therealting

There's also Dingwall for those looking for the ultimate balanced, tight B string.

How have people found shipping pickguards? I'm based in London and am wary of shipping my only pickguards overseas for instance. I suppose I could do a tracing.

Well technically people have been playing 41" scale double basses for centuries, so people could probably cope with 41" scale double basses, but it is a question of comfort as well as technique. I use and play a 3/4 size double bass (the standard size) using Simandl fingering, so I can play longer scales. Having said that, I owned a Dingwall Combustion (34-37" scale) for a few years, and part-traded it with colgraff on this very forum for his Dingwall Super J (32-35" scale) which was much more comfortable for me, even though the string spacing was wider (19" vs 18"). I do have some wrist and tendon issues which force proper technique etc even on guitar with barre chords, but shorter scales definitely help. Neck preferences are really funny things and depend on the length of your fingers, size of hand and length of your span among other things. I've just found that for ME, I don't get on with 35" scale basses. Anthony Jackson likes his 36" scale Fodera. And that's fine!

[quote name='GCYPbass' timestamp='1459244316' post='3014646'] Japanese TRBs are great value for the money. I too was a bit stressed when I was switching to 5 strings but it was very easy to get used to TRB's neck. I played it at a gig with a little practice without any problem. I too have small hands but it wasn't a problem at all. Only problem I got was that it is 35'' scale and I am not a tall guy. [/quote] The Mk I TRBs are 34" scale. I have a sixer... but it is very wide.

I'd be quite interested in trying one, always liked the look of singlecut basses and it suits the Soundgear well. I got a fanned fret SRFF806 recently, and I'd be particularly interested in trying an Ibanez fanned singlecut.

I have an Ibanez SRFF806 and a Yamaha TRB6 Mk I, and they are polar opposites in terms of spacing and feel... it's actually kind of weird to have those as the two you have narrowed it down to! It's kind of like "I have narrowed things down to a Lotus Elise or a Land Rover, which is better?"

I use all the positions, having tone control over the bridge and middle positions is critical. Two of my Strats have a master tone and a mid boost (the MIJ 60s has EMGs @18v with SPC, while the Sadowsky has switchable mid and gain boosts), the 57 has one tone knob wired to the neck and the other to the other two pickups. My MXG superstrat with Tom Andersons has a master tone.

I had a Modern Player Jazz 5 for a while, and apart from being heavy it was actually very good.