NBD - 74 Fender Precision Olympic White

BluesyDave

Looks great and it is exactly what you wanted.......always a bonus.  Back in the late 70's my mate had a natural mid seventies P bass and thing weigh'd a ton.  Sound good tho'.  I suppose the 'Ray' will be up for sale then?    

Bridgehouse

BluesyDave said:

Looks great and it is exactly what you wanted.......always a bonus.  Back in the late 70's my mate had a natural mid seventies P bass and thing weigh'd a ton.  Sound good tho'.  I suppose the 'Ray' will be up for sale then?    

Haha! You gotta be joking! The 'Ray is it's own kind of perfect. They are so different that I can justify keeping both. 

The missus would spot another P or a J, but she seems happy that these two are suitably different as to require both of them staying put...


However, (here we go!), I do fancy a short scale, maybe semi hollow... and not designed by Leo... 

ICBM

Bridgehouse said:

Black guard does look to be original. It's got a half-arsed attempt at a cut out for the truss rod, whereas the new one has it done properly, hence you can see some body

It's possible, if the transition was some time later in '74. It can't have been on Jan 1st 1975 anyway, and I don't think I've ever seen a '75 with a white guard. Just curious, really. What do the pot date codes say? (Assuming they're original.)

I like a truss-rod cut-out too, but seeing the white body in it does make it look a bit wrong . I usually try to make them with a bevel that goes right to the bottom of the guard at the edge, but not quite through it.

Bridgehouse

@ICBM - Pots are both 137-7405. Serial is 540243. Pup is 171074. 

There's a chance that as a custom colour they put a white guard on and thought "No, that looks wrong!" and popped one of the new black ones on. Then again, this was Fender in the 70's, so there's a chance it was mostly assembled in '74 and didn't leave the factory till very late 74/early 75. 

Or more likely we will never know and actually Fender were a law unto themselves back then and it could be anything from '72 to '78 and has had period correct aftermarkets put on at some point in it's (clearly) 'interesting' history

I'm reasonably convinced that at least some of it was made in '74. I'm mostly convinced it was probably screwed together sometime around '74. I'm sort-of but not totally convinced it was on a shop wall ready to be bought in 74.

Bridgehouse

Oh, and on the TR cut out - I quite like the fact that the new guard has revealed the screwdriver marks from ham-fisted previous attempts to wrestle it into shape It goes with the general "would make a good weapon at a dodgy gig" feel 

ICBM

If it weighs less than a locomotive it probably wan't made after 1974 .

Bridgehouse

ICBM said:

If it weighs less than a locomotive it probably wan't made after 1974 .

When I picked it up out of the case for the first time (expecting pneumatic drill weight), I wondered if someone somewhere down the line had tried to weight relieve it and was expecting a secret hide-your-drugs-in-here compartment under the pick guard.. 

Turns out Fred the Wood Picker from Fender lifted up a plank off the rack sometime around 74 and must have thought 'Crikey that's lighter than usual, oh well, it'll do for a few Precisions"

ICBM

Bridgehouse said:

When I picked it up out of the case for the first time (expecting pneumatic drill weight), I wondered if someone somewhere down the line had tried to weight relieve it and was expecting a secret hide-your-drugs-in-here compartment under the pick guard..

I may have told you this before, but a chap I knew bought a '79 Anniversary Strat that weighed a nice, comfortable amount - like about 8lbs - and sounded good, in a sort of almost 'acoustic-like' way.

When we opened it up, it had been "routed" for three humbuckers and an MXR pedal circuit, by what looked like a trained beaver…

Luckily he hadn't paid too much for it.

Bridgehouse

ICBM said:

Bridgehouse said:

When I picked it up out of the case for the first time (expecting pneumatic drill weight), I wondered if someone somewhere down the line had tried to weight relieve it and was expecting a secret hide-your-drugs-in-here compartment under the pick guard..

I may have told you this before, but a chap I knew bought a '79 Anniversary Strat that weighed a nice, comfortable amount - like about 8lbs - and sounded good, in a sort of almost 'acoustic-like' way.

When we opened it up, it had been "routed" for three humbuckers and an MXR pedal circuit, by what looked like a trained beaver…

Luckily he hadn't paid too much for it.

Luckily no beaver activity present here.. Maybe fender did have some good wood back then. I have seen a few other early 70s jobs that were nice and light

DLM

Bridgehouse said:

ICBM said:

what looked like a trained beaver…

Luckily no beaver activity present here.

Mods! To SC with this filth!

Bridgehouse

I've had a good play with it this afternoon - got a busy few work weeks ahead so decided to spend some time with it.

Truss rod has settled now after shipping so another tweak to stabilise was required. Action seems settled at 4/64, with just a smidge more on the E and A at just under 5/64. 

Pup needed height adjustment to balance volume but I think that is due to putting TI flatwounds on. 

Really easy neck to play - frets are actually in great condition (and look original). Tone pot taper is a teensy bit on and off but it's fine and does that turned-down precision thump really well. Bridge saddles are more stable than I thought they would be with no squirm at all, but again that could be the low tension of the TIs 

Popped a teensy bit of graphite lube on the tuning keys as they were a bit stiff in places and it's smoothed them out nicely. 

All in all its a good natured proper old p bass with bags of character. Perfect.

There's a bit of me that fancies putting a hipshot xtender on the E for low D stuff - but I'm in two minds. What do you think?