One of the more bizarre repairs I’ve ever tackled began recently when a customer sent photos of a ’59 Precision Bass he’d just bought with a 1965 neck. He hoped it could be salvaged despite numerous issues including a horribly modified body, missing nut, chipped nut slot, broken truss rod, pickup that was falling apart, and wiring harness that needed an overhaul. Figuring it best to tackle the hardest part first, I started to restore the body.
1) So much wood had been carved away that I thought long and hard about taking the job.
2) I removed the wood that couldn’t be saved then bought an aftermarket swamp ash body, sawed it into three parts, and joined it to the original center with the pickup cavity and its penciled-in date of 7/59.
3) There was so much wood carved from the bridge area that I had to fit a new piece. After installing it, I ran the body through a thickness sander, leaving a smooth surface while also hiding the joints.
4) I removed the original control cavity and put it in the new body to retain the look – crazy, I know, but that’s the kind of thing that makes it fun to do such difficult and time-consuming jobs.
5) My shopmate, Isaac, used his band saw to cut slabs from a block of swamp ash standing on edge, producing two laminates – one that was .1″ thick (so it can bend over the body cut on the top) the other for the back of the bass (.25″). We removed just enough wood to keep final thickness close to original.
6) The laminates were pinned together and glued in a vacuum press that slowly and evenly pulled the top over the arm carve.
7) I drilled holes through the top laminate so I could drop a flush-cut router into the cavities, then routed the overhangs with a roundover ball-bearing bit to replicate the body’s curved edges.
8) I installed the neck to make sure the pickup rout was on center and the bridge was properly located. With the pickguard in place, I drilled mounting holes for it and the bridge. After final-sanding the body, I handed it off to finisher Keith McGrath.
9) While Keith had the body, I figured out why the truss-rod nut was so deep in the hole…
10) …cleaned the pickups and their copper ground plates, and installed new rubber risers.
11) I’ll repair the nut slot and make a new bone nut.
12) Fellow repairman Gene Imbody saved what he could from the original wiring and made a new anodized pickguard.
13) I believe this bass originally had a Mary Kaye finish because there are remnants; in the pickup cavity, the ground plate was stuck to the thick yellow varnish, and when a section pulled loose, it exposed the original finish. Also, though very worn, the strap buttons show gold plating – another sign of a Mary Kaye finish.
While it would have been tempting to finish the body in a Mary Kaye blond, the owner’s daughter will inherit this bass and she definitely wants sunburst, which will go great with the anodized pickguard. In the February ’26 issue, we’ll address all the smaller repairs mentioned earlier and pop in on Keith to see how the finish is coming.
Dan Erlewine has been repairing guitars for more than 50 years. The author of three books, dozens of magazine articles, he has also produced instructional videotapes and DVDs on guitar repair. From 1986 through his retirement in late 2019, Erlewine was part of the R&D team, and company liaison for Stewart-MacDonald’s Guitar Shop Supply. Today, he operates a repair shop in Athens, Ohio, as well as building replicas of the guitars he made for Albert King and Jerry Garcia in 1972. This column has appeared in VG since March, 2004. You can contact him at [email protected].
This article originally appeared in VG’s December 2025 issue. All copyrights are by the author and Vintage Guitar magazine. Unauthorized replication or use is strictly prohibited.