tauzero

[quote name='Gust0o' timestamp='1378469909' post='2200771'] If your love is Harley, why would you? If your love was Suzuki or Honda, why would you? You like what you like, you don't need to bow and scrape to appease the egos and interests of others, surely? [/quote] I really have no idea how you read that into what I wrote. Oh well.

[quote name='molan' timestamp='1378424783' post='2200287'] Most Harley riders enjoy every minute of their time on their bike and a huge percentage have come from a sports bike background. To them their 'inferior' bike is actually far 'superior' to a high tech sports bike. [/quote] It would appear that neither Harley riders nor sports bike riders can comprehend that there is a whole world of bikes that aren't sports bikes or Harleys. Oh well.

It's all in the wood. Do you want it to burn hotter or for longer?

My Sei Original 5 headless fretless, or I could be tempted to a Flamboyant equivalent.

[quote name='molan' timestamp='1378140105' post='2196194'] I don't think there's many people who be in the either/or camp. Minimum entry price on one is way higher than the other. [/quote] I didn't think Foderas were that much more expensive than Harleys. Not unless you have a fretless, anyway. [quote name='molan' timestamp='1378140105' post='2196194'] Interestingly Harley also try to sometimes position their bikes as investments and also bring out limited edition models every year that are big, big money. [/quote] When I used to frequent the newsgroup rec.motorcycles, the line about Harleys being an investment was often trotted out (as there was no other measure by which they could possibly be qualitatively be evaluated as anything other than inferior). Maybe that's Fender's thinking - a unicorn turd will be more valuable than a thoroughbred stallion...

[quote name='Jah Wibble' timestamp='1377858182' post='2192788'] Unfortunately I had a really bad experience with this guy (or perhaps it was someone else working there? Apologies if it was) Called him up last year to see if he could do a price match on a head. He laughed heartley and loudly down the phone at me and said "Why would I want to do that??!" Left me feeling pretty humiliated for asking a pretty normal question. [/quote] The trouble with telephones is that you're relying entirely on the verbal and audible side of things. I just wondered whether Mark's laugh might not have been intended as derogatory but as the verbal equivalent of a smiley, to try and mitigate any offence you might have felt, but actually had the opposite effect. Of course, you were there and I wasn't, so that might not sound like a plausible alternative to you. I've bought one bass from Mark, a second-hand Sei, which developed a fault a little while after buying it. Basically the elderly Berg (IIRC) preamp had developed a fault in one of its buffer stages so needed replacing. I didn't get any discount on the Delano preamp I bought to replace it - conversely, he did do me a Gramma pad as a little sweetener for the Sei in the first place. Swings and roundabouts.

Nominally "Back in the USSR" although none of us actually had the record so I just made something up. But we mainly played originals anyway...

"I relict it as a hobby". Which actually gives us quite a nice past tense for a verb "to relic", but does make me hope that his other hobbies don't include either animals or sex. At least he didn't do it to anything valuable.

[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1378201374' post='2196847'] I do, and I haven't. I suppose the P is just so ubiquitous. You don't have to think about it. [/quote] Indeed. Fender have made a fortune out of selling P basses to people who don't think about it.

I've asked how it got so badly damaged.

It's hardly a new concept, the Aria [s]Sinusoido[/s] Sinsonido has been around for years, although the headstock is at the other end.

[quote name='4 Strings' timestamp='1377889491' post='2193366'] I don't think he is right, more a casual comment with an element of truth as there may have been some people who buy purely for (a very patient and hopeful) investment, probably more a comment about the difference between MiM and MiA price and quality [/quote] But in the case of the Custom Shop limited editions, he is right. See [url="http://www.fender.com/custom-shop/series/limited-edition/"]http://www.fender.com/custom-shop/series/limited-edition/[/url] which has nothing about the instruments in playing terms, but does say "Each Custom Shop Limited Edition instrument is only available for a short time, which makes it eminently collectible and adds to its investment value.". So Fender are aiming these instruments at (deluded) investors rather than players.

Looks like the ideal moment to pull an Ashbory out of your pocket to finsh the gig with.

I wouldn't worry about the intonation going out. It certainly doesn't match with my experience of 12 years without adjustable nuts and 25 years with them...

[quote name='molan' timestamp='1377870067' post='2193043'] Maybe it's the definition of 'investment' that's in question [/quote] Not so much "investment" but "as an investment". Don't forget all the caveats about the price of shares, houses, etc can go down as well as up. Even petrol goes down in price occasionally. "Investment" is just another word for "bet".

