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Squier Vintage Modified Precision V: who's got one?
- Thread starter Chef
- Start date
Doug Parent
Supporting Member
I actually like the bar
I actually like this bass in general, I have owned a few American Standards (pre 2010) and then some much much older Fenders and this Squire is so well executed that I think it's going to cost Fender sales in the American market. The Squire Affinity Series are junk in comparison. (Sorry no offense to Affinity owners)
Doug Parent
Supporting Member
Yeah. I have a practice of removing whatever strings that come on a new Fender/Squire product right away and string it with La Bellas. I get "my sound" and lower action immediately, it's an instant no brainer improvement. I highly recommend a tapered or exposed core B String.
Well, I have to disagree here, mine came used with LaBellas with a tapered B. String balance was off, could not get the B to intonate properly and despite the set being well broken in, I got way too much finger and fret noise for my liking.
Bottom line: strings are a matter of personal taste - just get the ones you dig on other basses and work from there. Tapered and EC B strings may or may not work for you.
NicJimBass
Flossin'? I thought your name was Munson!
I just ordered a set of Kalium strings, with 2 experiments in mind- 1. Having a tapered B, like you guys are talking about, as I really started noticing how different my B is since I threw on a set of D'Addario FlexSteels. And 2. Going with a much lighter guage string to try and get the tone on the B to match the other strings. I read a thread on here about a guy who went to a .110 B string, but that is a bit too light for me.... went with a .118 balanced set. We'll see how it goes!
Man that is one good lookin bass,I ordered the same model last week from GC they are to be in stock & should ship the 21st, I have been reading through this thread listening to the sound clips I'm very impressed. I was going to pull the trigger on the new Ibanez 655 it will have to wait $$, I miss my p bass bad & I miss the 5 string I had. I believe this will fill the gap at a great price, and I'm planning to put a set of Ernie ball cobalt flats & strap loxx then gig it.So, New Bass Day! 5 string Precision. I have to say, I'm pretty damn well impressed by this bass! I really can't find a fault with it. It was set up well and played good out of the box. I had some mods planned, but now I'm not so sure. Fit and finish is very nice. The neck is right on the money and nicely finished, as well. No ragged frets. No high spots. Intonates well and no dead spots. This thing is good to go! I'll be playing it at my next show! Definitely worth the price of admission.
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No doubt, a great bass for the money. Like I said earlier, I was planning a few mods, but I would have a hard time justifying them at this point.
Since there's so much talk about string choice in the past several posts, maybe my latest experience with my Squier VMP5 is related to this:
I haven't brought it to a rehearsal or gig in a while. I had it with me the other night at a loud classic rock band rehearsal. I know that the provided rig was loud and powerful enough because I used it a week earlier with my Valenti and it cut through the mix like a hot knife through butter. (Although I'm comparing a Valenti to a Squier so.....)
Anyway, I could not get it to cut through the mix no matter what amp settings I tried. Additionally, as I played, I felt that there were a few dead spots on the neck that weren't there previously. It was really weird because the last time I used this bass with this particular band, it sounded great; so much so that the CIJ Fender Jazz I also had with me that night sat on the stand the entire night.
Then I remembered that I recently changed the strings. I had a custom set of SS Rotosounds Swing 66 on there that last time (50-70-90-105-125) but they finally died after more than a year on the bass. I replaced them with a slightly used set of DR Nickel Lo Riders; same exact gauge. They sounded good at home, maybe these strings "don't have what it takes?" Or maybe they did at one time but not anymore?
Your thoughts on this .....
I haven't brought it to a rehearsal or gig in a while. I had it with me the other night at a loud classic rock band rehearsal. I know that the provided rig was loud and powerful enough because I used it a week earlier with my Valenti and it cut through the mix like a hot knife through butter. (Although I'm comparing a Valenti to a Squier so.....)
Anyway, I could not get it to cut through the mix no matter what amp settings I tried. Additionally, as I played, I felt that there were a few dead spots on the neck that weren't there previously. It was really weird because the last time I used this bass with this particular band, it sounded great; so much so that the CIJ Fender Jazz I also had with me that night sat on the stand the entire night.
