Hi brother bassists and Alembic lovers,
I received the Dean Jeff Berlin custom ( the feature of my previous thread to be or not to be ) two days ago and it arrived with, as expected issues.
This was fine by me as I had decided after years of paying luthiers to do my set-ups etc that I was going to give it a go myself (armed with my Dan Erlewine book!)
The bass was a ebay special and I bought it as it was cheap and I had never seen a JB model for sale in the UK before. I noticed stright away that the action was very high, the strings were heavy guage and that the neck was at a weird angle! It was also filthy. The previous owner had paid to have the original gold bad-ass 2 bridge and schaller tuners replaced with a black bad-ass 1 and black Gotoh tuners. Also, an EMG active onboard pre-amp had been added to the Bartolini pickups.
The previous owner actually included all of the original hardware with the sale..just as well as it turned out! For the first time in my life, I completely stripped the bass down into its componant parts - determined to get to the root of the neck issue and clean this baby up!
Off came the neck and right away I found the reason for the strange angle - two wooden shims at the body end of the neck cavity. On studying the parts I noticed that the black bad-ass 1 was very different in dimension from the original gold bad-ass 2..the strings were simply sitting much further away from the body and couldnt be lowered as much as the bad-ass 2 would allow! The shims were being used as a kind of extra adjustment...they had to go!
The obvious thing to do after this was to re-fit the original hardware, so off came the all of the black hardware (Bad-ass 1 & Gotoh's) and on went the gold plated Bad-ass 2 & Schallers!
The bass was then completely gutted. The filthy fingerboard and neck being treated to a lemon oil makeover and the body and hardware polished to a shine and the dull pickups polished with black boot polish(worked a treat!) The electrics were in good shape so left alone, all well and good so far!
Now for new strings. Next problem; The neck had too much relief! simple enough? afraid not. The truss nut appears to have been stripped by over enthusiastic use, my allen key has nothing to grip..Oh man! Another reason for the wooden shims? I think so. I removed the heavy strings and replaced them with lightweight 35 - 95's, adjusted the bridge, intonation and pickups and suddenly the action has went from awful high to an acceptable medium!
On plugging in the sound is surprisingly really sweet, the pre-amp and Bartolinis do a great job! All of a sudden after around three hours this guy is almost like a different instrument! It sounds great and plays very well!
I honestly believe that if I can replace the truss nut that I can get the neck relief sorted and have a super low action on this bass. I contacted Dean twice, but their attitude has been shocking. I have been informed that, as the JB model is handmade in the Czech republic and is now a discounted model that they dont have anything to do with them-END OF!
So there you have it. If you want a Dean bass they are delighted to deal with you if you have a bass made in a factory in Taiwan, but if its made in Europe you can kiss it!
Anyone out there got any ideas about the truss nut? Suggestions would be welcome!
Sorry to have rambled on here, but Im delighted that I have been able to do a nice set-up job on this bass and sort most of its problems by using my excellent guitar player repair guide book and some basic detective work!
I cant believe how easy the set-up was and I cant believe the ammount of money I have paid in the past for this type of service!
I think this bass is a winner
John.
