disturbing

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benno

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So i recently bought a brand new Corvette $$ 5 string from a Guitar center in NY USA and only 2 months later its broken. In the middle of a set on stage the pickup just broke loose from the wood of the instrument, forcing itself upward against the underside of the strings thus rendering it unplayable! (the fastener that the adjustment screw goes into to hold down the pickup ripped out of the wood) On top of this I still have gotten no help from Guitar Center (warranty card says contact dealer) or had any calls returned from Dana B Goods service. I would think a company like Warwick would do everything possible to uphold their reputation and if not themselves make it right, ensure the people in charge of making it right do in fact uphold their good name by correcting such a blatent flaw in craftsmanship as quickly as possible!
I have always held Warwick basses in high regard and I am very disturbed by this horrible series of events.

-Ben
 
G'day Benno,
Sorry to hear about this mate,it's happened to others,but it's very rare.
Seeing as the bass is under warranty,it's up to the dealer,GC,to honour that warranty.Dana B Goods are the distributor & might be the ones that fix this for you,but it has to go through GC first.Hopefully they'll get back to you in a reasonable time frame & get your bass back to it's former self.
An alternative is to just fix it yourself,by glueing the ferell back into place.It's a very easy fix that a few members here have done themselves,for the cost of the glue.This would be the quickest way but if you arent confident with the idea of fixing it youself,then it's best to hold GC to their word & let them fix it.In fact,your local GC might not even send this back to DBG's,& get their in-house service tech. to do the work.
I understand fully that these silly things shouldnt happen,but they do happen,albeit rarely.I also understand it's very frustrating & a big inconvenience but rest assured,Warwick and Dana B Goods provide some of the best service in the industry.That I know to be a fact.
Good luck & keep us posted how you get on.
**edit.Please check you private messages.
 
Welcome to the forum and the family Ben!

Greg covered it all, but I just want to stand up for and add reassurance that both Warwick and Dana B. Goods have the best service I've ever experienced in 30 years of being a guitarist and bass player. Even then, the techs at Dana B. Goods can get swamped and busy and they are not the quickest at answering emails. But phone calls and a personal visit to Tyler (Shop Manager for DBG) have proven to be more than excellent and expected. They are top notch!

But Greg is correct in that you need to go through Guitar Center. I don't know why they aren't returning your calls, but are you able to take the bass in person? I can understand the inconvenience if you take it in and they tell you the guy who handles warranties isn't in but will get back to you. If that happens, I know I would be ticked off! But I also know the techs at GCs only work one or two days a week, so that adds to the difficulty.

Often times, the experts from Warwick come on here and advise us to do our own repairs, if possible and they tell us it won't hurt the warranty. A fix such as yours is nothing that requires an expert to repair. Simply remove the pickup, the screw ferrule(s) that pulled loose will probably still be attched to the pickup screw, so remove them and use a SuperGlue wood glue or an epoxy to glue the ferrule back into the pickup cavity, let set and dry, then screw the pickup back in and it will be good as new, and none will know the better. :wink:

Hope this helps - we want you to be a happy member of our family here! And your Warwick should be one of the things that helps remove the stress and disturbances from your life through the music you make with it! :D
 
Hello Ben, welcome to the forum. PLease write me an email if you cannot solve the problem, and I'll do my best.
 
Hi, thanks for your prompt response, i had taken out the pickup to see what was going on and had thought it would be an easy fix myself, I was just rather annoyed with the idiots at GC Buffalo and had this vision of them making it all better right away. Mike Brown at DBG got in touch with me also just now. I will make one more personal appearance there at GC and if that doesnt work, I'll just fix it myself and be dissatisfied.

You are quite confident that an epoxy will bond the wood to the metal enough to hold all that pressure? It just makes me nervous that it will happen again in a few months...

You guys are all right, thanks,

BEN
 
Epoxy will be plenty strong to hold it in Ben.It only has some foam pushing against it.Or does the $$ have springs?Anyway,a couple of the guys here have done the same repair themselves with good success.While you have it pulled apart,it might be wise to check all the other ferells to make sure they're nice & tight.At the factory,these are pressed into place & the ferells have a knurl on their outside diameter to grip the wood.Being wood,it's suseptible to change,& that could well be the reason this has happened.Usually a bass in it's first 2 years settles,swells & contracts while it's becoming accustomed to the climate it's going to be living in.You might notice this as raised seems,mainly in the neck.It's completely normal & happens to most of us.A little rubbing back with a scotchbrite pad smoothes it all out again.
Any more questions you may have,dont hesitate to ask. :wink:
 
Hey Ben, the epoxy link should be stronger than the wood itself, so don't worry about happening again. It's like that joke with the guy traveling with 2 bombs in the airplane... Statistic it is impossible to be 3 bombs in the same plane, so he is safer that way. I never heard to happen this thing twice to someone:-)
 
Florin said:
...It's like that joke with the guy traveling with 2 bombs in the airplane... Statistic it is impossible to be 3 bombs in the same plane, so he is safer that way. I never heard to happen this thing twice to someone:-)
Click to expand...

