The Ten Million Dollar Bridge

http://store.hipshotproducts.com/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=353

OK....it's a joke, really. Hipshot is going to start selling their new headless bass bridge soon, but their website indicates that they do not have pricing set yet. I imagine that they threw the high price in as a joke.

But here's what catches my attention. You Guys all know how John Gallagher of Raven had his custom bass trem produced by attaching a stock bridge to a tremolo unit, right? It's not that hard to do....so use your imaginations a bit here. Imagine engineering a bass toplock, and using this new Hipshot bridge attached to a rippin' tremolo unit.

Of course, if one did not want to do the extra work, there is always the Bach Musik bass trem:

http://www.bachmusik.com/en/mtb-4-st-bass-tremolo_p1075

So what's the goal here, you might ask? "After all Eric, we have our Kahlers and Hipshots already, right?" True. But these are non-locking systems. I'm still after the ultimate system: a fully locking bass tremolo. And the small size of the Bach Musik fine tuners has me concerned, especially since I had that old Floyd ripoff bass trem that had fine tuners, and it took the jaws of life to be able to turn the bloody things due to the high tension. My thought is that this new Hipshot unit might have a fine tuning system that is easier to use.

This is why I still hold out hope to get a Steinberger TransTrem for bass one day, because if I did, that thing would go into a standard bass (yes....a Yamaha BB300), and I would go to some awesome machinist to have a bass toplock built. Andy says he can do it, but it's still a matter of his time (which is basically non-existent these days), as well as the cost of materials.

Anyways....food for thought.

Awright....I sent Hipshot an email to try and and encourage them to explore the possiblity of attaching their headless bass bridge to a tremolo.

Keep your fingers crossed, Kiddies.

egging them on ... decent eric.

i love doing custom work and i love the results ... just about everything mass produced seems to come up short with one thing or another. i just believe that one thing may not be suitable for another (me) so if i cant get it, i'll just build it.

but its always easier if you can get hipshot / kahler / carvin / warmoth / etc to build it.

i shud get a job in research and development with one of them.

i'm frustrated with the custom stuff right now. i just cant get materials. or ... i can get materials but i can only buy it if i but 10 tons of it. ... my gripe is in the custom cabinet thread ... maybe someone can give me some direction.

That's interesting, man! How are you going to be able to install that on a normal bass body? Are you going to do a bunch of routing to make it sit in the body like a Floyd or are you going to do something to the shape of the body like this guitar?

Probably something close to that Martin, although I think I can do so without having to route a huge open spot all the way through the bottom of the body.

omg ... winger.

furreal?

Fur shure!

I just remembered seeing that guitar in those catalogs, but I had no clue whose signature it was. So...yeah.

thats ok boots. we know.

not that theres anything wrong with being a winger fan.

remember bevis and buttheads friend trying to be cool wearing a winger t-shirt?

dork.

I actually like a lot of Winger tunes, and everyone in the band are all amazing musicians.

hey now ... i didnt say they were bad.

i just said ... winger.

now heres some criticisim ..........

have only seen them on some videos ... and it always seems like kip is more into dancing around with his bass than playing it.

Oh, definitely. In the videos, it was all about prancing about looking pretty. It was the 80's after all! But I have also seen live footage of the band, and I can assure you that Kip Winger is an extremely competent bass player. Reb Beach is, of course, Reb Beach. And nothing needs to be said about Rod Morganstein, although I never quite understood what made him go from such an intensely progressive group as The Dregs to something as poppy as Winger.

A guitarplayer friend of mine who also jammed in my garage knows Reb personally, and had a few of his old "leftover guitars" always bragging about how much he bought the guitar for and how rare they were...

until the poor soul lost his job and had to sell off ALL the Beach guitars to pay for his bills....

Yep....everybody knows somebody!

Andy sells Zakk Wylde's guitars....after he builds each one, that is!

Speaking of, remember that awesome aluminum V-looking demon guitar Andy built for Zakk for the movie Rockstar?:

http://www.blacklabelsociety.net/gear/rockstar/demonv1.jpg

I found out that it was stolen from Zakk only a few months after the movie was made! Somebody out there made a killing on that steal!

Notice Andy's name in the copyright? And that case was also hand-made by Andy for the guitar.

maybe he would remember my friends name. Dan Newman, and if so yep...small world. Dan used to live in PA, and jam with a couple bands here, now in Ohio..etc.etc...

I'll ask Andy if he knows Dan. Did he also work with Zakk?

