'Vintage' Warwick (82 - 96); neck / relief / truss rod issue

[warwickhunt]

I just thought I'd post this for Basschatters who might have similar issues to myself. Essentially it 'might' help if anyone has a vintage NT Warwick with a removable truss rod (pre 96... ish) and can't take enough relief out of the neck.

I recently purchased a Warwick Infinette (91) with a known neck issue. I took the bass on in the full knowledge that the truss rod was maxxed out and yet there was still an unacceptable amount of relief (approx 3-4 mm with 1st and 24th fret depressed). In my mind I had two extremes of fix; a new truss rod or major repair work involving removal of the fingerboard and the neck straightening/resculpting.

My first job was to check the truss rod worked so I loosened off the truss rod. A quick note on this: do NOT assume all vintage Warwick basses will act 'righty-tighty / lefty-loosty', I've owned 2 previous Infinettes and they both acted counter intuitively, as did a 91 Streamer. This particular truss rod seemed to work fine... oddly the truss rod acted in the correct manner (righty-tighty) which made me think it had already been tinkered with in the past or the truss rod replaced.

With no tension applied to the truss rod I could slide the rod out and checked that it flexxed... both ways. Oddly I'd never needed to adjust that much relief on my previous Infinettes and I wasn't even aware that it had the 2 way rod it, I assumed it was 1 way (you learn something new)!

With the rod removed (no strings on bass), there was relief in the neck akin to what you'd expect if there was string tension on the neck, obviously this would be exacerbated when I applied string tension. I then set about putting the rod in and tensioning to sort the relief. It tensioned absolutely fine and started to take out the relief. All up to tension, tuned etc and the rod reached its max with still too much relief in the neck. I then took a calculated risk and tried to apply that last 1/8th of a turn that might correct the relief... CRACK' the rod snapped. I guessed it might happen but it was something I had to try. Out with the truss rod and new one needed to be sourced.

Research showed that there are 3 rods available for older (pre 96) NT basses.
A - 82-86 One way iron
B - 87-90 One way alloy
C - 91-96 Two way alloy
Please note that there is a blurring of the dates/use of truss rods in any of the basses so potentially you could have either/or on the crossover years. However if your bass has a volute behind the nut it is pretty certain to be non-removable.

I decided to go for the iron 1 way rod as further research and questioning had shown that other owners had fitted these early rods to slightly later basses so I knew that it should fit (if not I had a spare rod for a different bass) and I felt the iron might be better up to the job, time would tell. A consideration for some might be truss rod weight; the iron one is double the alloy one but luckily the Infinette was of the kind of weight that I could live with that.

Rod ordered from Warwick (approx 30 euro inc delivery) and duly inserted into the bass. Repeat the above process and... we were back to the maxxed out with the bass 'just' having too much relief for my absolute best set-up but better than it was. I should say two bassists tried the bass at this point and both said it was fine for them and probably better set up than there own basses. I decided that if I fitted lighter strings than the current 45 - 105 I could probably achieve what I wanted without major surgery. I found an old set of 40 - 100 and this had the bass playing nicely. I still planned to get a set of 35 - 95 off a friend and thereby I could take a bit of tension off the rod to give me a bit more adjustment. I also toyed with tuning it DGCF but that would involve a whole heap of mid-gig nerves while I figured that out!

At this point I was wondering exactly how much effect lower tension, lighter strings might have on the neck. I gently pulled back on the headstock while holding the body with my right forearm so that I could flex the neck back to see how much I needed to bring it back to get nirvana. That's when I heard a little audible 'clunk' and the neck was perfectly flat! I released the headstock and 'clunk' it went back to previous; I repeated this several times. What I think is happening is that the truss rod has a mm or two of forwards/backwards movement in the truss rod/neck slot. On reflection, in order for the truss rod to be removable there 'probably' needs to be a fraction more play than you'd get in other truss rod slots. On a bass that is absolutely flat when out of tension, that initial play can be eaten up easily in the truss rod take up but on the odd bass that needs maximum truss rod ability then that initial 1-2mm of take up could make the difference.

My next step is to see a friend who has a machine shop and to see if it is possible to fabricate a very slim 'shim' of metal (diameter as yet undetermined) that will sit under the truss rod. I could use wood but I'd be concerned that if there is any issue inserting/removing it, then the wood's tensile strength (compared to metal), might mean it would break off in the truss rod slot!

Sorry if this is long winded but it might help others in the future.

Oh and as a footnote; I'm presently gigging this bass (40 -100's fitted) and it plays and sounds great... there is a happy ending!

[Kev]

Interesting stuff, John.

Interestingly, my 5th Anniversary has the opposite problem, a tad too little relief. Reluctant to choose heavier strings to sort it, but even with the truss rod completely slack the neck still doesn't move, straight as an arrow!

