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Double Bass Palatino Megathread part I

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#941
I called up musicians friend earlier today, the said my replacement Palatino had been picked up by UPS and was in-transit.
I checked online with UPS and it's true. in-transit 2 day air ship (normal shipping for Alaska, usually no direct ground ship up here)
Musicians Friend is starting to make me happier now.

I should be getting my Em bridge and fish pre from Bob's site (great service) Mon or Tuesday, and the Paly as well. I know what I'll be doing after work.

I'll keep you guys in formed of the mods
 
#944
I noticed a picture of the Palatino with a nice padded stand and padded hip rest on page 37 of this thread posted by tomersg. I did a search but no luck, does anyone know how to make the stand and rest pad? Tomersg? Thanks...
 
#945
And this is what happens to them when they fall and hit the floor.
A patron at the bar bumped into it at a gig last weekend.
Dead.jpg
 
#949
I have total sympathy for you, I can't see the picture (firewall filter @ work) so can't see the damage, I'll check it out when I get home.

I also had a falling over of the bass, my own fault, just home from a gig and didn't make sure it was sitting up solid, the soft case doesn't help ! It fell over, the neck hit on my stairs and it snapped off where it joins the body. Not a clean break unfortunately left a bit of the neck still attached to the body. No fotos I'm afraid, I was too despondant to take any :crying:

Anyway, I fixed it back on using a combination of epoxy and 3 large screws, screwed in from the bottom in a triangular shape. Clamped it together and crossed my fingers.

Well, it's actually turned out not too bad, it's certainly still very playable. There was a slight difference in the height of the neck, (lower) which I've had to raise the bridge holder to compensate for, it also has a slight angle to the right, which I've also compensated for by moving the bridge holder over a bit.

I've recently put a new set of Innovation 140H strings on, they're a Hydrid string with a gut core and a chrome wrap. A bit heavier gauge than the original strings, so a bit more efffort required but a nice solid sound with lots of fundamental and a bit of growl, nice :)

I bought a Stagg stand which I use all the time now, don't bother with the end piece or the metal side part, just play it from the stand and it is much safer on the stage.

I got the stand for about £25 which was a decent price, here is a link to a supplier, not the one I bought it from, but allows anyone to have a look at it,

Invalid Link Removed

The arms are adjustable to 3 different heights, if none of these suit it woud be easy to drill a couple of holes in the stand legs to change this. I tighten the arms sitting up at an angle of about 45 degress and the Palatino sits in quite nicely. I also removed the neck holder extension as it gets in the road if you're playing off the stand.

Hope you manage to get yours fixed somehow.
 
#951
Had a look at the picture last night, I see your point, looks pretty bad :bawl:

I used a 24 hour epoxy on mine, I reckon with the combination of the wood screws and the epoxy it is far stronger now than it was before as you said Droot. I was concerned that this may affect the tone in some way, it's difficult to tell, so I guess that means if it has it is not a huge difference.

Actually what took the most time was re-painting it and matching in the varnish, I used spray cans for both jobs, painting and gloss finish. It turned out not too bad, I'll stick a few photos up of how it is now later today.
 
