The first single truss road version as mine. Even the same color. Excellent basses!
My '91:
My '91:
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TRBP-6: Massive B String!
- Thread starter Dr. Cheese
- Start date
Snapped a pic this morning because why not
Back to @Thumpin6string comment earlier, I believe this is the model/finish that Patitucci had on the cover of Bass Player mag long ago, which started my quest as a teenager to land one. Lots of lawn cutting money saved, with my parents ponying up the rest. I think that happened for me around 1992. @Dr. Cheese re: the question you asked @Flaked Beans I've been debating having mine re-fretted for many years. It's still 100% playable, but there's several past the 12th fret that could really use it. I tend to be pretty hard on things and am amazed that everything on this bass still works 100% I've got a small crack on the bass side of the headstock from a fall on stage at least 20 years ago, but that's about it. I've replaced the 1/4" jack a few times, but that's par for the course with any gigging bass.
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Snapped a pic this morning because why not
It’s still a beauty.
I have said several times that although I do not feel that I have enough chops to get the most out of a six string, the TRB6 I had with a bolt on neck, dual truss rods, skinny pickups and no piezo, was one of the very best basses I ever owned. I would happily buy another if I came across one and I had the funds.
I sold it to a friend of mine many years ago (
)100% original, the frets were in top condition then ('06-'07) and the bass was absolutely flawless. Tried to buy it back several times but the guy said he'll never sell that bass. And he just got married and moved permanently to Seattle (from NY) with the bass (and his new wife 
).Here's me playing Donna Lee on the '91 TRB6P back in the mid '00s (recorded with the desktop mic of my old computer from the last century
)
The 1990 single truss rod TRB-6P in the rather blurry photo here was my main bass all through the 90's. I had to retire it around 2000 because of the neck stability problem - the last straw was flying out to do a one-off gig in a much warmer and drier climate. The neck upbowed so severely en route that it was fretting out above the 15th fret. I didn't have any tools with me so I had to suffer through the gig that way.
That bass became a "beta bass" with a number of different pickup and preamp combinations throughout its life. The best sounding pickups were Lane Poor medium impedance ones, but they had a hum problem that made them unusable. I sent them back to Lane, but that was right before his business melted down so I never got replacements (and had to file a dispute with my credit card company to get my money back). Without going through the whole pickup/preamp saga, what I ended up with that sounded really good was the stock pickups with a Demeter onboard preamp. As you can see in the pic the pickup routs are a little large - that's because I had EMG pickups in it at one point.
About 2 1/2 years I ago I acquired a nearly unused 1992 double truss rod TRB-6P, which was basically gifted to me. I posted about it at length in the TRB club thread, but here is a pic of it anyway. It now has the stock pickups and an Aguilar 3-band preamp, which is a pretty nice sounding combo - to my ears it's an upgrade over the stock preamp, though I do occasionally miss the piezo pickup for its unique character.
Oh, and just a correction re. John Patitucci's original Yamaha 6-string: it wasn't a stock TRB-6P, but a one-off that Yamaha made for him with different electronics than the ones that eventually were used in the production basses.
That bass became a "beta bass" with a number of different pickup and preamp combinations throughout its life. The best sounding pickups were Lane Poor medium impedance ones, but they had a hum problem that made them unusable. I sent them back to Lane, but that was right before his business melted down so I never got replacements (and had to file a dispute with my credit card company to get my money back). Without going through the whole pickup/preamp saga, what I ended up with that sounded really good was the stock pickups with a Demeter onboard preamp. As you can see in the pic the pickup routs are a little large - that's because I had EMG pickups in it at one point.
About 2 1/2 years I ago I acquired a nearly unused 1992 double truss rod TRB-6P, which was basically gifted to me. I posted about it at length in the TRB club thread, but here is a pic of it anyway. It now has the stock pickups and an Aguilar 3-band preamp, which is a pretty nice sounding combo - to my ears it's an upgrade over the stock preamp, though I do occasionally miss the piezo pickup for its unique character.
Oh, and just a correction re. John Patitucci's original Yamaha 6-string: it wasn't a stock TRB-6P, but a one-off that Yamaha made for him with different electronics than the ones that eventually were used in the production basses.
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The TRBP series is definitely deserving of the accolades it gets as one of the most consistently and excellently made instruments around.
Heavy though. I'm not usually that sensitive to bass weight, but I gigged with a TRB5 for four or six years and my left shoulder had a kink in it at the end of every night. It did sound good.
I have a fretless TRB5IIF and it's about 9 pounds(which is pretty light to me) that sounds and plays excellent but my relatively new TRB6II (bought it used in excellent condition in 2018) is much heavier. At least two pounds or more.