[quote name='molan' timestamp='1377868123' post='2193001'] It's just cheap marketing hype I'm afraid. Lots of manufacturers produce limited editions and try to claim that they will rise in value. This is merely another way of trying to move them quickly. Fender, and especially MusicMan, do this all the time. It definitely increases short term desirability and may command a higher price on the used market in the future but it's incredibly rare for one to rise to a level above the original new price - which is what it would have to do to be an investment. [/quote] I think you're missing the point. Buying something as an investment doesn't mean that it [b]will[/b] rise in price, just that somebody has convinced the buyer that it will. If I'd bought Santander shares in 2010 for the price of a Fodera, I could now sell them and get myself a brace of matching Squiers. In the case of basses, by the time you've worked out that a particular one would be a good investment because the price would rise enormously, the price has risen enormously. However, those particular ones would also probably have been ones that you'd have avoided as a player when they were cheap because they were crap (75% of 70s Fenders, all Hofner violin basses).

[quote name='molan' timestamp='1377641864' post='2189907'] I am now planning to have all my basses upgraded to feature "pickups wound by virgins" [/quote] I'm not sure that having all your pickups wound by spotty youths with unhealthy Playstation/Xbox fixations would be a significant upgrade.

[quote name='molan' timestamp='1377462614' post='2187883'] I have to say that I am genuinely amazed. I've worked off and on in a high end bass guitar retailer for close to 3 years and not a single customer has bought a new bass from us an investment. In fact one of the most common comments we get is that they know sir instruments will drop in value the moment they walk out the door. [/quote] What about limited edition runs? For example Status's 14 30th anniversary Series 2s: [url="http://www.status-graphite.com/status/frames/index_home.html"]http://www.status-graphite.com/status/frames/index_home.html[/url] I certainly wouldn't say that none of them will be bought to play down the Whippet and Firkin with, but might they be aimed as much at the collector as the player? As has been pointed out upthread, there's a bit of a difference between a high-end bass from someone like Fodera or Ritter who aren't turning out vast numbers of basses and a limited edition bass from a mass producer. In fact, if you look at Fender's blurb on [url="http://www.fender.com/custom-shop/series/limited-edition/"]http://www.fender.com/custom-shop/series/limited-edition/[/url] about Custom Shop limited editions, it says "Each Custom Shop Limited Edition instrument is only available for a short time, which makes it eminently collectible and adds to its investment value. Crafted with many features reserved only for certain artists and master built instruments, they are just what the name says they are: highly anticipated limited-edition models that go very quickly." which rather points to Fender aiming them at investors and not players.

I had them fitted to a fretless Sei by Jaydee in Birmingham - [url="http://www.jaydeecustomguitars.co.uk/repairs.html"]http://www.jaydeecustomguitars.co.uk/repairs.html[/url] Cost me £45 IIRC which included filling the original where-a-fretted-bass-has-them markers in.

[quote name='iiipopes' timestamp='1377634559' post='2189784'] Unless a player frequently changes brand and gauge of strings, in over thirty-eight years of playing bass I have never found the occasion to need an adjustable nut. Moreover, one important down side is that brass is softer than the steel strings sitting in the slots, and it can wear faster than a traditional bone nut placed and set up by an experienced luthier, as indicated by the number of vintage instruments that retain their original nuts after decades of play. [/quote] I've found it a very useful thing to have. I don't have them on all my basses, just the two Warwicks that came with them and two of the Antoniotsais. You've just contradicted yourself as well - if a brass nut wears, it'll be advantageous to be able to adjust it.

Blimey. You can get a Just-A-Nut I for a tenth of that: [url="http://www.thomann.de/gb/abm_6240_webster_nut_bass.htm"]http://www.thomann.de/gb/abm_6240_webster_nut_bass.htm[/url] It's not just the sound with the Just-A-Nuts though, it also means you can get the nut height nicely sorted out without recourse to files (or angle grinders, depending on what sort of "guitar improver" you are).

It's worth having a look at the Peavey BXPs, the Grind and Cirrus. Also the Schecter Studio 5 (I think it's the Stiletto, they have a baffling profusion of names and a not-terribly-good website).

[quote name='xilddx' timestamp='1377610553' post='2189343'] Yes but we aren't allowed to take the piss out of other basschat members so it has to be done to someone who isn't. [/quote] But he is a MiltyChat member. Does that mean that all of us who have dissed him will get told off?

A black version of that was my first proper bass (I don't count the bog-awful Rosetti Bass 7 that I had for a few weeks). Don't know why I chopped it in for a Precision...

Strat pickups? Surely it's an MDP.