PSA Repair Shop, BBC1

Nitefly

hotpickups said:

I think I’ll just unstar this thread   

I wish I could!

Jimbro66

Nitefly said:

hotpickups said:

I think I’ll just unstar this thread   

I wish I could!

Don't take it too hard mate. If it wasn't for your heads-up many of us might have missed the programme so, thank you, I certainly enjoyed it. On a personal note it was also good to see Julyan having not seen him for about 10 years. Mind you, his charges might have gone up now that he has celeb status

SPECTRUM001

Definitely worth flagging - I just watched it (first one I have seen for a couple of years) because of this thread - so thankyou !

What I like : seeing interesting objects being repaired and/or restored. The craftspeople on the show seem to be experts in their respective fields, and appear to go the extra mile to offer high end work. And that is often the challenge - to find someone with the skills and time to work through a project sensitively.

What I don’t like : Jay frickin’ Blades. Honestly, he is so condescending to his colleagues and guests. He may not realise, but the way he talks (‘you worked hard on that one’, ‘isn’t she clever’ etc) is quite archaic.

As for the posh people with the sapphire ring ? I thought they were lovely, and don’t give two hoots whether they come from money. They are just human beings like anyone else, and are either good people or not - their background is irrelevant (certainly to me). They may well have struggled to find a Goldsmith prepared to take on the restoration - given the scale and risk, so it is entirely appropriate for them to utilise the show.

My two heirlooms ? They are lovely pieces of family history, a tragic but worthy story (even down to Mont Blanc’s cold refusal to help - interestingly, their ‘lifetime guarantee’ doesn’t cover anything beyond recent production) and probably an achievable repair - so quite possibly exactly what the show want. Aside from the fact that I am a grump, and can’t stand the shite, sickly sweet reality TVness of the thing !!!

I will speak to my niece though, as she is far more outward going, and may well like to apply...

Watch this space !

prowla

richardhomer said:

boogieman said:

Oh and for what it’s worth, I had a guitar worked on by David from Flame Guitars last year. He’s a very good luthier, who builds his own range of guitars from scratch as well as more regular work like set ups etc. If he shaved the neck on that Hot Chocolate bass then it obviously needed it. I doubt he’d do it for fun. 

I’ve thought about that repair a lot - in particular what other options might have been available.

Other than making a replacement neck, I’m not sure there were any - but I certainly wouldn’t be keen on having the neck shaved on a vintage instrument.

If the neck needed shaving, then so be it - it needed a repair and filling it wouldn't have worked; however, he erased all of the character from the instrument and then capped it off by putting on bridge and pickup covers.

For me it was a renovation not a restoration; whilst the workmanship may have been top-notch, the point (ie. it being a vintage instrument with a personal history) was missed.

I was genuinely shocked at the end-result.

boogieman

prowla said:

richardhomer said:

boogieman said:

Oh and for what it’s worth, I had a guitar worked on by David from Flame Guitars last year. He’s a very good luthier, who builds his own range of guitars from scratch as well as more regular work like set ups etc. If he shaved the neck on that Hot Chocolate bass then it obviously needed it. I doubt he’d do it for fun. 

I’ve thought about that repair a lot - in particular what other options might have been available.

Other than making a replacement neck, I’m not sure there were any - but I certainly wouldn’t be keen on having the neck shaved on a vintage instrument.

If the neck needed shaving, then so be it - it needed a repair and filling it wouldn't have worked; however, he erased all of the character from the instrument and then capped it off by putting on bridge and pickup covers.

For me it was a renovation not a restoration; whilst the workmanship may have been top-notch, the point (ie. it being a vintage instrument with a personal history) was missed.

I was genuinely shocked at the end-result.

I’m guessing the experts don’t do any work without a consultation with the clients first.  

OilCityPickups

Rich210 said:

I mean who can be arsed to work on hofners anyway in the real world. Even the best don't touch them

let's see ... we rewind perhaps 20 sets of old Hofner pickups a year, many of these for luthiers doing restorations, many more for owners who love old instruments. We also live in the real world last time of checking. 

Philly_Q

boogieman said:

prowla said:

richardhomer said:

boogieman said:

Oh and for what it’s worth, I had a guitar worked on by David from Flame Guitars last year. He’s a very good luthier, who builds his own range of guitars from scratch as well as more regular work like set ups etc. If he shaved the neck on that Hot Chocolate bass then it obviously needed it. I doubt he’d do it for fun. 

I’ve thought about that repair a lot - in particular what other options might have been available.

Other than making a replacement neck, I’m not sure there were any - but I certainly wouldn’t be keen on having the neck shaved on a vintage instrument.