#952
I've been playing bass for only 3 years and have been wanting an upright for longer than that. I found my Palatino on e-bay and it arrived in great shape in the original box.
The first thing I noticed when I plugged it in is that the preamp is indeed very noisy. I also wasn't getting much sound out if it. Further reading of this thread solved that problem as I had set the bridge at the incorrect angle. Moving it towards and away from the neck while tapping it and finding the sweet spot is job one.
The second thing I did was order the Ingles SA-22 stand from Bob Gollihur. It works great and since I don't have a safe corner in my studio I got tired of dragging it into the next room and wrapping it in a blanket every time I had to set it down. Now it's right next to me ready to go at all times. :bassist:
My favorite bass was a 5 string fretless but I wasn't ready for the larger scale and lack of dots. So I took an address label and cut thin strips to use as fret markers on the side of the neck. I call them my training wheels and they'll be off soon. ;)
Once I got to where I could play the bass a bit I noticed that the G string was so low it buzzed above the 8th fret. The E string was also very high. I noted that my bridge was set a bit low in it's frame and I thought that if I slid it towards the G string it would move the string in that direction and due to the curve of the neck it would raise the G string while lowering the E at the same time.
A chance glance down the neck led to a big surprise. :eek:
My bridge was on backwards. :eek: :eek:
The steep and shallow arc of the neck was reversed on the bridge. You could see the bridge was way up on the E side and barely visible on the G side. I had installed the bridge according to the "E" that was penciled onto the bridge. There were also single and double marks indicating which side each adjuster foot belonged to.
This was a mistake made at the factory. :eyebrow: And it wasn't just labeled wrong. The notches for the strings are cut in reverse order. I took extra care that the E string didn't slip out of the shallow groove and turned the bridge around. The G string sits very low in the bridge but the buzz is gone and the E string is much lower.
I've got the adjusters set all the way down and I think the action is still a bit high. That may be normal for an Upright so I'm gonna hold off any sanding/regrooving on the bridge until I have a friend look at it. He's a pro musician who's got experience on DB's. I'll let him tell me if I can or should lower the action.
The "backwards" bridge is kind of interesting because I noticed a set of photos on this thread that appeared to be set up the same way. At least it looked like it was and the carved "S" in the bridge is facing the opposite way.
I've not tried the rubber under the bridge as it looks as though the pickup has been wrapped in rubber from the factory. And since I haven't noticed any tail piece buzzing I'd have to say that except for the preamp buzz I'm very happy with the bass as it arrived. So until I can play the thing with enough confidence to take it out of the house I'm happy with the way it works now.
When my wife joined the church choir and they needed a bass player 3 years ago I volunteered to give it a go. At 50 years old I can honestly say playing bass changed my life I'm having more fun than I thought I ever would.
Now if I could just find some jazz cats to start a band........
 
#954
This post describes my recent experience in purchasing and modding a Palatino. The mods I tried included ones I read about in this forum (i.e., string change to Corelli Ex, damping the stock wire tailpiece, and stripping paint off the endpin tighenting mechanisms so that you can actually play the thing without it slowly sinking to the floor).

Folks in this forum generally seem to indicate that the inner tube under-the-piezo shim mod noticeably improves the sound. Given the somewhat crappy sound of the unmodded Palatino, I knew I needed to try the shim. Only, I did not have an inner lying about. I looked around the garage for some other suitable shim material. I tried 1/16" thick gasket material, but it created a horrible distortion when I tested it. Same thing with a bit of soft foam. Then, I recalled that I have some balsa sheet around. I figured that the soft wood might make a good shim material to buffer the piezo from the rather hard wood tray in which the pickup sits, with the bridge feet resting on top of the pickup.

I had raised the bridge feet adjusters quite high for my playing preference. So, I picked a relatively thick sheet of balsa - 1/16th inch - from which to make the shims.

The balsa shims did appreciably mellow the tone of the Palatino. And, the thickness allowed me to again lower the bridge adjusters to a minimum, yet still high enough to suit my playing style.

The most effective mod I did, however, was replacing the stock metal tube end pin with a 3/4" oak dowel. It is quite evident that the original metal tube end pin contributed greatly to the inherent ringing or reverb sound I have noticed, and reported by others in this forum. Not only that, but the sharp metal tube actually cut through the feet of the cheap rubber tip after a couple of hours of playing. The objectionable reverb quality was pronounced in the original configuration. The tailpiece damping mod and balsa shims improved it, but did not entirely eliminate the Palatino's ringing reverb.

The oak dowel endpin did, however, solve the unwanted reverb issue. I got the material at Home Depot, cut it to the length of the original metal tube, same put a Danish Oil stain on it, then dipped the lower end a few times in Plastic Dip to make a renewable non-skid tip.

With these mods the Palatino nearly equal to the amplified sound of my acoustic UB. I have used it in a couple of gigs, in which my piano player and drummer have both commented favorably on the sound.

