1993 Fender Precision Bass (Pre-Restoration)

This is a Fender P-Bass that is made in Korea (denoted by the serial number beginning with "CN").  I got this bass from some kid who advertised on Craigslist and it did not come with any strings.  From my internet research, the 3 in the serial number denotes the date of manufacture, around 1993 that is -- which puts this guitar at 20 years old.

It comes with Schaller tuners on the matte finish headstock.  The bass was in a pretty ratty condition as evidenced in the photos below.  But I recognized that this bass has some pretty good bones and most of the stuff are cosmetic in nature that I can fix up with some simple cleaning.

What's a used guitar without a sticker right?  The pickguard is in excellent shape and the oxidized screws give it some character.  During the restoration process, I will keep the original screws but definitely will remove the sticker.  The pickup (closest to neck) housing is cracked and busted so I needed to work some magic with epoxy to piece it back together.

The bridge is in good shape with no rust, just dust.  This was the fairly easy to clean but I had to undo the five screws that hold it so I can check the grounding wire.  Obviously, the springs to preload the string saddles are in good condition as well.

Underneath the volume and tone knobs were small pieces of the original pickguard plastic covering.  I had to clean remove the pots and output jack anyway so I can wash the pickguard thoroughly.  I some point, I will need to replace the pots, as the volume one has some noise when turning it up or down.

There are hardly any deep scratches on this 20-year old cream body.  In fact, after cleaning it, the body is somewhat flawless.  Again, I had to look past all this when I decided to buy the guitar.  And finally, to really give it an aged look, I buffed the body with chrome polish -- which easily removed these surface-only scratches.

Next post...photos of the restored instrument.