Teisco Bass Bridge Mod

Gear
1

Hey all,
I recently bought a Kay bass (K-20B) that was made by Teisco in the 70s. It had the confounding ability to both not touch the zero fret and still hit the pickups at the highest fret.

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IMG_41881053Ă—3726 553 KB

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IMG_4192806Ă—3230 390 KB

While trying to fix this issue, I realized the bridge was so out of whack that I would either have to replace it or mod it to properly function.
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IMG_41974028Ă—1294 924 KB

Well, after about 17 days of grinding, drilling, waiting for parts, neck shims, and fine tuning we have a properly functioning bass.
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IMG_43253024Ă—4032 2.29 MB

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IMG_43243024Ă—4032 2.46 MB

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IMG_43233024Ă—4032 2.55 MB

Thanks to everyone who helped me in my first post, and if you need any extra information, just ask!

10 Likes
2

Have you adjust the neck relief/ truss rod?

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3

Yep! Did a full setup, truss rod and all. I had to shim the neck to a wild degree to get it playable and not touching the pickups, but it worked! Still need to intonate it, as you can probably tell, but it plays like a slightly untuned dream :wink:

3 Likes
4

After seeing the initial pics I’m not at all surprised you had to shim the neck. I don’t see that happen all that often in these days of CNC machines but it still happens. With the older import stuff QC can be a real nightmare. It’s why we avoided most of it back in the 60s and early 70s.

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5

Love the effort you put into this one!

I have to ask, what is that thumb rest looking thing? It looks like it’s on the wrong side to be useful.

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6

That’s for grabbing with your fingers while you pluck with your thumb.

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7

So that right there is the thumb rest’s evil cousin, the tug bar. Back in the olden days when bass was “supposed” to be played with your thumb, you could use a tug bar for some counter pressure; a thumb rest but worse, basically.

2 Likes