While the Palatino is not best for all my gigs (especially ones where the mojo of the acoustic UB is important), I know it will prove to be useful and convenient, now that I have made these mods.

I would upload the sound samples I made of the various configurations, if I knew how.
 
#955
Let me say first of all that this is one of the best discoveries I've made in a long time.

I've had my Palatino for about 18 months. I took a chance when I saw it on Ebay. I've been doing internet searches since then to try to come up with other users, and I've been coming up washers, so I suspected I was the only bass guy in the world to have one of these. It's great to find that not only do others have them, but they are well thought of.

I quickly put the bass together out of the box, and it played, but I was a bit underwhelmed, although I enjoyed playing it and everyone loves the look of it. As someone said on here, it's what an EUB should look like.

After recently finding TB and this thread, my eyes are opened. The bridge was leaning towards the fingerboard! Not the tailpiece! Neither was it perpendicular!

I've recorded a couple of tracks on my hard disk recorder and was quite pleased with the overall thump and mood, but not the volume. Looks like moving the bridge will help a lot. I made a quick adjustment the other day, but only had time for a quick blast, but it seemed to be a much louder, richer tone.

I e-mailed Palatino in the first few weeks to ask about a manual and replacement strings. They e-mailed a manual, but it's very basic, and doesn't cover pretty important stuff like bridge angles and so on.

(Mine came with a rubber strip to go under the bridge, presumably because of this thread)

They also said that I should get half-size DB strings. These don't seem to be easily available.

My local stringed instrument shop said they could do me Elites half-size strings for £72 the set - what's that, about $120?

Most people on here seem to be using 3/4 size.

Do you guys think 1/2 size Elites would be ok, or are 3/4 a better bet? Are Elites good strings?

I feel that now I have found this thread, I am starting out on some significant Palatino adventures. I have some bass-lines I really want to try out on the Palatino once I get it up to speed.

Thanks for any help, guys.
 
#956
3/4 strings seem to be fine, although you will want to trim them to a shorter length. As you can see in my post above (#954), I put a set of Corellis on the Palatino I just bought. I had to cut off about 12" of the new strings, but I ensured that the cut was still in the section of string that was wrapped in silk. I also ensured that I made a nice 90 degree bend in the string before cutting (to avoid unwinding the wrapping).
 
#957
Pagan said:
I bought a Stagg stand which I use all the time now, don't bother with the end piece or the metal side part, just play it from the stand and it is much safer on the stage.

I got the stand for about £25 which was a decent price, here is a link to a supplier, not the one I bought it from, but allows anyone to have a look at it,

Invalid Link Removed

The arms are adjustable to 3 different heights, if none of these suit it woud be easy to drill a couple of holes in the stand legs to change this. I tighten the arms sitting up at an angle of about 45 degress and the Palatino sits in quite nicely. I also removed the neck holder extension as it gets in the road if you're playing off the stand.
Click to expand...

Pagan, I looked at DB stands a while ago, but I thought that the bottom of the Palatino would be too narrow to rest on the arms. The Pal is only 7 or 8 inches across at its widest part.

I must have looked at different makes, as you say you can play the thing from the stand without any trouble. Sounds like a good idea. Any chance of a photo?

Cheers!
 
#958
Hey guys. Wonder if this has been asked before. I play EBG in a hard blues band (most of the songs are Stevie Ray Vaughan style) and have my eyes set on a 2n hand electric Palatino. Do you think a Palatino will do for such an electric blues band? I'm referring more to tone than volume, but all input is welcome.
Also, I'm left-handed. Can the Palatino be adapted? My main concern is with the fingerboard, since I understand in some (many?) double basses the fingerboard is planed flat under the lowest string for it to vibrate more freely. I guess inverting the strings on such a fingerboard won't do the trick. Thanks, guys.
 
#959
I'm a lefty and had no problem flipping mine. The fingerboard on mine is not flattened.
I mostly play bass guitar, I use mine for what we call our "diner set" LOL I'm guessing you won't like the tone for your blues tunes as much as a bass guitar...but maybe you will!! Anyway, it's a lot of fun to play and I recommend getting it!!
 
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