Then I remembered that I recently changed the strings. I had a custom set of SS Rotosounds Swing 66 on there that last time (50-70-90-105-125) but they finally died after more than a year on the bass. I replaced them with a slightly used set of DR Nickel Lo Riders; same exact gauge. They sounded good at home, maybe these strings "don't have what it takes?" Or maybe they did at one time but not anymore?
Your thoughts on this .....
I've used the nickel Low Riders before, to tame aggressive-sounding basses. I'm not surprised you found them too much of a good thing on the P5, which is at the more polite end of the scale.
Roto's would be a good choice, but so far my favourite has been the D'Addario nickel round BT sets. Balanced tension really evens out the response, and delivers a nice match between the E and B strings. I like the lighter-gauge set on my Oly White.
Roto's would be a good choice, but so far my favourite has been the D'Addario nickel round BT sets. Balanced tension really evens out the response, and delivers a nice match between the E and B strings. I like the lighter-gauge set on my Oly White.
Here's my CAR VM P5.
Lic by Hipshot Ultralite tuners and an aluminium Hipshot A style bridge. Aluminium knobs. Fender American Standard Precision V pickup which has had a hotter scatter rewind by Bareknuckle pickups UK.
The body has been routed out under the pickguard to get the weight down further (it was 9.8lbs which made it one of the heavy ones, but the fit and finish are fantastic and it played and sounded so good with no dead spots at all that I had to keep it.
It weighs 8 1/2 lbs now, balances perfectly and is very loud acoustically which is great for unamplified couch practice.
I have Nickel Low Riders on and it sounds amazing, cuts through well with the band, although I am mostly playing with a heavy pick so that sure helps. Can get a nice fat dubby tone fingerstyle.
I love this bass, it's hard to put it down. It just begs to be played!
My band mates say it's the best sounding bass I've had. It's also the least expensive (including all mods). I say least expensive because I just can't bring myself to call it cheap.
It's a class bass, even when stock.
I also have a new BadAss V laying around. I thought about installing it on my VMP5 but the holes didn't line up. Did you plug the old holes and drill new ones?
I put it on last year, I think the 3 middle screws lined up but I had to plug and drill the outside ones.
My local shop has let me bring home a 3TS VM P5 on loan to use/try for a few days. First thoughts are that it is pretty good! Have only played it thru my practice rig thus far, but might even take it to a gig Saturday night! Can't really see it going back at this point...
The things I would mod are:
Pickup
Headstock string retainer (middle 3 strings)
Bridge
Direct replacement pickup brands for Precision P5. What is available? So far I have only found Nordstrand and Wilkinson. What are the other options?
Hipshot Bridges seem to be the go. Are people mainly going for the 18mm spacing? What other bridges are getting a look in?
The things I would mod are:
Pickup
Headstock string retainer (middle 3 strings)
Bridge
Direct replacement pickup brands for Precision P5. What is available? So far I have only found Nordstrand and Wilkinson. What are the other options?
Hipshot Bridges seem to be the go. Are people mainly going for the 18mm spacing? What other bridges are getting a look in?
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The most common pickup swap so far, has been Fender Am Std, followed by Nordstrand. There's a Neo pickup made by a small maker (James Reid?), and I think one person mentioned a Bartolini.
The biggest deal pickup-wise, is to do whatever it takes to get proper pickup height and alignment to Fender specs. I've looked at a half-dozen, and so far every single one had the pickup halves set too flat out of the box, and not at the proper height. On two of the four I've set up so far, I had to pull the outer bass-side screw, and re-insert it at a steeper angle in order to get the proper break angle between the pickup halves. If you (or your setup tech) take care of this important detail, the stock pickup will give you excellent balance string-to-string, and possibly save you the cost of an aftermarket pickup.
Bridge-wise, it's important to stick with 18mm spacing, as there's not enough fingerboard width for anything wider. You'll have to use the Advanced Search for "bridge" within this thread, but we've got quite a bit of stuff between us. Hipshot vintage top-load,Type A, eBay specials, etc.
So far, nothing that's a straight drop-in as far as screw holes go.
TBH, unless you have a heavy attack and need a rail-type or lockdown bridge or want the slight change in sustain envelope that you get from high-mass bridges, there's no pressing reason to change out the stock one. The VM P5 already has the appropriate amount of sustain if you're going for the vintage P-bass vibe.
