Thread: Bass ID
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Old 11-09-2021, 12:09 PM
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Ken Smith Ken Smith is offline
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I think it can be from there, Romania or Hungary or that region. The screws on the tuner plates are typical of what you see from Hungary when they put old Tuners on a new bass rather then the traditional regular non-Philips head screws. Small things like this are one of the red flags you see. Also, it is common there that they stain the insides with coffee or something to make the wood look older on the inside. Many things are done to antique the bass. Natural playing wear, natural looking wear is often not there like nicks from the bow tip or frog on the edges. If the bass looks like it hasn't been played much or at all, then it was probably recently made. They even sell new basses with cracks to seem old.



I have had many of these so called older 'looking' basses that were faked and antiqued and have seen others as well. The Hungarians even buy new Romanian instruments and then antique them to pass them as older. I think this is the culture there. But, there are real basses from Hungary as well that can be new or old and sold as such without false claims. Often, the inside work is bad. Blocks in the corners that are not fit, bass bars with gaps, graduations too thick and thin, tops and backs carved or made with grinders and all sorts of other Carpenter type work as opposed to a real violin luther doing good honest work. Even some of the trained luthiers turn out fast cheap work. Re-building these basses gets expensive as standards for me at least are high, no excuses.
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