The Yamaha BB mega-thread

[Al Krow]

10 minutes ago, therealting said:

The price I got on my 435 is pretty much unbeatable IMO, more than £850 less than the cheapest P35 price I’ve seen. 

I presume you're talking about new prices here?

10 minutes ago, therealting said:

The price I got on my 435 is pretty much unbeatable IMO, more than £850 less than the cheapest P35 price I’ve seen. I may yet change out the pickups and get the fingerboard dressed and rolled.

Seems like a good plan to me! 

What pups are you thinking of swapping in?

Edited May 2, 2019 by Al Krow

[therealting]

2 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

I presume you're talking about new prices here?

Seems like a good plan to me! 

What pups are you thinking of swapping in?

Nope, used prices! I’ve not seen a P35 for less than £1100 so far.

Not sure what pickups yet but if I do they’ll probably be Nordstrands. 

[Al Krow]

4 minutes ago, therealting said:

Nope, used prices! I’ve not seen a P35 for less than £1100 so far.

Well there was definitely one in the last month in the FS, which someone on here didn't hesitate to snap up (and is very delighted he did!)  

[therealting]

3 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

Well there was definitely one in the last month in the FS, which someone on here didn't hesitate to snap up (and is very delighted he did!)  

Just searched and seen it, killer price! This was still more than £650 cheaper so I think I’ll be ok for now 😄

[Al Krow]

2 hours ago, therealting said:

Not sure what pickups yet but if I do they’ll probably be Nordstrands. 

I do love my Nord big singles in my Ibby SR premiums!

I could see a hum cancelling Nord being quite interesting for the J pup, but not sure I would swap the P pups - seems to be such a 'core' part of the Yammy sound?

[bassfan]

I have to say after playing this for a while they are lovely basses for the money.

 

[Reggaebass]

After playing mine on and off for about a month now,  I think they’re unbeatable for the money, and I love the selector switch 🙂

[dannybuoy]

You're all making me wish I kept my 415! It was lighter than my 1025X and had a slimmer neck, black sparkle paintjob and painted headstock.

[Reggaebass]

12 minutes ago, dannybuoy said:

black sparkle paintjob

That’s definitely a bit of me 😀,   Any pics.

[AndyTravis]

@bassfan that 424 is ace

[therealting]

1 hour ago, Al Krow said:

I do love my Nord big singles in my Ibby SR premiums!

I could see a hum cancelling Nord being quite interesting for the J pup, but not sure I would swap the P pups - seems to be such a 'core' part of the Yammy sound?

Well that’s the thing, they sound absolutely fine. Will probably have a play with strings first before I think about pickups. It’s genuinelt astounding for what it cost. 

[dannybuoy]

17 minutes ago, Reggaebass said:

That’s definitely a bit of me 😀,   Any pics.

No great ones, like all the ones on Google they all look plain black! 

It is a very subtle effect, not anything like the Musicman sparkle paintjobs I'm afraid! But looks obviously different next to the 1025X up close.

[therealting]

 

[bassfan]

2 hours ago, AndyTravis said:

@bassfan that 424 is ace

Cheers Andy. It was a good buy I have to say. Couple of marks on the back but as a first go with my own BB (I can’t count @Al Krow ‘s) I’m quite surprised. Might benefit from some new strings. 

Any recommendations on strings for these for an old Skool no slapping vibe? 

Edited May 2, 2019 by bassfan

[AndyTravis]

9 minutes ago, bassfan said:

Cheers Andy. It was a good buy I have to say. Couple of marks on the back but as a first go with my own BB (I can’t count @Al Krow ‘s) I quite surprised. Might benefit from some new strings. 

Any recommendations on strings for these for an old Skool no slapping vibe? 

Have heard the Ernie ball cobalt flats are nice, @lee650 uses them

[dannybuoy]

Not tried them on my BB mind, but I have TI flats on my Fender P and Sandberg Basic. Lovely strings.

[Al Krow]

Just now, dannybuoy said:

Not tried them on my BB mind, but I have TI flats on my Fender P and Sandberg Basic. Lovely strings.

Do you find your Sandberg, basic? 

[gobasserk]

Sandberg is not to mention together with genious  org. designs 😉 

[mikeycrikey]

2 hours ago, bassfan said:

Cheers Andy. It was a good buy I have to say. Couple of marks on the back but as a first go with my own BB (I can’t count @Al Krow ‘s) I’m quite surprised. Might benefit from some new strings. 

Any recommendations on strings for these for an old Skool no slapping vibe? 

Use Chromes on my 424X and i think they sound awesome.

 

[dannybuoy]

1 hour ago, Al Krow said:

Do you find your Sandberg, basic? 

Yes, it sounds much better than their more complicated ones that have the MM pickup too close to the bridge! 

[Reggaebass]

11 minutes ago, mikeycrikey said:

Any recommendations on strings for these for an old Skool no slapping vibe? 

I’ve got D’Addario half rounds on my 415 , they’re smooth to play and have that warm tone without losing the clarity , and with a bit of amp tweaking they can go deep 🙂

[gobasserk]

I used to use Warwick red labels on everything because they are so cheap you can change strings every week. I love nothing better than fresh steel strings. I tend to say you can always dial highs out but if the strings are old, dead or done you can't dial anything in anymore.  But I noticed a significant degradation on the red labels that occured with time. I had quiet a lot ..well how is that called in English..? The string core was broken on numerous new set of strings. It hit me once on a weekend in the studio when 5 out of 10 sets had dead e strings right out of the packing. I had to fight in the shop for getting them replaced and again 2 of 5 sets were like that. Even more bad was that suddenly I had problems to get my basses ..oh god...my english... in German it is called octave purity? What it means is that you can play an octave anywhere on the bass on any frets and it is "in tune" and sounds fine. I gave two of my basses to my tec guy and was afraid their necks had gone twisted but it turned out that with any other strings than the Warwicks tuning was just fine. Only with the red labels the problems occured. 

So I changed to D'addario Steels. Double the price of the Warwicks but I think they last a bit longer and they have more bottom. 

Edited May 3, 2019 by gobasserk

[Al Krow]

@M@23 - see you have gone to the darker side (midnight blue --> black) from your avatar and joined 'Team Sandberg'!

You kindly shared your thoughts on your favourite strings for your P35 when we met. I think you mentioned they were nickel rounds? Grateful if you could remind me of make and guage etc.

[dannybuoy]

I tried all sorts on my BB415, after getting my 1025X I realised I liked those stock D'Addario nickels better than anything else I had been using before ,so have pretty much exclusively been using those since! Except a brief foray into Dunlop Super Bright nickels, which were far too floppy for my liking. Might try the NYXLs on the next change though to see if they are a significant step up.

[M@23]

1 hour ago, Al Krow said:

@M@23 - see you have gone to the darker side (midnight blue --> black) from your avatar and joined 'Team Sandberg'!

You kindly shared your thoughts on your favourite strings for your P35 when we met. I think you mentioned they were nickel rounds? Grateful if you could remind me of make and guage etc.

I felt a fraud, and thought best to change it! Haha. Yes, the ones that came stock are D'Addario EXL170-5. They're 45-130s. I really like them, plus they're very reasonable priced. I liked them as the ones on yours are, which are definitely worn in, but they could probably do with a fresh set if you like that new-string-zing! I'd have got another month out of them!