Here they are:
Will, your comment prompted me to weigh both my TRBs.
Lo and behold, they're in the mid - 5kg range, the TRB6P being just a tad (100g) heavier than the TRB6II (which is rather surprising as the II is 35" scale, and thus a whisker larger).
Mid - 5kg is up around 12lbs, so yes, both are heavy, but as I do ALL my playing seated thgese days, weight ceases to be an issue. Frankly I like a bass with a bit of heft so I can dig in.
I've only had the TRB6P in my possession for a few months, and having used it on several gigs, had already zeroed-in on what I thought to be a great all-round tone for the material we're playing. This discussion nevertheless prompted me to explore the sound of the piezo in a bit more detail, which I did in a lengthy session walking through several bop standards last evening. With the treble backed right off on the bass, I was able to achieve a very reasonable, almost faux ampeg-baby-bassish sort of tone. LOL
Love these basses.
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Hi!
I got my single truss TRB like yours in 2020 and it does have that neck issue.
Have you talked to anyone on addressing the neck movement issue? I wonder if inserting carbon fiber rods would help but I don't know how it will be approached.
Thanks!
I never looked into specifically doing any repair to try to mitigate the neck stability problem, but given the through body design I think it would be difficult. Somebody could probably do it, but it would be major surgery. I'd guess it would involve removing the fingerboard, routing out space for any neck reinforcing rods you'd put in, putting it all back together and doing a lot of finish repair - probably a very expensive proposition. If the neck was a bolt-on I imagine it would be more possible.
The later dual truss rod TRB-6P that I have now has a very stable neck, but the neck profile is noticeably bulkier. I've gradually gotten used to it, but I really liked the neck better on the single rod TRB.
An update to that earlier post: I ended up reinstalling the original Yamaha electronics. The Aguilar preamp was ok, but I missed the character of the original circuit. Also, lately I have been blending in the piezo pickup quite a bit, which I wasn't able to do with the Aguilar pre the way it was wired up.
On a whim I bought a TRB6 with the slap cut for a decent price only because I'm wary about bringing my neck thru TRB.
It does have a heftier neck but is a bolt on sans the piezo - which I'll definitely miss.
I just got a reply from a tech/luthier here about my neck question and advised against the carbon fiber inserts. As long as I have no problems with adjusting the truss rod, I should be good according to him.
Thanks for the reply, Brader!
My guess is this sort of mod would be cost prohibitive and risky. I don't think it is certain the fretboard could be removed intact. So attempting the mod could result in the requirement to building a new fretboard.
I think whether you are good to go depends on how extreme and frequent your local humidity swings are and how much the neck is moving around.
The neck problems with my bass were manageable until I moved to the midwest.
I bought the bass used with a repaired crack in the fretboard. The crack opens up when the humidity dips too far into the teens. I was having to do a lot of truss road adjustments just to keep the bass playable. The truss rod nut was becoming more and more difficult to turn.
The seasonal humidity changes in my house were originally varying from <10% to over <60%. I have spent quite a bit to moderate the humidity swings in my house. Now humidity usually stays between about 25% and 40%, but it may occasionally go higher or lower with extreme weather.
The bass is much happier. The neck still moves, but I don't think I have adjusted the truss rod for over a year. However, the bass doesn't leave my house. I don't think it would be wise to trust it for gigging. I expect the fretboard to eventually fail on this bass
.
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It was worse for me then when I still lived in my hometown, especially the situation in my room.My guess is this sort of mod would be cost prohibitive and risky. I don't think it is certain the fretboard could be removed intact. So attempting the mod could resulting in the requirement to building a new fretboard.
I think whether you are good to go depends on how extreme and frequent your local humidity swings are and how much the neck is moving around.
The neck problems with my bass were manageable until I moved to the midwest.
I bought the bass used with a repaired crack in the fretboard. The crack opens up when the humidity dips too far into the teens. I was having to do a lot of truss road adjustments just to keep the bass playable. The truss rod nut was becoming more and more difficult to turn.
The seasonal humidity changes in my house were originally varying from <10% to over <60%. I have spent quite a bit to moderate the humidity swings in my house. Now humidity usually stays between about 25% and 40%, but it may occasionally go higher or lower with extreme weather.
The bass is much happier. The neck still moves, but I don't think I have adjusted the truss rod for over a year. However, the bass doesn't leave my house. I don't think it would be wise to trust it for gigging. I expect the fretboard to eventually fail on this bass
My room's floor is wooden and below it, moist earth. My room is approx. 5 feet above it.
It doesn't help that my room doesn't have AC and only gets cooled by the outdoor breeze. During the wet season - we only have two season here - it's moisture city all around.
