So, as some of you know I bought my first bass a little over a month ago, a mid 90’s Korean Squier Jazz, it was comfy, had a few dings and was in kinda rough shape so I figured I’d take a plunge and do some work on it myself, if it went boobies up, whatever it wasn’t expensive and it’s be a learning experience.
So when it arrived, first thing I noticed was the control plate was really badly off centre, someone mentioned it might be a previous owner fitting an upgrade, but taking it apart there were no extra holes, weird but nothing too scary, so I replaced the white pickguard for black and realigned the control plate (tip, DON’T buy cheap amazon pickguards, I had to recut the pickup hole to fit the thing) tuners are okay, nothing to write home about so they might get swapped eventually (suggestions welcome) the other thing that was annoying was the bridge, seemed like the saddles were shot, so I ended up buying a replacement bridge (overkill probably but it was cheap) so instead of the vintage example I threw on a fender high mass, good lord this things stable, and it sustains like a mother.
I couldn’t get on board with the Strat knobs it came with so I got some knobs from mim bass my friend trashed, entirely cosmetic but I feel looks way better, anyway here’s the results of my labour, before and after,
Just my opinion but I feel it looks a million times better, that bridge is gorgeous. Like it looks half desirable now.
I’m not done with the mods yet, pickups on it are kinda weak so I’m researching different models, that’ll be my next likely, possibly fender CS or toneriders if I’m cheaping out. But yeah, what’s your opinions? I’m genuinely interested, and if you have any other tips I’m all ears, my aim from the start has been just to make it an all round nicer instrument functionally
So when it arrived, first thing I noticed was the control plate was really badly off centre, someone mentioned it might be a previous owner fitting an upgrade, but taking it apart there were no extra holes, weird but nothing too scary, so I replaced the white pickguard for black and realigned the control plate (tip, DON’T buy cheap amazon pickguards, I had to recut the pickup hole to fit the thing) tuners are okay, nothing to write home about so they might get swapped eventually (suggestions welcome) the other thing that was annoying was the bridge, seemed like the saddles were shot, so I ended up buying a replacement bridge (overkill probably but it was cheap) so instead of the vintage example I threw on a fender high mass, good lord this things stable, and it sustains like a mother.
I couldn’t get on board with the Strat knobs it came with so I got some knobs from mim bass my friend trashed, entirely cosmetic but I feel looks way better, anyway here’s the results of my labour, before and after,
Just my opinion but I feel it looks a million times better, that bridge is gorgeous. Like it looks half desirable now.
I’m not done with the mods yet, pickups on it are kinda weak so I’m researching different models, that’ll be my next likely, possibly fender CS or toneriders if I’m cheaping out. But yeah, what’s your opinions? I’m genuinely interested, and if you have any other tips I’m all ears, my aim from the start has been just to make it an all round nicer instrument functionally
