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Thunderbird Club

#150,103
BC Blackmur said:
Yes, I'll take a number! The Thunderbird is 2nd only to my life long BC Rich. Bought the Eagle used in '84, 6 months old. Came with the 1 year warranty on it.

If anyone cares to read the backstory, here it is:
Bought the TBird in Feb 2019, couldn't put it down for 2 weeks, even though my fingers turned black every time I played it with the original strings. I have heard of other Epiphones with this problem, guitars as well as basses. Liked it so much I bought a Hipshot bridge for it, just because I had never changed a bridge before and was getting into doing my own setups and mods at the time with both guitars and basses. And yes, I did finally change the strings when I put in the new bridge. Although it didn't really sound any different to my aging ears like I thought it would.

I actually bought it on a gut feeling, went to my local GC to sell off a Sire VV7 that I had for 1 1/2 years. Beautiful looking bass, well made, just couldn't gel with it. Spent the last 6 months I had it playing in passive mode with flats on it, didn't use the much talked about/praised pre-amp. Wasn't looking for another bass, just going to pocket the money and keep an eye out for something else. While I was waiting at GC for their asking price, salesman said they had a 15% off sale going for trade-ins. Yeah I know, when don't they!
Went into the bass room, not sure if they were in the middle of restructuring it but they had 2/3 the basses from what I remembered from the previous summer (spent a few weekends trying out everything). Not much of a selection at all but the TBird always caught my eye. Walked out with a new in-the-box TBird for $45 with the trade-in and additional 15% off. Not the Pro or VP, just a plane Jane but I couldn't have made a better choice.

So glad I got rid of the Sire for this, it is incredible. The dark tone of the pickups are just completely different from the BC Rich but I love it. The frets are a tad sharp, but nothing that will make me bleed and not really anything to complain about. Love the color of the neck, back of it is just gorgeous. I don't feel the need to change anything else about it. Playing with a pick just takes a slight adjustment of the tone knob, brilliant. I'm definitley using it on my next EP along with the BC Rich.

OK, I'm done rambling for now. It's late, I'm on furlough from work this week because of you know what and am enjoying a couple? of Bourbons and Beer chasers while jamming to some tunes with the TBird.
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T-bird, bourbon & beer. Someone should write a song. Welcome!
 
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#150,104
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#150,108
GBassNorth said:
Dang, he's ruining the value of my 2015 bird!
Somebody hurry up and buy the darn thing before he lowers the price even more. This is beyond a steal!
Would make a nice Father's Day present, or slap a biohazard sticker on it and call it your COVID bass.:D
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Yeah. That’ll be an aberration. Someone appears to have snagged a nice bird. Hope it wasn’t a:
 
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#150,111
MCF said:
Yeah. That’ll be an aberration. Someone appears to have snagged a nice bird. Hope it wasn’t a:
Click to expand...

If there's one thing I don't think highly of, its Flippers.
Anyone can buy a bass and after they get it decide it just isn't the right bass for them, so they sell it at fair market value, that's ok. But the schmucks that jump on a good sale for the sole purpose of turning around and reselling it for profit aren't worth spit in my book. I won't knowingly sell to a flipper and I won't knowingly buy from a flipper. Like you, I hope this one went to a good home and not a flipper.
 
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#150,112
GBassNorth said:
That's one thing that my 2015 does better than my other birds, that burpy funk that I normally associate with Jazz. The coil taps allow you to switch from Humbucker mode to single coil mode on each pup so you can in essence get that burpy jazz sound. Much harder to do on my other birds, easy peasy on my FrankenGoth as well, which also has coil tap capability. That said, for every minute my 2015 is in single coil mode it's in humbucker mode for hours first.
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I occasionally tap the bridge or neck. I don’t care for both tapped. But that’s just me.
 
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#150,113
GBassNorth said:
If there's one thing I don't think highly of, its Flippers.
Anyone can buy a bass and after they get it decide it just isn't the right bass for them, so they sell it at fair market value, that's ok. But the schmucks that jump on a good sale for the sole purpose of turning around and reselling it for profit aren't worth spit in my book. I won't knowingly sell to a flipper and I won't knowingly buy from a flipper. Like you, I hope this one went to a good home and not a flipper.
Click to expand...
When I bought my Foundation at a very fair price from a Pro player, he made darn sure I wasn’t a flipper. I’m glad I passed the test. Although it’s not a bird, it’s a wonderful bass.
 
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#150,114
Larry V said:
If everything goes as planned, “Dorothy” will be off to her new owner later this afternoon.

This will put me at 5 TBirds... probably 2 away from having my “right” number of 3 basses; 2013 Gibsons R and NR and the Classic Pro.

I was hoping that “Dorothy” would eventually go to @Nocturnal but the timing/price didn’t work out.

Anyway, I took some pics for the new owner of the packing process and I thought to share them.

View attachment 3790351 View attachment 3790353 View attachment 3790354 View attachment 3790355 View attachment 3790356

The price to ship with the bass torn down was almost half the price of intact and that appealed to the purchaser. A bit of work to wrap it all up and cut down a box but in the end, the almost 2 hours it took paid off.
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Wow. Part of me regrets not knowing that was for sale. I would not have been able to resist.
 
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#150,115
GBassNorth said:
If there's one thing I don't think highly of, its Flippers.
Anyone can buy a bass and after they get it decide it just isn't the right bass for them, so they sell it at fair market value, that's ok. But the schmucks that jump on a good sale for the sole purpose of turning around and reselling it for profit aren't worth spit in my book. I won't knowingly sell to a flipper and I won't knowingly buy from a flipper. Like you, I hope this one went to a good home and not a flipper.
Click to expand...

If we've got a con flipper out there, we'll see it.
And yes G, hope to a good home.
 
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#150,116
Toptube said:
Well, they do print directions about doing that, on the inside of the cardboard pack for the strings. HOWEVER, they changed their roundcore strings a few years ago, so that they turn into a triangle shape, after the nut. Effectively mitigating the old unwinding issues.

Low Riders shouldn't matter, as they are hex core.

Every brand has a dud string every now and then. But, I haven't ever gotten a dud from DR. Whereas some other brands, I have had repeated issues. Super Brights had problems in basically every pack I bought. And I bought several.
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I haven't got a dud DR yet, but did have a couple of dud Tomasik Jazz flats. To their credit, they replaced the strings. I had 'em on a Ric, and they were decent on the Ric, but ultimately, the Ric went and I haven't tried those strings on anything else since.
 
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#150,118
GBassNorth said:
Dang, he's ruining the value of my 2015 bird!
Somebody hurry up and buy the darn thing before he lowers the price even more. This is beyond a steal!
Would make a nice Father's Day present, or slap a biohazard sticker on it and call it your COVID bass.:D
Click to expand...
Mine is still somehow pristine. Probably because I play the Flamingo and the pixie dust '01 most of the time.
 
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