I moved in with my Wife in the city so that issue is almost non-existent. My other basses are still in my hometown though but they have sturdier necks than the TRB6P single truss.
Before I go on, I want to say that I am not an expert on this subject.
IMHO, the neck on my TRB6P is actually much stiffer than some of my more stable basses. Another recently active thread on this issue suggested that the problem is most likely due to the different woods in the neck. Basically the neck and fretboard have different rates of expansion. The difference is potentially magnified because the neck is finished, while the fretboard is unfinishedrosewood I believe it's actually ebony. So the neck is protected from moisture exchange but the fretboard is not.
Some suggested oiling the fretboard might help. Ref: https://www.talkbass.com/threads/pr...nd-temperature-changes.1669270/#post-28984198
I tried bore oil on my bass and it didn't seem to help. The bore oil I choose was recommended by several clarinetists I worked with.
Before applying the oil I read up and articles suggested caution in regards to over oiling the fretboard, as it may cause the wood to become spongy and soft. I was pretty conservative with oiling the fretboard. I basically applied oil and rubbed the fretboard with my fingers. I let it set it set for awhile and then wiped it off. Not sure, but I may have done two applications on succeeding days. It might try again without wiping the oil off.
AFAIK the oil does not really moisturize the wood because it does not penetrate very deep. My understanding is the oil basically reduces how permeable the surface is, so it slows the rate of moisture exchange. The oil is sort of like a temporary finish.
I have to wonder if sealing the fretboard would significantly mitigate the problem. My first bass was a Rickenbacker 4001, which I still own. The neck is pretty floppy, but neck relief is pretty stable. AFAIK the fretboard is rosewood, but it's sealed.
IMHO, the neck on my TRB6P is actually much stiffer than some of my more stable basses. Another recently active thread on this issue suggested that the problem is most likely due to the different woods in the neck. Basically the neck and fretboard have different rates of expansion. The difference is potentially magnified because the neck is finished, while the fretboard is unfinished
Some suggested oiling the fretboard might help. Ref: https://www.talkbass.com/threads/pr...nd-temperature-changes.1669270/#post-28984198
I tried bore oil on my bass and it didn't seem to help. The bore oil I choose was recommended by several clarinetists I worked with.
Before applying the oil I read up and articles suggested caution in regards to over oiling the fretboard, as it may cause the wood to become spongy and soft. I was pretty conservative with oiling the fretboard. I basically applied oil and rubbed the fretboard with my fingers. I let it set it set for awhile and then wiped it off. Not sure, but I may have done two applications on succeeding days. It might try again without wiping the oil off.
AFAIK the oil does not really moisturize the wood because it does not penetrate very deep. My understanding is the oil basically reduces how permeable the surface is, so it slows the rate of moisture exchange. The oil is sort of like a temporary finish.
I have to wonder if sealing the fretboard would significantly mitigate the problem. My first bass was a Rickenbacker 4001, which I still own. The neck is pretty floppy, but neck relief is pretty stable. AFAIK the fretboard is rosewood, but it's sealed.
I happen to know the whole history of the 1992 dual truss rod TRP-6P that I acquired in 2022 (because it belonged to a former employer and was kept in his family after he passed away), and it perfectly illustrates all of your points. I hadn't thought about the expansion/contraction problems being a result of using all the different woods, but that totally makes sense.
I literally hadn't seen the bass in 28 years when I got hold of it, but I did know that it was stored in a non-climate controlled airplane hanger in Arizona for 10 years, and it lived in Colorado before and after that, in mostly low humidity with big temperature swings. All of that likely caused the following issues that I discovered when I got the bass: Serious fret sprout that caused finish cracking around the fret ends, a crack in the center of the fingerboard from the top end down to about the 18th fret, and most strangely, even with the thick poly finish you can feel some relief of the wood grain on the body, which is something that I've never seen on a bass of that type.
The fingerboard crack seems to be stable, i.e. not becoming any more severe, so I most likely won't do anything about it unless the bass is ever refretted. It does make me a little fearful of tightening the truss rods, though, but so far I haven't needed to. The fret ends were easily filed down - the finish lifting around them is just a cosmetic issue since you can't really feel it, so it remains.
The electronics worked perfectly until a few days ago - there seems to be a bad solder joint or a failing component on the preamp board that's causing some pops and signal dropping out. The bass is in the hands of a very skilled repairman at the moment, so hopefully he can hunt down the problem and not have to replace the preamp. I've been down the preamp-swapping road with my first TRB-6P, and I'd much prefer to stick with the stock electronics.
Also, FWIW in my experience I never found oiling ebony fingerboards to be of any benefit, nor did it overly soften the wood.
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