looking great! It'll be nicer than a few of the real ones when you get done.

 

[el_crawfordo]

Looking great! It'll be nicer than a few of the real ones when you get done.

Im statrting to think the same. Im excited to compare to my buddy’s but just to stack the deck in my favor im going to now wait until ive really got it tuned in. I offered him a free setup for his troubles, so maybe we wont leave too sore if the suntech is a sleeper.

 

[GTHintz]

Well honestly you're going to get a ric sound due to the neck through and what pickups are in it. The rest is a bit relative. If you get the neck playing fast and easy to maneuver it's going to smoke a lot of beat up genuine rics out there that need the work done. I've even got a cheapo Rogue bass that I've done work to that I honestly am pleased with the tone. It's one of the cheapest basses you can buy yet I'll plug it in and jam with anyone and not feel inadequate. It's got upgraded pickups though so it's not stock but still, I think you're going to have a great playing sleeper ric no matter what the truss rod cover says.

 

[Gilmourisgod]

If you look at a real Ric, all the fret tops are filed nearly flat, because crowning them would cut into the thick FB varnish. A lot of Rics have that same separation of finish at the frets, kinda inevitable as the wood neck and metal frets expand differentially. Fingerboard looks great! Never seen sparkle inlays on a faker. After all that work, you might as well do a full level, crown, and polish. Is there a shorter push pull pot out there? The Ric ones fit in the standard cavity depth, which is approximately 1” deep. I used a stock 4003 harness on my clone build, a tight fit but it works.