Summer Fun: S.D. Curlee Restoration

[dadagoboi]

Thanks to Pilgrim I bought this about a month ago.  It's a great sounding bass and I can imagine it looked pretty spiffy when new, the body is a nice piece of Honduras Mahogany.  Unfortunately this one has been abused.  IMO this is not normal wear.  So time for a refin and fixing some playability problems



Heavy wear on front of body around the DiMarzio, about 3/32" will have to be removed to get it flat


Back isn't too bad, the brass is in good shape and no deep buckle rash.


Fretboard is a mess but little actual wear to the maple and frets are close to new


Sanded the back of the neck with some 180 to see what I'm dealing with.  It smelled like the sweat socks in my 9th grade gym locker after a week of P.E. in Miami's September heat.


First step will be stripping the body...easy, right?

[Dave W]

First step will be stripping the body...easy, right?

Yeah, right. 

Any idea what the finish was?

[godofthunder]

I love those basses! Looks great Carlo.

[Denis]

Cool!

The wear and finish deterioration is very similiar to that on the Curlee bass I picked up for Hornisse. Somewhere I recently read that the finish on Curlee's basses, especially the earlier ones, was rather thin and deteriorated quickly. Looks like that may be true!

And yeah, these things sound great!

[dadagoboi]

Yeah, right. 

Any idea what the finish was?

Definitely NOT nitrocellulose, I think it was varnish.  Took a lot of paint stripper and steel wool to remove it, turned gummy instead of loosening in big patches.  This is the back after stripping.  I used straight lacquer thinner and terry cloth on the front of the neck then sanded with 220 and hit the dark spots with household bleach.  I'll use toner to blend it


This bass is #2000 or so, it's amazing they were still drawing lines for mortises.  All the brass was still being drilled instead of punched. I think headstock logo is a woodburning stamp.  That's the trussrod anchor under the nut slot.



The front after being block sanded by hand with 60 grit.  I jointed the back of the neck heel until it was level with thinner body.  Took off about 3/32" total.  Next is 80 grit and the top half of the sides.  I want to make sure the contour is the same as original so I'll leave the back unsanded until the top is done. Neck shim looks like it was a stationery label.  Pickup pocket was shallow to begin with, has to be deepened to accomodate lower action.

[Chris P.]

Very cool!!

[Dave W]

Sounds like it probably was some kind of varnish.

I guess I'm not surprised that they were still drawing lines and using a woodburning stamp. After all, Rickenbackers in this era still had wiring channels made with overlapping Forstner holes.

[Pilgrim]

SUUUUuurree, blame me.........

[Highlander]

("What I did on my vacation")

This is what we call a Busman's Holiday over here... Bassman's holiday?

"Gummy" is what happened with removing the fin on my PC - got there in the end...

[drbassman]

I like that neck design.  In fact, I'm warming up to some sort of removable neck on my future builds.

[Pilgrim]

For a bolt-on neck, that's about as robust and substantial as you could possibly have.  Ought to be every bit the equal of a neck-through.

[sniper]

I like that neck design.  In fact, I'm warming up to some sort of removable neck on my future builds.

that jig you designed should go a long way towards making a neck pocket like that.

glad to see you restoring that Curlee. it is looking super and i am sure the corrective mods will make it a nice player.

[dadagoboi]

Since the bridge mounts directly to the neck, it's about as close as you can get to a neck through.  The neck/neck pocket fit is very tight.  Here's the pickup wire/ground wire chase routed into the side of the neck.  There's a small hole drilled into the face of the neck to keep the ground wire in place.  You can also see how the much the finish yellowed...you can get close to that with 2-3 days in the summer sun with a freshly nitro cleared neck

[sniper]

...you can get close to that with 2-3 days in the summer sun with a freshly nitro cleared neck

bang a rang!

[Pilgrim]

...you can get close to that with 2-3 days in the summer sun with a freshly nitro cleared neck

That would be the George Hamilton tan-refin technique, right?