Factory truss rod setting (minor Fender rant!)

[4000]

39 minutes ago, White Cloud said:

I've had a wooden neck on a very expensive handmade bass completely fail back in the 80's ... not cool. That led me to purchasing my first non-truss rod graphite necked bass. 

Tbh I won't buy any bass without at least graphite rod reinforcement nowadays. 

See my post above.

[geoham]

55 minutes ago, FDC484950 said:

Tension off the neck and strings slackened for transport I can understand, but no tension on the truss rod and strings at pitch just seems to be inviting issues if shipped and exposed to lots of temperature variations IMHO.

That’s my thinking too. The bass arrived kind of in tune... more or less a semitone flat across the board.

12 minutes ago, Geek99 said:

No excuse for that. Who did you buy it from ?

I bought it from PMT, but I don’t really hold it against them. It was on back order, and going by the packaging they received it and shipped it straight to me. 
 

Overall, I totally agree with the comments that you can’t expect a perfectly set up bass straight from the factory. But a loose truss rod with more than 2mm relief is pretty poor by most folk’s standards - particularly given the inconvenient truss rod access.

I think I’ll drop Fender a wee email with my concerns and a photo of the QC inspection tag!

[Geek99]

Don’t expect perfect but it sounds not even close 

[Cuzzie]

16 minutes ago, 4000 said:

I bought a used Status once and the neck was twisted. I’ve seen it happen to Zon and Modulus too. Stuff happens to carbon fibre necks too y’know. 😉

Aye, played so much the life was wrung out of it probably......!

Never said it was infallible, but balance of probabilities failure and warp rate will be less I would imagine. I imagine wood, wood and truss, wood and truss and carbon etc as you go up the pyramid.

The most in-tune guitar I have is the hohner headless - it can practically go on holiday from Sahara to Antarctic and barely change.

[SH73]

Temperature, transport, humidity all have an impact on truss rod. If it settles in your home, it may take days after you put new strings in to get to the desirable shape. 

I was given a jazz bass that sat in the loft with flats on tense over 20 years. I could easily lent it to the archery Olympic team.

[nilebodgers]

27 minutes ago, SH73 said:

Temperature, transport, humidity all have an impact on truss rod. If it settles in your home, it may take days after you put new strings in to get to the desirable shape. 

I was given a jazz bass that sat in the loft with flats on tense over 20 years. I could easily lent it to the archery Olympic team.

My old Yam BB sat in an unheated warehouse for 15 years and could have also done duty as a competition bow when I dug it out again. It took quite a bit of adjustment to get the relief back to a normal value and it also took a few weeks in the house to be stable again. Truss rod access is rubbish on those too which made it especially annoying (heel end embedded nut that standard tools don't fit properly).

[mcnach]

20 hours ago, ClassicVibes said:

I wouldn't expect any bass to arrive perfectly set-up. 

 

This.

Humidity etc may be very different at source from what it is where I receive it. Just like I don't expect a bass to arrive in tune, going over it adjusting it to my own preferences is something I would always count on doing. Sometimes, an instrument has arrived nearly there, but it's by chance more than anything. 

I don't expect to have uneven frets, or badly cut nuts, etc... but set-up? Yeah, I expect to do at least a very basic one on receipt. It's also not a big deal at all. Like buying a new car and adjusting the seat/mirrors for my own driving position.

edit: I also very very rarely keep whatever strings a bass comes with. I have my preferences, so I put strings I like very soon after I get the bass (I keep the original strings on initially until I'm satisfied that I'm keeping it). Sometimes those strings mean minor adjustments too, I can't expect a company to guess what strings and gauge I would be using on the bass. (shrug)

Edited May 7, 2020 by mcnach

[mcnach]

2 hours ago, geoham said:

That’s my thinking too. The bass arrived kind of in tune... more or less a semitone flat across the board.

I bought it from PMT, but I don’t really hold it against them. It was on back order, and going by the packaging they received it and shipped it straight to me. 
 

Overall, I totally agree with the comments that you can’t expect a perfectly set up bass straight from the factory. But a loose truss rod with more than 2mm relief is pretty poor by most folk’s standards - particularly given the inconvenient truss rod access.

I think I’ll drop Fender a wee email with my concerns and a photo of the QC inspection tag!

 

really?

[White Cloud]

2 hours ago, 4000 said:

I bought a used Status once and the neck was twisted. I’ve seen it happen to Zon and Modulus too. Stuff happens to carbon fibre necks too y’know. 😉

I don't doubt it however, it doesn't match my own experience.

[BigRedX]

TBH the only times I've had to adjust the truss rod on any of my guitars or basses is either when I have fitted strings with a completely different tension, or when I bought an instrument from a country with a very different climate to the UK. The rest of the time I leave it alone. I can live with the very tiny fluctuations in relief caused by the UK climate.

[geoham]

1 hour ago, mcnach said:

 

really?

Yeah, I’m a great believer in constructive feedback. There’s a QC card with four signatures on it. Genuinely, if one of those signatures was mine and the end user wasn’t happy I’d like to know.

Realistically, I know these are factory workers and probably signing 100+ of those every day and may not care what some bloke in Scotland thinks!

[4000]

1 hour ago, White Cloud said:

I don't doubt it however, it doesn't match my own experience.

I once had a custom bass built with carbon fibre neck reinforcement. It moved  the most of any bass neck on any bass I’ve ever had, by far. 

Wal stopped using it for supposedly the same reason. 

[SH73]

3 hours ago, nilebodgers said:

My old Yam BB sat in an unheated warehouse for 15 years and could have also done duty as a competition bow when I dug it out again. It took quite a bit of adjustment to get the relief back to a normal value and it also took a few weeks in the house to be stable again. Truss rod access is rubbish on those too which made it especially annoying (heel end embedded nut that standard tools don't fit properly).

Exactly, mine is a heel embedded nut too. I tried over a period of three weeks then gave up. Only a 1/4 turn at time. Doesn't bother me though as it sounds like 50s bass.