It's to do with quality, Korean black logo have thinner laminate body, gold logo are full thickness alder body. Check out Squier Wiki website for good info.
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Show us your Korean Squiers
- Thread starter ulynch
- Start date
It's to do with quality, Korean black logo have thinner laminate body, gold logo are full thickness alder body. Check out Squier Wiki website for good info.
I'd been keeping an eye out locally for a used Jazz Bass as I've never owned a jazz and am curious to try one.
I picked up a Korean Squier a week ago for AU$200 (~US$130). Serial number indicates it's out of the Samick factory in 1991.
Advertised in good condition, but partly disassembled because the owner had got tired of trying to work out why there was hum & buzzing. After checking that all parts were present and there was no damage, I took it off his hands.
A few hours work over the long weekend and it's now singing very nicely.
Issues were:
- Open circuit neck pickup. Coil wire broken near the eyelet solder terminal. Fixed by unwrapping the last winding and reterminating in the eyelet as per original termination.
- Bridge pickup couldn't be adjusted to correct height. Foam underneath had compressed, so an extra piece had been added, making it way too high. Removed both pieces and replaced with fresh material.
- Tone control was intermittent due to a loose terminal on the pot. Repaired & refitted the pot. Cleaned & lubricated all pots & O/P jack.
- The quality of the wiring & soldering was terrible thanks to the owners tinkering, so I removed the wiring and a lot of excess solder & flux and completely redid it.
- The serrated eyelet terminal & wire for connecting the conductive paint in the cavities to the output jack ground was not fitted.
I suspect that just one these issues came up originally and the rest were most likely caused by the lack of knowledge and skill employed in the repair attempt!
Put it all back together, set the pickup heights and gave it a run.
No hum or noise, and playing very nicely overall, but still a mechanical buzz whenever the A or E string was plucked. The buzz went away whenever I touched the A tuner and turned out the button was loose on that tuner. The quality of the "Licensed by Schaller" tuners looks quite good, and no issues with any of the others, so that tuner might have been knocked against something solid at some time. Fixed it with a tiny quantity of RapidFix.
So, for AU$200 and a few hours of my time, I now have a what appears to be a very decent Jazz Bass. It's early days, but I do like the feel and love the versatility already.
I picked up a Korean Squier a week ago for AU$200 (~US$130). Serial number indicates it's out of the Samick factory in 1991.
Advertised in good condition, but partly disassembled because the owner had got tired of trying to work out why there was hum & buzzing. After checking that all parts were present and there was no damage, I took it off his hands.
A few hours work over the long weekend and it's now singing very nicely.
Issues were:
- Open circuit neck pickup. Coil wire broken near the eyelet solder terminal. Fixed by unwrapping the last winding and reterminating in the eyelet as per original termination.
- Bridge pickup couldn't be adjusted to correct height. Foam underneath had compressed, so an extra piece had been added, making it way too high. Removed both pieces and replaced with fresh material.
- Tone control was intermittent due to a loose terminal on the pot. Repaired & refitted the pot. Cleaned & lubricated all pots & O/P jack.
- The quality of the wiring & soldering was terrible thanks to the owners tinkering, so I removed the wiring and a lot of excess solder & flux and completely redid it.
- The serrated eyelet terminal & wire for connecting the conductive paint in the cavities to the output jack ground was not fitted.
I suspect that just one these issues came up originally and the rest were most likely caused by the lack of knowledge and skill employed in the repair attempt!
Put it all back together, set the pickup heights and gave it a run.
No hum or noise, and playing very nicely overall, but still a mechanical buzz whenever the A or E string was plucked. The buzz went away whenever I touched the A tuner and turned out the button was loose on that tuner. The quality of the "Licensed by Schaller" tuners looks quite good, and no issues with any of the others, so that tuner might have been knocked against something solid at some time. Fixed it with a tiny quantity of RapidFix.
So, for AU$200 and a few hours of my time, I now have a what appears to be a very decent Jazz Bass. It's early days, but I do like the feel and love the versatility already.
Congrats on your new bass and thank you for a great post about your steps to bring this bass back to life. I appreciate your attention to detail!!!
Thanks. Was helped along by detailed posts from other forum members on the pickup foam and conductive paint earthing issues, so happy to make my contribution when I can.
Here are my two, both S9 serial. Wicked clean and the burst has ungodly low action. Got both with period cases, one maybe 70s. One came with the paperwork. $200 into them, priceless.
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It's probably a long shot, but does anyone have any info on what strings would have been fitted on Korean Jazz Basses at the factory? Mine is a 1991 Jazz Bass out of the Samick factory.
The 'E' were indeed made by the Young Chang company. They also marketed their own 'Fenix by Young Chang' brand which were essentially re-branded Squiers. This led to a 'falling out' with Fender, the transfer of Korean Squier production to Samick and the start of the 'S' serial numbers. E1xxx is 1991, E9xxx is 1989, etc. I found this out when researching a recently-acquired Fenix P/J that bears an uncanny likeness in how the neck feels to the first-generation Squier JV and SQ instrument from Japan. This head-shape is one of 3 attempts to avoid further legal action from Fender:
1989 E9xxxxx Korean PJ 5-string
my first attempt at a nitro-laquer sunburst years ago,
also did the bridge upgrade string thru body.
Thinking about some better pickups.
It plays well, do most of my practicing on it.
my first attempt at a nitro-laquer sunburst years ago,
also did the bridge upgrade string thru body.
Thinking about some better pickups.
It plays well, do most of my practicing on it.
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I never ever saw this model and this Squier logo before!!!
Why not? Mine is built very well and has excellent sustain, could stand new pickups.
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My ‘89 Korean Squier already had the “new sculpted neck heel” like the AM PRO II ?!?!
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At the time, the SQ and JV series Squiers surpassed everything coming out of the USA.