On the early VM basses, you could get a small improvement in tone by swapping out the cast pot-metal saddles for machined steel or alloy. However on this one, there's casting line on the stock saddles, just the swirl pattern on the ends from being machined out of solid rod. I tried fitting threaded vintage steel saddles to alternate strings, and didn't hear the expected difference from string to string.
Some have slight spacing problems if you look at the way the strings pass over the pickup poles, but tweaking the neck joint to one side or the other, or at most, crazy-gluing a few aluminum soda-can shims to the ends of the inner saddles, will take care of that.
The biggest deal pickup-wise, is to do whatever it takes to get proper pickup height and alignment to Fender specs. I've looked at a half-dozen, and so far every single one had the pickup halves set too flat out of the box, and not at the proper height. On two of the four I've set up so far, I had to pull the outer bass-side screw, and re-insert it at a steeper angle in order to get the proper break angle between the pickup halves. If you (or your setup tech) take care of this important detail, the stock pickup will give you excellent balance string-to-string, and possibly save you the cost of an aftermarket pickup.
Bridge-wise, it's important to stick with 18mm spacing, as there's not enough fingerboard width for anything wider. You'll have to use the Advanced Search for "bridge" within this thread, but we've got quite a bit of stuff between us. Hipshot vintage top-load,Type A, eBay specials, etc.
So far, nothing that's a straight drop-in as far as screw holes go.
TBH, unless you have a heavy attack and need a rail-type or lockdown bridge or want the slight change in sustain envelope that you get from high-mass bridges, there's no pressing reason to change out the stock one. The VM P5 already has the appropriate amount of sustain if you're going for the vintage P-bass vibe.
On the early VM basses, you could get a small improvement in tone by swapping out the cast pot-metal saddles for machined steel or alloy. However on this one, there's casting line on the stock saddles, just the swirl pattern on the ends from being machined out of solid rod. I tried fitting threaded vintage steel saddles to alternate strings, and didn't hear the expected difference from string to string.
Some have slight spacing problems if you look at the way the strings pass over the pickup poles, but tweaking the neck joint to one side or the other, or at most, crazy-gluing a few aluminum soda-can shims to the ends of the inner saddles, will take care of that.
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For my past 3 gigs I didn't bother to bring any other basses, just my VMP5.
I am having trouble with intonation above the 12th fret, things get pretty squirrly on the D and G strings. might have to look into repositioning the bridge, or getting a new bridge. I really like quick release bridges, but then again, I dont know when or if I will ever take off my TI Flats.
I am having trouble with intonation above the 12th fret, things get pretty squirrly on the D and G strings. might have to look into repositioning the bridge, or getting a new bridge. I really like quick release bridges, but then again, I dont know when or if I will ever take off my TI Flats.
I only installed the Hipshot A style bridge on my P5 as I was on a quest to lighten it by all means available.
The stock bridge sounds great and doesn't need changing for the sake of tone imo (didn't notice much difference if any in that respect).
The stock bridge sounds great and doesn't need changing for the sake of tone imo (didn't notice much difference if any in that respect).
highlights of work on mine (none of which is NECESSARY)
Pickups "James Reed" neos
Bridge (not drop-in but nearly) American Deluxe (standard not hi mass $30-40 on amazon or flEbay), Screws drop in but bridge is "off line" towards treble side a tiny bit.
Threaded barrels help adjust for that, bump each string toward bass side one notch off "center" groove.
I also replaced the pots and jack since i was replacing the pups (not needed but while i had it apart) with CTS and SwitchCraft, solid shafts and Fender Knobs.
Got my extra P pickup back from my rewind guy. Next steps:
- Making a reverse-P pickguard this weekend (I'm making a router template; if it works out and anyone else wants one, I'd be happy to bang out a couple)
- Deciding once and for all whether or not I want to double-P this thing
- Possibly a ToneStyler
- Possibly move the jack to the edge
- Making a reverse-P pickguard this weekend (I'm making a router template; if it works out and anyone else wants one, I'd be happy to bang out a couple)
- Deciding once and for all whether or not I want to double-P this thing
- Possibly a ToneStyler
- Possibly move the jack to the edge
