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Which bass will be the next T-40?

#121
The Japan built early 5 string BTBs are also a solid bet with 35" scale and 19mm spacing. These basses were touted as "Boutique Basses" and were a radical departure from Ibanez' offerings at the time.
I have a first year ('99) BTB505 that I recently resurrected with a factory neplacement neck, Gotoh GB707 tuners, n.o.s. pots, new NYXls, and a thourough cleaning. It's a solid bass. The B string rings like a piano and sustains like a 12 pound bass would be expected to and is comparable with my Lakland, Cirrus, and Martinson 5s.
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#122
I can't really see the MM Sub achieving this status purely because there are similar Sterling basses available new for similar or less money.

To me it has to be something that is not available now and wasn't super popular at the time. I think these models have the potential:

  • Fender Dimension
  • Fender Blacktop Jazz
  • US Peavey Cirrus
  • G&L M2X00 models
 
#123
kodiakblair said:
I've no idea.

The 'T-40' thing is mostly a USA trend. There's very little interest in them elsewhere.

Few examples. It's over 2 years since anyone in Germany posted on bassic.de about the T-40, it's the same story with France's onlybass forum. Here in the UK, an American TB member did a NBD about his T-40 last week. For posts before that, you need to travel back to 2016 for one I made :thumbsup: 5 years of crickets on The Netherlands' basgitaarforum.
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That is mainly because the T40 was released at a time when the instrument market wasn't as international as it is now. Even today on Talkbass you hardly hear about Warwick (and Framus) , Duesenberg, Magnus, Maruszczyk or Sandberg.
 
#125
kodiakblair said:
Like I said, it's mainly a USA thing.

In Europe we had Aria Pro with the SB-1000 and Ibanez launching the Musician. Matsu were building about half dozen other brands sold here.

We were spoiled for choice.
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Would Westminster, Vantage, Westone be part of that half dozen brands in addition to the Aria Pro II's you Euros were getting your hands on? Have you had the good fortune to have had a Vantage VS series? Give my left @ut for a Westone
 
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#127
I'm going to have to agree with the previous comments stating there will not be another situation like the T-40 happening again.

Also, what seemed to have been overlooked was what started happening to the prices of Peavey guitar combos earlier that year so the writing was on the wall for affordable Peavey gear well before the T-40 started getting attention. The COVID influenced marketplace also got sellers too spoiled to allow such a situation happen again.
 
#128
I'm also willing to nominate one I recently picked up. A USA Hamer CruiseBass. It's a 5-string with a 2TEK bridge, real Schaller tuners, Seymour Duncan Basslines P/U's. It is shockingly good. I love the neck & narrow string spacing, it sustains forever, & exhibits excellent build quality. I actually traded a very nice Korean (2001) Lakland Skyline 55-02 for it, straight across, no regrets.
 
#129
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#130
Weight aside, the T-40 was also a Tank in every other respect. You'd have to work pretty hard to break anything on that bass. I still have my ancient Peavey Mark III 400BH bass amp down in the basement, for reasons I cant articulate, since it currently needs a recap, or some other repair that would exceed it's street value. That thing worked like a champ for 30+ years, which was typical of Peavey gear. Nothing spectacular tone-wise, just bulletproof meat and potatoes. My L2K is still going strong too, though I rarely play it anymore.
 

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