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32" Medium Scale Bass Thread


Rumple

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56 minutes ago, Kateplaysbass said:

La Bella do medium scale - I have their medium scale Low Tension flats on my 32" ACG and I love them.

 

All the LaBella flats I have tried (except the nylon covered) have had a weird stickiness about them. I don’t know whether it is a reaction to my skin, or a generic problem. I’ve tried cleaning them with lighter fluid, rubbing alcohol, string lube, etc to no avail. I always end up taking them off (with the exception of the Hofner Violin bass I had) and regretting the considerable sunk cost. Perhaps the low tensions are different.

 

I have been using Maruszczyk flats on my Mezzo and find them to have a really good smooth feel to them. They are also about 2/3 the price of LaBellas. However, they only just fit. They are designated short/medium and the G only just makes it over the nut before the silk starts, so they might not fit some basses.

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19 minutes ago, Obrienp said:

All the LaBella flats I have tried (except the nylon covered) have had a weird stickiness about them. I don’t know whether it is a reaction to my skin, or a generic problem. I’ve tried cleaning them with lighter fluid, rubbing alcohol, string lube, etc to no avail. I always end up taking them off (with the exception of the Hofner Violin bass I had) and regretting the considerable sunk cost. Perhaps the low tensions are different.

 

I have been using Maruszczyk flats on my Mezzo and find them to have a really good smooth feel to them. They are also about 2/3 the price of LaBellas. However, they only just fit. They are designated short/medium and the G only just makes it over the nut before the silk starts, so they might not fit some basses.


I have the same issue with La Bella flats, especially when my hands are sweaty. The low tensions were worse!

 

On the Deep Talking Flats I have solved it… before I install them I give them an extensive rub down with Wet & Dry paper to rough them up. It makes a big difference. I wouldn’t have bothered if I didn’t like their tone so much.

 

Dunlop make some good medium scale flats. They fit fine on a Mezzo. Eye wateringly expensive though.

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  • 2 months later...

Any folks aware of this offering from Gordon Smith. https://www.gordonsmithguitars.com/shop/guitars/gs-bass/#reviews. Pricey I think and vaguely reminiscent of the Orange O bass, especially if you opt for a single cutaway. I wonder if it is actually made in the UK, or just tweaked here, like the Auden offerings.

 

Still there aren’t many medium scale basses available in this country, so it adds to the range of choice. I still can’t understand why Fender/Squier aren’t offering a medium scale P bass. I think it would sell really well.

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18 hours ago, DaleASmith said:

I’m maybe looking at going with Retrovibe for my next 32”. Most of their basses are available in 32” scale and they do some really great looking basses. 

The medium scale ones have 42mm nut width and 2x2 headstocks, neither of which suit me. I have to say the shapes don’t float my boat either. I like the look of the P/MM model but it is full scale only. If he came up with a medium scale P with a Jazz style neck, I would be right there with my wallet open;  ditto the P/MM model.

 

Actually, if somebody marketed reasonably priced medium scale Jazz style necks in the UK, I would snap up a couple immediately. They can be bought from China and the USA but you have all the import duty/VAT hassles to deal with. I guess there just isn’t a market here for anything other than full scale offerings and some of those are seriously expensive. I have considered buying a Squier Jaguar H bass just to get the neck and marry it up to a P bass body.

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On 16/05/2024 at 16:10, Obrienp said:

Any folks aware of this offering from Gordon Smith. https://www.gordonsmithguitars.com/shop/guitars/gs-bass/#reviews. Pricey I think and vaguely reminiscent of the Orange O bass, especially if you opt for a single cutaway. I wonder if it is actually made in the UK, or just tweaked here, like the Auden offerings.

 

Still there aren’t many medium scale basses available in this country, so it adds to the range of choice. I still can’t understand why Fender/Squier aren’t offering a medium scale P bass. I think it would sell really well.

According to the spec it has more than one tuner and no machine heads?I have heard of basses with built in tuners but even a headless has machine heads of some sort.

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1 hour ago, dodgnofski said:

Hi,

 

Does anyone have a 32” scale P or maybe a Jazz they may wish to part with? I’m struggling a tad with long scale in my dotage & find short scales too short.

 

Thank you👍

I've an Ibanez Mezzo P/J that I'm interested in moving on but it's a 5 string.

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34 minutes ago, BassBunny said:

I've an Ibanez Mezzo P/J that I'm interested in moving on but it's a 5 string.

Thank you, unfortunately I can’t do fivers😟🙈

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3 minutes ago, Obrienp said:

Sandberg 32”? Which model is that? I’ve only seen full scale and 30” advertised.

I think it was a custom order Cali. It's in the lefty bass for sale thread only recently

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  • 2 months later...

Does anyone have a set of 32” Medium Scale, stainless flats, light gauge they wish to sell? Red silks preferred if possible? I wanted to try a set on my 32” Jazz to see if l can get on with them before buying a new set👍

Edited by dodgnofski
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  • 5 weeks later...

I eventually took a punt and bought a 32” Jazz style neck from China off eBay. It wasn’t as painful as I had imagined. It took over 3 weeks to arrive but when it did, it was in good condition and the import duty had been sorted. It was unfinished but had a nut installed and the frets had been nicely executed. The heel proved to be a little wider than the Fender standard, so I had to ease the neck pocket on a Precision body to fit it.
 

Anyway I’m at risk of straying into build diary territory, so suffice to say I now having a working, lightweight, medium scale P bass with Jazz style neck. It sounds pretty good IMO, if a little bright (full size P body, so pickup is a little close to the bridge). The whole thing, including Tonerider pickup and Schaller machine heads cost me a little more than £200, plus a lot of finishing work. I still think Squier could sell a lot of medium scale P basses if they would only bite the bullet.

 

Here it is in action:

 

 

IMG_0236.jpeg

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35 minutes ago, Obrienp said:

I eventually took a punt and bought a 32” Jazz style neck from China off eBay. It wasn’t as painful as I had imagined. It took over 3 weeks to arrive but when it did, it was in good condition and the import duty had been sorted. It was unfinished but had a nut installed and the frets had been nicely executed. The heel proved to be a little wider than the Fender standard, so I had to ease the neck pocket on a Precision body to fit it.
 

Anyway I’m at risk of straying into build diary territory, so suffice to say I now having a working, lightweight, medium scale P bass with Jazz style neck. It sounds pretty good IMO, if a little bright (full size P body, so pickup is a little close to the bridge). The whole thing, including Tonerider pickup and Schaller machine heads cost me a little more than £200, plus a lot of finishing work. I still think Squier could sell a lot of medium scale P basses if they would only bite the bullet.

 

Here it is in action:

 

 

IMG_0236.jpeg

Very cool! Maybe this is a rabbit hole I need to explore too… 

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Apologies folks, I committed a sin of omission and forgot to add my newest 32" scale acquisition to this thread. Strung with Long scale EXL170BT strings.

 

Here's the NBD post:

 

 

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The other day someone posted an interesting 1980s Ibanez on Reddit that I'd never seen or heard of before. My first response was "Surely that's a fake, it looks like no other Ibanez I've ever seen!" and I am a bit of an Ibanez nerd. But sure enough, the RB Bronks series was very real, with the RB60 and RB70 both made by Fujigen Gakki solely in 1989. And they're very much medium scale basses! Consider me educated! 

 

1989_RB70-CO.jpg.6ca43283cef408a52c1c230cd0b171ec.jpg

 

1989_RB70-OC_rear.jpg.bf53d43f895ffd3feb9957fdab7f1b67.jpg

 

 

 

 

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