Water Damaged Marcus Miller v7 Renovation

About the Job

A customer brought in a water-damaged Marcus Miller v7 bass guitar for repair because he was not getting any life out of it.

He's bought it on ebay and didnt realise it was water damaged.

The Problem

Cost wise this was going to cost a fortune to put right and the customer was not willing to pay for it so decided to scrap it and buy a new one.

We made him an offer to buy it as scrap and try to renovate it ourselves which he accepted and a deal was done.

Initial Inspection

On initial inspection, everything was damaged and had to go.

There was only one way to fix this and that was to strip it down and start again.

Repair & Setup Work

We began by removing the neck then the pickups, control panel, pickguard, bridge and 9v battery casing and wiring.

We then proceded to removing the polyurethane finish with a blow torch by scrapping off the hot finish.

We then sanded it down and filled in any little dents or scratches, then sanded it again until we had a smooth finish.

We then applied 3 coats of undercoat left for 24 hours to dry then applied 3 coats of fire red finish and left for 45 minutes to dry.

Now was the time to spray on a thick coat of black crackle paint and left for 24 hours to dry. The crackle effect started working immediately.

The next day we applied 3 coats of lacquer and left for 24 hours to dry.

We then started on the neck, by deep cleaning and scrubbing all the grime out, then filed the frets, crowned them and finally polished them to a mirror finish. We then cleaned the fretboard and applied 2 coats of lemon oil to it.

Now the reassembly started. We began with the electrics by sheilding all the cavities with copper tape, then reinstalled the pickups, control panel, pickguard, bridge, jack socket and 9v battery casing and wiring.

We restrang the bass and after setting up the action and intonation, we tested it and it was working perfectly.

Final Setup Specs

Parts	All parts used were originally Marcus Miller parts
Paint Work	All body sprays used were Montana Sprays, (Undercoat, Fire Red, Black Crackle & Lacquer)
String Gauge	D'Addario XL 45 - 105 Super light gauge
Tuning	Standard EADG
Man Hours	15 Hours spread over 6 weeks
See the full video	Watch the full video

Final Result

After the setup, the bass played fantastically. If anyone is interested this bass is now for sale at a very reasonable price, please contact us for more details.