EricHaven wrote:

I'll ask Andy if he knows Dan. Did he also work with Zakk?

probably so, but Reb's name was prevalent in all conversations as soon as he took out the guitars...lol

but he never said anything about Zakk that I can remember.

Dan was just another guitarist with the "if it belonged to so and so", it has to be the finest guitar on the planet schtick....

how the hell are you guys all so connected? i suppose it's the tasmania syndrome, there's nothing here to get connected to...

It's something in the water.

Seriously, it's all about getting out there and meeting people. Make a lot of introductions, get your name out there, play everywhere that you can, and don't let up. The more you widen your pool of resources, the more likely you will eventually run into someone who knows someone. It takes time and effort, but if you're already gigging, then it's just the next step, really.

You Guys know how I met John Gallagher? I found the Raven website, and I sent a message explaining who I was, what I was doing, and I asked if there was a way to get a message to John. The webmaster gave me his email address, I sent John a greeting, and we started talking about bass trems, distortion use, and metal in general. I've known John now for about five years.

Meeting Andy was simply the result of moving here to Washington, and getting into the local scene.

Andy and his wife used to live down in Hollywood where she worked for A&M Records. Zakk Wylde's wife also worked for A&M, and the two became good friends. When Andy's wife heard that Zakk was looking for an ace guitar tech, she mentioned Andy. That was back in 1990, and Andy found himself touring the world with Zakk and Ozzy for the next few years. Andy and Zakk have been good friends ever since.

Those are my stories.

madmike wrote:

hey now ... i didnt say they were bad.

i just said ... winger.

now heres some criticisim ..........

have only seen them on some videos ... and it always seems like kip is more into dancing around with his bass than playing it.

He had some really cool basses. He had a Jackson signature and I think he was with Hamer for a little while?

Possibly even a Spectre or two.

Man, sounds like a party...

i'm actually debating over purchasing a jackson kip winger signature that came up in australia, it's all frikkin lacewood .

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Jackson-Professional-Kip-Winger-Active-Bass-Guitar_W0QQitemZ120443373790QQcmdZViewItemQQptZAU_Musical_Instruments_Instruments?hash=item1c0afc08de#ht_500wt_956

Drool...those things are awesome, man.

tekkentool wrote:

i'm actually debating over purchasing a jackson kip winger signature that came up in australia, it's all frikkin lacewood .

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Jackson-Professional-Kip-Winger-Active-Bass-Guitar_W0QQitemZ120443373790QQcmdZViewItemQQptZAU_Musical_Instruments_Instruments?hash=item1c0afc08de#ht_500wt_956

Jackson. All Lacewood. $600.

What is there to debate here?

Kugelspot wrote:

tekkentool wrote:

i'm actually debating over purchasing a jackson kip winger signature that came up in australia, it's all frikkin lacewood .

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Jackson-Professional-Kip-Winger-Active-Bass-Guitar_W0QQitemZ120443373790QQcmdZViewItemQQptZAU_Musical_Instruments_Instruments?hash=item1c0afc08de#ht_500wt_956

Jackson. All Lacewood. $600.

What is there to debate here?

i have exactly 600 and might want to replace the pups. also at this point i don't have a decent bass amplifier or hardware pre.

tekkentool wrote:

Kugelspot wrote:

tekkentool wrote:

i'm actually debating over purchasing a jackson kip winger signature that came up in australia, it's all frikkin lacewood .

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Jackson-Professional-Kip-Winger-Active-Bass-Guitar_W0QQitemZ120443373790QQcmdZViewItemQQptZAU_Musical_Instruments_Instruments?hash=item1c0afc08de#ht_500wt_956

Jackson. All Lacewood. $600.

What is there to debate here?

i have exactly 600 and might want to replace the pups. also at this point i don't have a decent bass amplifier or hardware pre.

IDK man. Do what you want, but you won't have this opportunity for a very, very long time if you pass this up. You can get an amp or replacement pickups anytime.

I suppose you're right g-spot.

sigh.....

let the jackson expert say a couple words....

600 for a passive p/j winger?...I'd never do it. Despite what the ad says, only the 2 humbucker model with 4 knobs has the preamp in it.

600 for YOU is ok down there considering how much your prices are for units, and the lacewood is unique no disputing that. I would assume that another jackson that is rare would be 1000 so you could take a bid on it.

BEST OFFER HIM 500 and see what happens

amimbari wrote:

BEST OFFER HIM 500 and see what happens

Good idea

All of a sudden, I'm picturing Mike/Amimbari as William Shatner, and the theme song for Priceline.com is playing in my head.

