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NBD: Gary Willis GWB35 (fretless) with mods


goonieman
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Hi All,

I bought this off EZBass - of this forum - a few days ago. Great chap!

I'm loving this beauty. Been wanting to try one for ages - but they are quite rare.

This was full-on black - but was stripped back to bare wood and lightly varnished.

EZBass had a bit of enamel on the top, with a bit of plastic laminate, which I removed. I got over-zealous taking the paint off, which left witness lines. I ended-up having to sand the whole thing back down through the varnish - took ages :rolleyes: , even with a sander.

I've put some beeswax polish on it now, and I thought I might as well sand the neck down too to remove the roundwound marks and take away the slightly proud and sunk fretline markers (impercetible to some, but you can 'sense' these lines when wiping your hand across - and they do interfere with the 'mwah' too).

Anyway, I levelled the neck and wet-sanded from 400-1500, then used T-Cut for a mirror finish, and light coat of lemon oil... I can almost see myself in the neck now!

I also re-cut the nut. the factory setup was crazy high. Just silly. Strings are now pretty much on the fretboard, where they should be.

Plays wonderfully with the flatwounds.

The preamp and pup are very decent to my ears, although it's true that it can be a bit hissy with treble boosted right up (but nobody should go that far anyway really)

The ramp is a great bonus. For me, it aids speed and fluidity substantially.

Winning!

[url="http://s723.photobucket.com/user/bassfiend3000/media/IMG_5387_zpspfhnsqmc.jpg.html"][/url]
[url="http://s723.photobucket.com/user/bassfiend3000/media/IMG_5388_zps8frjpyab.jpg.html"][/url]
[url="http://s723.photobucket.com/user/bassfiend3000/media/IMG_5389_zpshepebhau.jpg.html"][/url]
[url="http://s723.photobucket.com/user/bassfiend3000/media/IMG_5390_zps2jtqsg2x.jpg.html"][/url]
[URL=http://s723.photobucket.com/user/bassfiend3000/media/IMG_5393_zps2rcr05vr.jpg.html][IMG]http://i723.photobucket.com/albums/ww234/bassfiend3000/IMG_5393_zps2rcr05vr.jpg[/IMG][/URL]

Edited by goonieman
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Looks like a lovely job you've done there. If this hadn't sold, I might've taken it back to 'normal' too, although I would have probably ended up adding an ash veneer to match the ramp (a proper wood veneer this time). Enjoy, I know I did.

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Yeah, I have been tempted to add a natural colour dye too... but held back.

Kind of tempted to do a thin skin nitro shoot in olympic white, with clear coat as well - which is sure to relic quickly and nicely. That would mean not playing it for a while though... that ain't gonna happen for a while!

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[quote name='goonieman' timestamp='1453560642' post='2960558']
Kind of tempted to do a thin skin nitro shoot in olympic white, with clear coat as well - which is sure to relic quickly and nicely. That would mean not playing it for a while though... that ain't gonna happen for a while!
[/quote]Ah, ever the dilemma; sounds cool though.

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