:lol: I hadn't heard that one before, but I might have to try that the next time I fly! :lol: But then security would guarantee I would miss my flight and end up in a federal prison instead! :shock:

Back on topic, there are epoxys, such as JB Weld, that professional race car drivers have successfully used on their stress-cracked engine blocks! Of course, metal to wood is different, and wood can still expand and contract, but the people who repaired their own here have had good success, so you can be confident with the fix. And doing it yourself will obviously be faster than waiting on Guitar Center to honor their business responsibility!

After you repair it yourself, I would go back to GC , ask for the manager, explain the situation and your attempts to get GC to honor the warranty. Show your receipt for the epoxy and explain how you had to research how to fix it yourself, that you had to invest your own time, money, and effort to restore your bass that was supposed to be under warranty and under GC's customer service guarantee. Tell the manager that you are dissatisfied with the treatment you got from GC and that while you like the variety of music equipment and some of the prices they offer at GC, your confidence in their ability to keep you a satisfied customer after the sale has been greatly shaken. My bet is that the manager will bend over backwards to win back your confidence. You'll probably walk out with some goodies and the staff will treat you like a VIP in the future!

Also, keep all your receipts - for the bass, the epoxy, etc. and document all the attempts you made to get your warranty honored. Have plenty of ammo to make a strong case to the store manager...
 
yeah. thats my plan 8)
thanks again for the help.

BEN
 
epoxy didnt work, it ripped out again. shopped around for the best possible metal/wood epoxy. didnt work. who do i contact for a replacement? this crap has gone on far too long.
 
Beno, you should contact the store that sold the bass to you and have it fixed or replaced under warranty. Explain them that you don't want under any circumstances to happen again on the stage, and ask for a replacement...
Email me if they don't want to help you.
 
I am finished with this crap. GC refuses to do anything except act like idiots who know nothing and can do nothing. Nothing has been made right and i only get more and more upset. my attorneys will go from here, i dont need this.
 
Ben,I'm sorry you're being pissed around by GC.But I've seen one guy superglue his back in & it's still there,after regular gigging.
Do what you have to do,but is it really worth forking out all that money to retain a lawyer for something can be fixed so easily?Dont get me wrong,I'm trying to help ya here & get you back to rockin your $$ for years to come.
If a dealer refused to fix something for me,I'd contact their head office.We dont have GC here in Australia,but I understand they're mostly franchises?Is that right?Anyway,if they are,they have a head office.Give them a call,or get your lawyer to call.This isnt a big fix for them.
Keep us posted please mate.
 
I worked for GC and they train their employees to be snakes. Don't deal with the people at GC, go to the corporate guys they don't give a shet where GC's money goes. They just sit back and rack in the dough. Any stolen or broken gear gets taken out of the store manager's bonus so the guys at you GC are not going to help at all. They have lines and lines memorized to make you give up and still want to come back. Don't believe anything they say cuz its all B.S.!

If you got the bass in NYC then go to a guy in brooklyn called Gary Fried (said like freed). He's a great luthier. He helped me out and he's a really great guy. If you want his info. call the brooklyn GC and as for his number they should give it to you.
 
Mike Brown at DBG got in touch with me also just now.
Click to expand...

It sounds like the GC guys are being tools.

Have you actually taken the bass back into the store to submit it for warranty replacement?

What did Mike Brown from DBG have to say?

I haven't dealt with DBG before, as I'm in Australia, but I've heard they're good guys.

I know you're frustrated, but keep pursuing it - it's worth it to get your bass fixed. I shouldn't think you need the hassle and expense of lawyers just yet.

;)

Good luck.

;)
 
It seems that this problem was solved, and the basses starting from march- april this year will not have this problem anymore...
 
Great to hear Florin!

Thankfully, this or any other problem hasn't happened to me, but it's good to see Warwick addressing the issue (as if I didn't know they would). Any chance we can know what they did to solve it?
 
Sure, sometimes the solutions are really easy...
Smaller holes, the ferules sit much tighter now :-) In the near future, they told me we will change the ferules with different model. But we should have no problems anyway.
 
Florin said:
Sure, sometimes the solutions are really easy...
Smaller holes, the ferules sit much tighter now :-) In the near future, they told me we will change the ferules with different model. But we should have no problems anyway.
Click to expand...

Thanks! Good solution. 8)
 
good to hear. Dana B people are always there to help whenever these clowns at GC do not want to do their jobs.

Last year I purchased a Vette Bubinga standard and fretless and it did not have the straplocks. i took it back to them within 2 hours of the purchase and instead of going through another gig bag to get me the locks they say that they needed to order them from Dana B (they had over 6 Wics on stock) and I hgad to wait until i hear a response or as they said...."you can just order them through the website".

anyways due to other reasons i had to return the bass within 3 days and of course they were demanding the straplocks 'because they were there when the bass was sold" and i called their manager who calmed them down and gave me credit back to my credit card.

I only go to GC for acessories and other stuff... when i want a bass or something like that I go through another Warwick dealer (smaller but more personal and many times they match the GC prices and give you 100% customer satisfaction.
 
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