"Priceline negotiator!"



As for the bass, well....I'm no Jackson authority, as that is definitely Mike's territory. But let's see here....$600 Australian dollars is about $555 USD. Hmmm....the bass is a nice one, but I think more so about it's construction instead of it being a Kip Winger model.

HOLD THE PHONE GANG....the ad says "local pickup only". Now TK, you're in Tasmania, right? If I do my math correctly, you are located about 600 miles away from the seller. So in addition to dropping all of your money on the bass, are you also going to spring for a plane ticket?

I think YOU mis-read it Eric:

Comes with soft case. Please phone or message for postal rates. Ph 02 95571634.

so it does look like the guy will ship it.

and it has 4 offers already so who knows...and 555.00 is 100 too high for us here in the states, but over there???

I overpaid for my Concert-V by about 100 bucks, but you know what...I wanted it

the bass itself as a "KipWinger" is eh..... but for what it is made of, yes it is not as rare as the 4 knob unit, but still....

here's my friend Andre's Winger....

Ah, I overlooked that portion of the description. The part I'm referring to is in the Other Item Info section that reads: Posts to: local pickup only. Kind of conflicting information there. If the guy is willing to ship, he needs to say so in the whole ad, and not just part of it. But no matter.

And back on topic, I heard back from Hipshot regarding their new headless bass bridge system. I had also tried suggesting they might want to slap one onto a tremolo bridge. Here is what they said:

Hi Eric,

Thank you for your e-mail. The headless system is now available. The retail price is $350. I can hook you up for $175.00. I also think you would love our bass tremolo system. If I can be of any assistance in the future please contact me and I will set you up.

Best Regards,
Jason Ungleich
800-262-5630

Which I think, when roughly translated. means something along the lines of "So buy one 'cause they're cheap, and we've already got a bass tremolo system, you nimrod!"

yeah i noticed it was pickup only, but my sister goes to university about 3 blocks away fromt hat location, so i can just get her to ship it
i suppose compared to the price of basses in australia (900 for a classic vibe p-bass) it's a pretty good deal. But i'm still not so sure, if i was willing to spend a bit more and get an EMG PJ system and pre i'm certain it would be an excellent bass, but i dunno if i'm up for spending again quite so soon (just bought a guitar). Fark, i hate hard decisions.

tekkentool wrote:

yeah i noticed it was pickup only, but my sister goes to university about 3 blocks away fromt hat location, so i can just get her to ship it
i suppose compared to the price of basses in australia (900 for a classic vibe p-bass) it's a pretty good deal. But i'm still not so sure, if i was willing to spend a bit more and get an EMG PJ system and pre i'm certain it would be an excellent bass, but i dunno if i'm up for spending again quite so soon (just bought a guitar). Fark, i hate hard decisions.

Dude, like I said, just buy it and get any mods you need once you have the money.

Kugelspot wrote:

tekkentool wrote:

yeah i noticed it was pickup only, but my sister goes to university about 3 blocks away fromt hat location, so i can just get her to ship it
i suppose compared to the price of basses in australia (900 for a classic vibe p-bass) it's a pretty good deal. But i'm still not so sure, if i was willing to spend a bit more and get an EMG PJ system and pre i'm certain it would be an excellent bass, but i dunno if i'm up for spending again quite so soon (just bought a guitar). Fark, i hate hard decisions.

Dude, like I said, just buy it and get any mods you need once you have the money.

aight, i'll best offer his arse 500 and see how it goes.

That bass would be sick with EMGs.

Chowderboots wrote:

That bass would be sick with EMGs.

oh hell yeah, while we're on the subject. does anybody know the difference in tone between the EMG Pj and the PJX set ?

tekkentool wrote:

Chowderboots wrote:

That bass would be sick with EMGs.

oh hell yeah, while we're on the subject. does anybody know the difference in tone between the EMG Pj and the PJX set ?

It's supposed to have more headroom. Other than that, I have no idea.

Hmm, intersting stuff, looks like a sweet headless setup, and shouldn't take a sever amount of r&d for them to convert it to a trem...

Kugelspot wrote:

tekkentool wrote:

Chowderboots wrote:

That bass would be sick with EMGs.

oh hell yeah, while we're on the subject. does anybody know the difference in tone between the EMG Pj and the PJX set ?

It's supposed to have more headroom. Other than that, I have no idea.