[warwickhunt]

My 5th Anniversary is the same as yours that it is pretty flat with virtually no tension on the rod... in fact I think I nipped it up just to stop it roaming about!

Mind the fact you can take a problem rod out in seconds (easier than changing a battery) is a God send and despite this issue there aren't as many issues with rods as folks might imagine.

[buzzardian]

you might simply take outthe rod and turn it around

[Kev]

[quote name='buzzardian' timestamp='1503080681' post='3355622']
you might simply take outthe rod and turn it around
[/quote]

Does that work??

[buzzardian]

sure

[Kev]

[quote name='buzzardian' timestamp='1503081295' post='3355632']
sure
[/quote]It seems obvious now you have said it....

How's your fretless 5th anniversary, similar to John's and mine?

[warwickhunt]

[quote name='buzzardian' timestamp='1503080681' post='3355622']
you might simply take outthe rod and turn it around
[/quote]

Sounds like a plan and a good idea! Before you do though have you established which way the rod is working? Plug a tuner in and see what happens when you go each way. In the event that you are convex rather than concave when maxed then it might well be worth a try, especially if the rod just drops out.

[Kev]

[quote name='warwickhunt' timestamp='1503100198' post='3355788']
Sounds like a plan and a good idea! Before you do though have you established which way the rod is working? Plug a tuner in and see what happens when you go each way. In the event that you are convex rather than concave when maxed then it might well be worth a try, especially if the rod just drops out.
[/quote]
Oh it's certainly reducing relief now when tightened. TBH I won't be experimenting just yet, the bass is in need of some fretwork anyway so I'll probably just chat to the luthier about it.

[three]

Thanks Kev, not relevant to me as I don't currently ow a Warwick bass, but an interesting and informative story, and an example of Basschat at its best (and in the spirit of why many of us first got involved).

[ebenezer]

I had a through neck thumb from this era, and with a set of 45-105 roundwound strings the truss rod was on max and still too
much relief for me.

[Kev]

[quote name='Kev' timestamp='1503126624' post='3355824']

Oh it's certainly reducing relief now when tightened. TBH I won't be experimenting just yet, the bass is in need of some fretwork anyway so I'll probably just chat to the luthier about it.
[/quote]

I lost patience and experimented.

It works! Makes sense really....

[DrDrill]

I've now got exactly the same problem with my old streamer, clunk and all, Warwick want 80Euros for a new truss rod so i've ordered a couple of 630mm £8 stainless truss rods, single and dual action to see what happens, i've also got some shim from work and if none of that fixes the issue i'll make a new rod and see what happens. Trust me i'm an engineer...now where's ma hammer!!

[goingdownslow]

My '91 Thumb Bass always had a very low action, could have been considered as too low but it was playable so I never touched it.

A year or so ago I did a dep job with a band that tuned down a half step and that's when I noticed a bit of fret buzz. The next time I played with this band I thought I would set up my bass pre-gig but could get no relief on the neck. In fact there had been no tension on the rod at all.  I removed the rod (1-way alloy, lefty-tighty, righty-loosy) and reversed it, tensioned it and it did the trick. Needed no adjustment when returned to correct pitch.

[DrDrill]

Update.Tried to shim it, didn't work. I replaced the truss rod. The £8 rod was just over 1mm too thick so with some judicious use of a file and a liberal coating of aircraft grease  I now have a truss rod that actually influences the chunk of maple that is the neck.

Although initially the neck bow was getting worse 'cos i'd used the 2 way rod and was turning lefty tighty which was the original Warwick truss rod convention DOH!

In the mean time however i've gone all retro and have become rather attached to the mellow PASSIVE tones of my Limelight Jazz 😱 (run through a dUg DP-3X )

Edited April 26, 2019 by DrDrill

[mybass]

It’s a fretted neck ? If so there may just be a slight chance, especially if it’s been refretted, that the frets may have been ‘forced’ into too narrow a fret slot for the tang width, the hidden part of the fret that seats into the fboard. Many luthiers superglue frets In now so as I say, there may be a slight chance the frets are forcing neck issues. I think there is only one way to check all this I’m afraid and that’s a pro refret job. Other than this by what you are saying, the neck wood itself may not be right.

I think early Warwick truss rods were double flat rods that only adjusted one way before the later dual action ones were readily available.

[DrDrill]

Could be. But I reckon it's just a less stable neck and the old aluminium one way rod doesn't have the oomph to flex it. The alu rod adjuster comes to a dead stop unless you're prepared to malky it (which i'm not) and the steel rod adjusts easy peasy.

My Ltd Edition Streamer which is the same age and has a wenge/thin maple 5 piece neck, as opposed to the more normal Maple/thin wenge 5 piece is fine.