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bass not working in amplifier

Pebbles
Posts: 3
hello all, for a while now my bass (cheap p-bass ripoff from amazon ) stopped working in its amplifier about january, i think its because the volume was turned off then the knob went loose, what should i open up and do to fix this? any help is appreciated!
2nick3
Posts: 533
Is the knob lose on the shaft, or is the whole shaft/volume pot turning with the knob?

If the whole shaft is turning stop turning it. If you're rotating the volume pot behind the pickguard you can break the wires - still fixable but a bigger job.

The nut on the volume pot may be lose and easy to fix - remove the knob and see if you can tighten the nut it was hiding. Hold the shaft with one hand while you tighten the nut, first just with your fingers then just a little more with pliers or a wrench. You don't want to go too far, but you need to get it tight enough to not come lose again. Some threadlock could help prevent it from happening again.

If that doesn't fix it, or you think the wires got pulled lose from the pot, you'll have to remove the pickguard to get to the controls. That's not as bad as it sounds, but you may need access to a soldering iron. There are tons of videos on YouTube about replacing volume and tone pots that will walk you through it. Just don't cut the strings unless you have new ones to replace them - it's not necessary. And you are specifically looking for working on a Precision bass, as the pickguard is all one piece.

Dave's World of Fun Stuff has a good walkthrough (I'm not associated with Dave at all, I just find him fun to watch):

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