4001 v63 JG 1995

“My High Flying Bird”
The story goes that the poor guy’s wife launched his bass out of a second floor window, and he took it to his local music shop in the USA to see what they could do. After some deliberation they put it on ebay for spares, and we bought it .

This was back in 2004. When it arrived, although the body and neck was in three pieces, it looked too good to break so over the next few months, between other work, we breathed new life into her.
Now she is a real beauty, fully restored, fully functional and sounding great.

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Description

First part of the restoration was putting the three pieces of body and neck back together and this was done using slow cure epoxy glue ensuring the pieces all lined up perfectly. After it had cured it was apparent that the process had be successful and the lady could be saved.
Surprisingly only a few slivers of wood had been lost in the ‘accident’ but a small amout of filling was necessary and this was the deciding factor that a change of colour from the original Fireglo was necessary to hide the repairs.
She was sanded and finished in nitrocellulose black followed by several coats of clear and finally compounded and then machine buffed to a glass like shine.

Using a Rickysounds pickguard, as the original had snapped, the electronics and all the original fittings were refitted. The only other part that had been broken was one keywind which was replaced.

The strap pins are now Rickenbacker straplock types instead of the vintage style which this model usually has, and this is because on its first outing, the strap came away from the rear strap pin and she dropped onto a stone floor . She landed on the jackplate and flattened one of the screw heads but this was the only damage, all the repairs held firm. Now she is one of my personal player basses and is often borrowed by people using our studio to put down some great sounding bass lines.