If the neck needed shaving, then so be it - it needed a repair and filling it wouldn't have worked; however, he erased all of the character from the instrument and then capped it off by putting on bridge and pickup covers.

For me it was a renovation not a restoration; whilst the workmanship may have been top-notch, the point (ie. it being a vintage instrument with a personal history) was missed.

I was genuinely shocked at the end-result.

I’m guessing the experts don’t do any work without a consultation with the clients first.  

As presented in the programme I did the feel the work done was more than a bit inappropriate, but as you say, they must have discussed it with the clients first.

There was also the aspect that they were restoring the bass primarily as an heirloom for the guy's widow and son.  They added some guff about the young man wanting to play it, but really it belongs on a wall - if he wants to play bass he's probably already got his own instruments at his age.

boogieman

Philly_Q said:

boogieman said:

prowla said:

richardhomer said:

boogieman said:

Oh and for what it’s worth, I had a guitar worked on by David from Flame Guitars last year. He’s a very good luthier, who builds his own range of guitars from scratch as well as more regular work like set ups etc. If he shaved the neck on that Hot Chocolate bass then it obviously needed it. I doubt he’d do it for fun. 

I’ve thought about that repair a lot - in particular what other options might have been available.

Other than making a replacement neck, I’m not sure there were any - but I certainly wouldn’t be keen on having the neck shaved on a vintage instrument.

If the neck needed shaving, then so be it - it needed a repair and filling it wouldn't have worked; however, he erased all of the character from the instrument and then capped it off by putting on bridge and pickup covers.

For me it was a renovation not a restoration; whilst the workmanship may have been top-notch, the point (ie. it being a vintage instrument with a personal history) was missed.

I was genuinely shocked at the end-result.

I’m guessing the experts don’t do any work without a consultation with the clients first.  

As presented in the programme I did the feel the work done was more than a bit inappropriate, but as you say, they must have discussed it with the clients first.

There was also the aspect that they were restoring the bass primarily as an heirloom for the guy's widow and son.  They added some guff about the young man wanting to play it, but really it belongs on a wall - if he wants to play bass he's probably already got his own instruments at his age.

I do wonder if it’s only us guitarists that get worried about it keeping its originality? The program has restored plenty of other things to as-new condition, why should that bass be any different? I doubt they’ll ever sell it, so they probably aren’t worried about devaluing it by over restoring it. I agree about the son wanting to play it being nothing but guff, that smacks of something the producer came up with. 

thegummy

boogieman said:

I do wonder if it’s only us guitarists that get worried about it keeping its originality? The program has restored plenty of other things to as-new condition, why should that bass be any different? I doubt they’ll ever sell it, so they probably aren’t worried about devaluing it by over restoring it. I agree about the son wanting to play it being nothing but guff, that smacks of something the producer came up with. 

I'll never understand those vintage guitar guys who will pay through nose for a vintage resistor, for example, to replace a damaged one.

That's just crazy to me.

Jimbro66

Old Hofners have had more than their fair share of disparaging remarks but back in the late 1950s they would have been some of the most desirable instruments available to British guitarists. The British government's import ban on American guitars meant that the Gibsons, Fenders, Gretsches and Guilds seen in rock & roll films and musical press photos were just a dream. The nearest thing to Eddie Cochran's Gretsch would have been a Hofner president or maybe a Grimshaw SS Deluxe. The President cost around £60 in 1959 which put it way beyond the reach of most young players so their best options were the Hofner 2-pickup Club 60 (about £40) and 1-pickup Club 40 (about £35). Both still a lot of money at that time. Anyone who fancied Buddy Holly's Strat was out of luck and would have had to settle for a Futurama.

Although the import ban ended in June 1959 it took a while for American guitars to trickle into Britain and they were hugely expensive. Stanley Lewis in Edgware Road, London was one of the first dealers of Gibson Guitars and I have a copy of their 1959/60 catalogue. Les Paul Standard £120, ES-335 £130, ES-175 £140 and an L-5 a whopping £255. All a small fortune in those days  -  and the prices didn't include a case! A Club 60 was a bargain by comparison.

A Club 60 like the one restored in The Repair Shop was about the best any young players could hope for in 1958-59 unless they had fairly well off parents to make a Hofner President possible. Yes, there were other brands available from Italy, Czechoslovakia, Japan, etc but most were piss poor. So it's hardly surprising that the guy who took one into The Repair Shop was really proud that he'd had it from new. 62 years ago he would have been the envy of his mates.

