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Double Bass Worth Fixing?

#21
Going against the grain here, but I would vote for selling this one off to a luthier who can patch it up and sell it to somebody in a rockabilly band or some other kind of music where these large and always obvious injuries are valued as a badge of honor. The tearing injury will bee seen by you every time you play it and it will wear on your psyche. Better to start fresh and definitely have it set up by a luthier who knows what you are doing. The bridge on your current bass is positioned pretty far up toward the fingerboard out of standard position now, which will cause you trouble in terms of string height intonation for a contemporary D neck bass. You can probably find some god assistance available in the Portland-Vancouver area, if that is closer than Seattle. Good luck! Let us know how it turns out.
 
#22
I will definitely let you folks know how this turns out. At this point I really want to just fix it to the point it doesn't have a hole, as noted its in an area you really can't see, additionally I always play with a belt guard that covers it anyways, it just doesn't SOUND right to me since this happened. 100 percent right on the setup is garbage on it too, my high school had actually purchased me a shen to play on, and this wasn't getting much use the last few years I really played.
 
#25
Yeah I have Thursday through Monday off. If I don't get a call back from Nick by then, I will take it by Custom Strings in the valley and let you guys know what they have to say (one of two shops that the EWU bass instructor recommended to me today)
 
#26
james condino said:
That bass will take about a dozen more impacts like that and still work on the job.
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Mike Gilge said:
the back is actually detached from the side for a fairly large area as well.
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A friend brought his bass by over the holidays asking if I could glue up a seam. He plays lots of outdoor stuff on a beater plywood on which he refuses to spend a dime, hence coming to me instead of a real luthier. LST, the back was more than two thirds off, and he was still gigging on the thing! Had this been a carved bass I'm sure it would have involved some serious time and money. Because it was a ply everything fit back together almost like Legos, and the only difficulty was borrowing enough clamps!
 
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#27
So somewhat inebriated at this point....and going to finally admit this... I went to high school in Midland Michigan.... yep you guys have never heard of it probably. But it has to be one of the smallest towns in America with the orchestral venues it gets! I literally not only saw Edgar Meyer play when I was in HS, he gave us a clinic! And after that...life happened... at this point I really really just want to play again.
 
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#28
And because after all, this is the internet and people can say anything.... I will at least try and provide proof to that previous statement!
 

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#29
james condino said:
I could take that same bass, slap on some duct tape and make five times the value of it between now and October playing gigs and living a fun life; maybe even so much fun that I got arrested while on the job.... Which do you want to be????
j.
www.kaybassrepair.com
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Yes, my first bass had a damage a bit like that. I covered it with some tape with the words "Keep cool - do not freeze" on it.
 
#31
Povl Carstensen said:
Remove "part" of the top?
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My first thought was to open the seam on the upper bout opposite the crack (i.e, on the treble side), maybe 4 or 5 inches, so that you could put a rod through to push out the crack. But KFS's solution gets pressure behind the crack and avoids opening up the bass at all.

James, isn't that crack on the bass side upper bout? I'd say it's at one of the more visible spots, especially for the player, and where a right fore-arm is likely to be making contact with the bass.

In any case, it should be an easy fix, for not much money.
 
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#32
Mike Gilge said:
............ I took very bad care of, literally knocked chunks out of the edges on the bottom....
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In high school my neighbor and I used to sneak the old Kay outta' the band room and literally take it sledding down the big snow covered hill beyond the football field. I was always amazed that we never broke the neck. I also did the same thing with the first electric guitar I ever built; no broken necks but wow was the case trashed! I still sold it for $500 in 1984 and bought a nice original 1956 hardtail stratocaster on 48th street at We Buy and had change left over! 'Wish I still had that guitar- I'd probably not be on the bass nerd forum right now....

I have two different customers that played the main stage at Merlefest with only half the back attached on their old Kay and still had a great gig. One of them is on the bench right now getting glued back so they don't repeat it this spring.
 
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#33
Mr. Schnitzer has a fun story about his first restoration, an old Kay he bought out of an attic. The owner's grandbabies were using it as a trampoline, leaping off a piece of furniture flat-footed onto the belly of the Kay and springboarding off of it.

He was horrified, as I recall, but the story proves that these are durable basses. Well, other than the necks.
 
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#34
KUNGfuSHERIFF said:
Mr. Schnitzer has a fun story about his first restoration, an old Kay he bought out of an attic. The owner's grandbabies were using it as a trampoline, leaping off a piece of furniture flat-footed onto the belly of the Kay and springboarding off of it.

He was horrified, as I recall, but the story proves that these are durable basses. Well, other than the necks.
Click to expand...
 
#38
An update to this....I dropped the bass off at Custom Strings in Spokane Valley today.... The luthier there seems very knowledgable. He is going to remove the top to fix this, and estimates that by itself to be around 400 (to fix the damage in the picture). I am also having him do some bridge work, remove the (STUPID) finish from the back of the neck, and any other setup things he thinks should be done (new strings too of course). Ill update this thread with pics, and my opinion of his work for future reference to the community. Thanks guys!
 
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#40
Mike Gilge said:
An update to this....I dropped the bass off at Custom Strings in Spokane Valley today.... The luthier there seems very knowledgable. He is going to remove the top to fix this, and estimates that by itself to be around 400 (to fix the damage in the picture). I am also having him do some bridge work, remove the (STUPID) finish from the back of the neck, and any other setup things he thinks should be done (new strings too of course). Ill update this thread with pics, and my opinion of his work for future reference to the community. Thanks guys!
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That's awesome! I have a recently used ES9 I bought off a local college student. I also still have my first decent guitar from third grade. You have a bass worth repairing and keeping. For multiple reasons. Good luck!
 

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