Yeah, more headroom, less compression, in other words, less EMG "sterile"(tell me a Spector sounds sterile, see what happens... ) modern sound, more full range & vintage sound.

Basically, more mids, I would expect...

hey TEKK, did you B.O that guy with the KipWinger today I STILL only see 4 offers from yesterday...

you get 5 tries at a b.o. before ebay will lock you out from offering on the ad...start at 400 and work your way up.

REMEMBER 5 b.o. tries then your done.... HOTELS.COM and William Shatner? = me? not on your life ( But I do wish I had Shatners fame and fortune for the past 50 years )

Darkstrike wrote:

(tell me a Spector sounds sterile, see what happens... )

Though I have been toying with the idea of replacing the stock pups (EMG-J's) in mine with EMG-JX's

hey Kugl, is your emg setup the EMG or EMG-BTC?

the difference is with the BTC package, you get the separate bass/treb/vol/blend - 4 knobs
the other version is VVT- and VVT/blend
or is yours the splitshaft bass/treb and the other 2 are vol. and blend? - 3 knobs

Kugelspot wrote:

Darkstrike wrote:

(tell me a Spector sounds sterile, see what happens... )

Though I have been toying with the idea of replacing the stock pups (EMG-J's) in mine with EMG-JX's

Wouldn't bother, TBQH.

amimbari wrote:

hey Kugl, is your emg setup the EMG or EMG-BTC?

the difference is with the BTC package, you get the separate bass/treb/vol/blend - 4 knobs
the other version is VVT- and VVT/blend
or is yours the splitshaft bass/treb and the other 2 are vol. and blend? - 3 knobs

Neither. It's an Aguilar OBP-3. It's got 2 vol., a concentric bass/treble knob, and a mids knob with a push-pull switch to change between high mids and low mids. I'm really liking it. I just wish it was a full 4 band eq with seperate controls for high and low mids.

Darkstrike wrote:

Kugelspot wrote:

Darkstrike wrote:

(tell me a Spector sounds sterile, see what happens... )

Though I have been toying with the idea of replacing the stock pups (EMG-J's) in mine with EMG-JX's

Wouldn't bother, TBQH.

Like I said, I've been toying with the idea, but not considering it too seriously. If the difference is only subtle, I won't bother. Even if it makes a significant difference, I'd probably not bother anyway.

It probably ain't something you couldn't do with that OBP-3, I'd say, the just sound a little bit more like regular J pickups, if I'm remembering correctly, its been a while since I heard them though.

It certaintly ain't gonna be night and day.

More developments with the Hipshot bass bridge.

I have been talking with Jason from Hipshot, and:

Hi Eric,

The $175 price is only for you. Normal retail is $350. I offer this price to builders and people in the industry. Your locking project would be something that we will look at in the future. Do you have any drawings or specs that you have in the works?

Best Regards,

Jason

My reply:

Hi Jason,

Thank you for the special price, and I will be picking up one soon to do some experiments. Obviously, this is not something I would re-sell or capitalize upon in any way, but would be for my own personal use. I just want to make it clear that my intentions are for my own playing, and not to plagiarize Hipshot for any profit in any way.

As far as design ideas and/or drawings, I only have some concepts in my head that would be built upon existing technology. But the idea would be to take, say, your bridge with the fine tuners, and attach it to a fulcrum-style tremolo block system such as your current bass tremolo has. The other piece of the puzzle will be once I produce a toplock. This will likely be machined from brass, and use clamps and allen screws such as a Floyd Rose has.

Let me reiterate that, as someone who has used bass tremolos since 1984, and also as the moderator of a bass tremolo forum, I can tell you that one of the biggest problems in getting bass players to invest in a tremolo is the tuning issue. I spent years perfecting my techniques to be able to keep my Kahlers in tune, and I am successful for the most part. But not only do I want to have the added security of a locking system, I also want the added range that a locking system will provide. We have done many tests over the years that proves definitively that a locking tremolo has a much farther range of pitch change than a non-locking system does. I have had countless discussions with other bass players who would like to invest in a bass tremolo system, but only if they had the tuning stability and range of motion that a locking system can provide. As long as the system was priced competitively, there is little doubt in my mind that the first company to come up with a complete and fully locking bass tremolo system would quickly run away with the market.

I look forward to hopefully working with you soon.

Best regards,

Eric Haven

I think that will get them to think a lot!

I'd jump on the gravy train for an always in tune bass trem.

I suck at reading long things, add, ect... its not a trem system is it?