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Wal Bass Club.

#9,621
bronzet said:
Here is a sneak peak of the Stingray too - quality of the pic is not very good. The stingray is olympic white but has some yellowing - i have pulled the bass apart and it has the original epoxy preamp and the neck is stamped 78 and pots 77. It will sit well with my other Pre-EB Stingray (you can see a pic of that in my thumbnail pic). Anyways i am now licking my wounds (at least my bank account has a bit of a hole in it now) now that i bought both of these together just today :)

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Loving that Mk 1 Custom. Really early "transitional" model from when Wal were still working out exactly what the Custom Series would look like. Pro-style headstock and chrome bridge plus the inlayed coachlinings along the centre line. Gorgeous! Presume it's early 1981, then?

What's the neck profile like? Custom Series soft V or Pro Series C?

See you're in Dunedin - also home to one of the other pivotal Wal users from the early days, Prof Rob Burns.
 
#9,622
The neck is a bit chunkier than the Mk2 i have. I would describe it more of a C shape than a V which the Mk2 has - i like both neck types too. The person that sold me the Custom told me it was made in 1980. There is no hand written sticky tape note with the specs on it inside the electronics lid so i have not been able to confirm that yet.

I haven't met Rob in person but i have spoken with him many times on the internet - he is somebody with real street cred, you only have to briefly look at his CV starting with David Gilmour. He has got some awesome basses namely his Wals too.

TrevorR said:
Loving that Mk 1 Custom. Really early "transitional" model from when Wal were still working out exactly what the Custom Series would look like. Pro-style headstock and chrome bridge plus the inlayed coachlinings along the centre line. Gorgeous! Presume it's early 1981, then?

What's the neck profile like? Custom Series soft V or Pro Series C?

See you're in Dunedin - also home to one of the other pivotal Wal users from the early days, Prof Rob Burns.
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#9,624
I bought it from a seller here in New Zealand. It had been sitting in storage not being used and they offered to sell it to me. I haven’t taken the neck off yet. I could find the correct Allen key last night. When I do manage to find the correct one, I plan to have a look at the neck stamp and hopefully get an official date on the bass.

The stingray rocks just like my new Wal :)


mikeswals said:
Is there a date on the heel of the neck?

Did you gat this Mk1 from Radoor? (jeez I hope I didn't butcher his name!)

And nice StingRay! I've got a white '78 with maple board.
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#9,626
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NBD...1985 MK1...with bonus fretless neck! Fretless neck is the original which was de-fretted. The factory fretted neck is from 1982...which is one of the Pro Custom Series necks. A really interesting bass...
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#9,635
mikeswals said:
Thats really cool, and appears to be really clean.
Is the action drastically different swapping necks?
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I haven’t flipped to fretless just yet.
But will be doing that soon.
The fretted neck plays fairly well with low action. I’m using extra light strings to keep the action virtually effortless to play. Hoping this action should translate perfectly for the fretted neck.

I will definitely report back. :)
 
#9,636
bassballs27 said:
I haven’t flipped to fretless just yet.
But will be doing that soon.
The fretted neck plays fairly well with low action. I’m using extra light strings to keep the action virtually effortless to play. Hoping this action should translate perfectly for the fretted neck.

I will definitely report back. :)
Click to expand...

Here’s my pre-Game of Thrones report...



Sorry for the cell phone distortion and string noise. The fretless neck seems just great with the same setup as the fretted. I’m impressed!
 
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#9,639
bassballs27 said:
Sorry for the cell phone distortion and string noise. The fretless neck seems just great with the same setup as the fretted. I’m impressed!
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In my experience Wal necks can easily be swapped. I changed a fretted Mk1 neck for a fretless Mk1 neck once and had no problems or set up issues either. These necks are all exactly the same size I believe.
 
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#9,640
Les Fret said:
In my experience Wal necks can easily be swapped. I changed a fretted Mk1 neck for a fretless Mk1 neck once and had no problems or set up issues either. These necks are all exactly the same size I believe.
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And it seems that all Wals come pre-shimmed from their shop. This definitely makes for more neck consistency. Lots of builders build basses as one offs and you can barely ever change necks. Sure they fit a bit tighter...but with bolt ons, having a little bit of wiggle room in the pocket isn’t a bad thing. Some Pre CBS Fenders had too much wiggle room. LOL.
 
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