As regards necks, the Hofner ones do have a tendency to separate from the body but, as Julyan showed, they are fairly straightforward to put back. On the other hand we all know what can happen to Gibsons when they fall over and that's not a particularly easy or cheap repair!

prowla

Jimbro66 said:

Although the import ban ended in June 1959 it took a while for American guitars to trickle into Britain and they were hugely expensive. Stanley Lewis in Edgware Road, London was one of the first dealers of Gibson Guitars and I have a copy of their 1959/60 catalogue. Les Paul Standard £120, ES-335 £130, ES-175 £140 and an L-5 a whopping £255. All a small fortune in those days  -  and the prices didn't include a case! A Club 60 was a bargain by comparison.

That's interesting - I guess that's another contributor to the Les Paul '59 cachet, discussed in another thread.

NelsonP

£120 in 1959 is £2,855 in today's money.
Les Paul Standards are cheap these days!

SPECTRUM001

NelsonP said:

£120 in 1959 is £2,855 in today's money.
Les Paul Standards are cheap these days!

Yes indeed - we currently have great value equipment available.

thegummy

NelsonP said:

£120 in 1959 is £2,855 in today's money.
Les Paul Standards are cheap these days!

To look at it the other way, a Squier Classic Vibe is £14 in 1959 money and I assume would be much better than any Hofner available at the time.

We definitely have it good these days.

Kind of sad to think how many people would have been completely excluded from having a guitar back then.

downbytheriver

Is anyone going to mention the non-matching pickups? 

Jimbro66

downbytheriver said:

Is anyone going to mention the non-matching pickups? 

The bridge was the original and the neck a very slightly later Hofner type. The guy said at the start that he'd made modifications to the guitar but didn't clarify why he'd changed that pickup.

thegummy

Jimbro66 said:

downbytheriver said:

Is anyone going to mention the non-matching pickups? 

The bridge was the original and the neck a very slightly later Hofner type. The guy said at the start that he'd made modifications to the guitar but didn't clarify why he'd changed that pickup.

He added a Dimarzio Super Distortion in the 80s

WezV

I don't think its really disparaging to acknowledge old hofners can have issues, just a fact.

I'm rather fond of them, but they have issues any potential owner should know about.

Necks will come loose, bodies can seperate, especially on the verithins,  pickups are prone to failure.


I have an old committe body and verithin bass neck I keep meaning to make into something.... must dig them out 

UnclePsychosis

hotpickups said:

crunchman said:

thegummy said:

Rich210 said:

What I'm not joking. Like you all say you can't believe anything made by the BBC. 

Now you're onto something though. He could of just found a minty and got the pledge out. That makes more sense to me. I mean who can be arsed to work on hofners anyway in the real world. Even the best don't touch them

The guy who fixes the guitars is a member of this forum.

Which one?

They have had two.  The guy from Flame Guitars is a member here, although he was last active in March 2020.  Some people were quite abusive about him shaving the neck on the Jazz bass.  It wasn't shown on the TV, but he did say in the thread on here that there was damage, and he had to do it else you could get splinters from it.  Whether that was right or wrong, the way some people on here reacted was totally over the top.  A lot of good people have got fed up and stopped posting because of that element on here.

The one this week was someone different though.

Everyone’s a critic it seems nowadays.  

The younger generation seems to take joy out of destroying people. You should hear my two sons attack people on TV when they have absolutely no life experience, compassion or knowledge on the subject. Just spout shite from their mates social media pages 

The ironic thing here is that this forum is full of middle aged men rather than youngsters and yet there's still plenty of us seemingly still furious about a light entertainment show. I'm not convinced youth has much to do with anything. 

Rich210

UnclePsychosis said:

hotpickups said:

crunchman said:

thegummy said:

Rich210 said:

What I'm not joking. Like you all say you can't believe anything made by the BBC. 

Now you're onto something though. He could of just found a minty and got the pledge out. That makes more sense to me. I mean who can be arsed to work on hofners anyway in the real world. Even the best don't touch them

The guy who fixes the guitars is a member of this forum.

Which one?

They have had two.  The guy from Flame Guitars is a member here, although he was last active in March 2020.  Some people were quite abusive about him shaving the neck on the Jazz bass.  It wasn't shown on the TV, but he did say in the thread on here that there was damage, and he had to do it else you could get splinters from it.  Whether that was right or wrong, the way some people on here reacted was totally over the top.  A lot of good people have got fed up and stopped posting because of that element on here.

The one this week was someone different though.

Everyone’s a critic it seems nowadays.  

The younger generation seems to take joy out of destroying people. You should hear my two sons attack people on TV when they have absolutely no life experience, compassion or knowledge on the subject. Just spout shite from their mates social media pages 

The ironic thing here is that this forum is full of middle aged men rather than youngsters and yet there's still plenty of us seemingly still furious about a light entertainment show. I'm not convinced youth has much to do with anything. 

Hiya feel, like I need to apologise again as I've been quoted. I did a parody on the trolls! Love the show and much respect to people working on it.