Hector Wolff said:
This is all very interesting, because when I got my SB180 set by Jeff B., I asked about upgrading the end pin, and he said that it was a pretty decent one and he wouldn't bother.
Well, he was right. I found my Shen end pin to be quite sturdy, easy to operate and reliable. I'm glad I didn't spend the money.
I'm sorry you guys seem to have had a different experience.
The endpin itself was fine. The shaft that is. It was the plug that I was unimpressed with. The plug was turned from a decent looking lump of ebony. The whole assembly was simply the ebony plug with a brass plated cap on one end that was bored through the side and tapped to accept the set screw. There were no guides or bushings in it at all.
First of all, the wall of the plug where it was turned down to allow the cap to fit over it was hardly more than 1/16" thick, and the cap was simply glued onto the ebony plug. The set screw was fine, except that the flattened thumb piece used to grasp it to tighten it was smaller than a dime.
The screw-on rubber stopper was very small, did little to keep the bass from slipping and had a nasty habit of not staying tightened in the pin.
If the bass stayed in my house, I could have easily set it and it would have stayed forever. But, I probably pack up and move my bass out of the house 2-5 times a week depending on the season. The first issue was that you had to crank that screw down as tight as you could get it to keep the pin from slipping.
Secondly, in less than a year, the brass cap loosened from the ebony plug as it isn't easy to attach metal to wood using only glue. So, as the bass was played and it rocked around on the pin, it broke down the very thin ebony wall, making it that much harder to keep it tight, thus more rocking, more decay in the wall, etc. I'm sure the fact that I play with the pin extended about a foot didn't help the matter.
In no time, it was unusable. It was what you would probably expect from a student bass, but the overall design is simply cheap. It was very much worth it to upgrade to a high quality pin.
It's kind of like nice tires on a car. It doesn't do much for the performance or value, but you are able to enjoy it every time you use it.
The KC Strings pin is of very high quality. It's better designed, better made and about 100 times easier to use.
Now I am experiencing the same thing with the tuners. Three of the four have had the ears loosen on the post and rattle something awful. I have to keep supergluing them to stop it. The machine screws that hold the actual gears to main shaft keep backing out and the gears come apart. I have gotten in the habit of tightening them every time I take the bass out. I thought about glue in the threads, but what if I really wanted to remove them?
As soon as I have the scratch, I'll replace them with something better. The overall build, playability and sound of the bass make the upgrades well worth it. Although, if I would have added the cost of these upgrades to the front end in the first place, I wonder what I could have gotten?
