bbl wrote:
A Fender neck with a rosewood board and a skunk stripe is not at all unusual.
In 1973, it would have been very unusual. As were Fender bass maple necks with maple cap fingerboards. They exist, but they're not the norm. Remember, I bought my first Fender Precision bass, in 1973. I'm not sure anyone else on this forum can make the same claim. It was black, one piece maple neck, and a left handed case. ALL 10% upcharges- custom color, lefty, maple neck, and lh case. And it was $321.00 (!) out the door, from Sam Ash Music, on w, 48th. St. in Manhattan. I was 21, and thrilled to finally get a real lefty Fender bass.
Modern era Mexican made Fender necks with rosewood boards have a skunk stripe.
The rosewood board on that neck is VERY thin. It may have been thinned out too much during refret prep, or it was just a thin added veneer board by a luthier, or Fender, to fill an order...hard to say what happened there. As a 40+ year tech, that knows these basses as well as any luthier could... from experience, what I will say here is true, but might not be popular. I wish people would stop spending tons of money on PROBLEMS, just because these instruments have "Mojo" or some arbitrary collector value. These basses in many cases are good instruments that play well. In other cases, there are 'S' curves, maxed out truss rods, stripped adjuster nuts, nasty areas of urethane finish chipping, lousy nut spacing, badly machined sloppy neck joints, and just uncomfortably chunky necks. And I love chunky necks. But not the uncomfortable ones. Fender bass connoisseurs will know what I'm talking about here.
The modern American series Fender basses are, mechanically, the best basses Fender has ever made, in my opinion. Buy one and keep playing it until your teeth fall out. Then. pass it on to another deserving lefty bassist. LOL!
