Fender American Special line

[cassius987]

I don't know much about these instruments other than they are no-frills and MIA. I played the Precision from this line the other day at Guitar Center... stood up VERY well to some MusicMans, Epiphones, and other Fenders. The tone was bright and snappy with a good bottom end, as you'd expect of a top-notch Precision. In fact the only other bass I enjoyed as much was a Road Worn P. The other American and Mexican basses weren't doing it for me, and neither, I am sad to say, were the Stingray Classics I was excited to try out. I didn't sample all of the MusicMan fare as most of it had 1.5'' nuts and that's so small it causes my left hand to cramp.

For ~$1,000, these would make a good way to bring a solid Fender into your collection. The only concern I have is they don't appear to have graphite rods in the neck like the pricier Americans, but this one had a flat neck and good action.

[sloop_john_b]

Looks like a nice piece, but I really do feel like you can piece together a much nicer P for like, half the price, with nicer pickups and hardware. My home-assembled P is an absolutely killer bass. The only P I would splurge on is a vintage one.

[cassius987]

I'd love to see (and hear) more about your homemade Precision John, as I have been wanting to do something like that for a long time but not sure if I wouldn't get carried away with the budget. I was thinking it would cost a minimum of around $700 to do what I wanted using Fender-licensed parts.

[sloop_john_b]

Oh man, well, it ain't pretty to look at! But I would be happy to describe it:

My first instrument ever was a P copy made by "Premier". It served me well for a while, then collected dust for years. I was never able to hold onto a P bass for very long, and there was no way I was going to sell my first instrument, so I decided to make something useful out of it, and I would have a P bass that would be a keeper no matter what!

I stripped the body of its thick black paint, got myself a big fat/wide Warmoth quartersawn maple neck, a BAII bridge, Hipshot Ultralite tuners, and a tortoise pickguard from All Parts. I happened to have a set of Duncan Quarter Pound P pickups from a previous project which I used.

I painted the body Shell Pink, but after wards decided I wasn't crazy about it and stripped it off, half-assed. So now, I have a really rough looking bass, with remnants of pink paint and visible bondo (which I had to use after winding up with some gouges while stripping off the paint - I'm a hack hobbyist).

That all being said, it sounds phenomenal and after lots of tweaking, plays like a dream as well. The big fat bridge really helped to focus the tone, and the pickups sound really good too. The neck is way wider then I'm used to, but I'm getting used to it - this bass has actually replaced my Classic Stingray for my last few gigs, the first time in about a year I've gigged with a different bass (and I play 1-2 times a week).

Here's a quick cell pic for ya:

[cassius987]

That's cool John. A good P Bass should probably be in every player's stable... or at least I think so. I am going to try to put one together using Warmoth parts and maybe do it in the style of the '72 "thinline" look.

[antipodean]

As an alternative to all that work, you could look at a pre-loved MIJ/CIJ '57 or '62 RI P-bass for $700-900 including shipping...

[cassius987]

As an alternative to all that work, you could look at a pre-loved MIJ/CIJ '57 or '62 RI P-bass for $700-900 including shipping...

I am all for taking advantage of a great used market but something about putting the bass together myself really appeals to me. At this stage I think I have the skill set to do >90% of the work without help. The other thing I have in mind is all of the weird little tweaks to the design I could really only do by going "custom" from parts.

[marc61]

I tried the American Special P Bass too. I rather liked it. Not sure why, but I don't dig string through bodies.

I'd like to get a Pbass with a 7.25 radius (62 reissue, 70s) sim yeah I'd piece together something with that neck, and even a Mex body

[whojamfan]

Nice job John, bet it sounds great!