NBD: Anyone else ever owned one of these?

[chriswareham]

Actually owned this for a couple of months, but I was under the impression that Rickenfakers were off limits. Rereading the moderator posts, I understand it's just the selling of real or fake Ricks that's verboten. So, seeing as I definitely wont be parting with this, here's my latest acquisition:





It's a Czech made Jolana bass from the mid 1980s. The model name was "D Bass", which would have originally been engraved on the truss rod cover. Sadly someone has "anonymised" this one with a TRC made from what looks and smells like a piece of plastic from the lid of a fertiliser container! The bridge strap lock unscrews to reveal a screwdriver that can be used to completely disassemble the bass - quite a neat touch, and something that appears to have been standard for Jolana guitars. The neck is through body, and sadly the truss rod seems to be beyond adjustment, so the bass is currently having a new truss rod fitted along with replacement black-white-black three ply pickguard and truss rod cover.

The pickups have separate tone and volume controls with a three way selector switch, and the pickup poles can be adjusted with the screwdriver. The neck is moderately wide, but very shallow. Despite the high action from the duff truss rod, I found it very comfy to play. The nut is aluminium, which is something I'd not seen before. If the neck will take it, then it's going to be strung for drop Bb with the heaviest four strings from a five string set, allowing it to be my main gigging bass.

So I'm wondering, have any other Basschatters owned one of these?

[Bassassin]

Jolana D! Had Faker GAS for one of these for a good few years, missed a few on Ebay back in the day, but never seen one in the flesh.

We played in Prague a few years back & I had high hopes of picking one up cheap but no joy. The shops were all full of bloody Rickenbackers!

Jon.