Great video! Also, I'm not sure if you've figured this out by now by now, but the ON/OFF switch is intended specifically for the motion sensor. Powering it on will direct activation to the sensor, while powering it off directs it to the button.
I actually collect these fish and there's a BUNCH of knockoffs of these from many different countries, I have one really strange knockoff of billy called "Starry Fish", he came exclusively from russia too, just goes to show how popular these things were to the point even companies in other countries would try making their own variations to hop on the trend and make a bit of profit aswell, lol, wonderful repair job!
Yeah, I've since noticed a load of different versions out there. I never realised how popular they were, but there are plenty of collectors out there! I wouldn't consider myself a collector just yet. I only have 2 so far, but I'm definitely keeping my eyes peeled for more! 👍
@@StezStixFix yeah, these things are so cool and overall hilarious to watch, especially the cheap bootleg ones because of how sloppy the programming is 😂, but overall these are really unique, wish they still made them like they used to lol
@@yeeyeehaircut4964 I thought I had encountered some sad collectors in my time, like people who collect electric kettles, but you sir, take the cake. Congratulations!
I fixed one of these during lockdown. Head gear in the motor was split causing the head not to work. Bought gears off eBay which were 9 tooth, took forever to get the gear on right but as I moved it closer to head worked again! Now he’s fully working!
WilliePlayz When replacing the gear I find it hard to put the new gear onto the shaft as my hands aren’t as good for gripping onto things sometimes. After my repair was successful I repaired another one named Rockin Singing Bass that had the same problem and that worked very nicely! Knockoff fish aren’t sometimes as good as the original as for cheap wiring and gears. I’ve got into singing fish for years and I still watch videos of them to this day, wish I got more but unfortunately it’s space issues. I’m in a house where everything can’t be put on the wall so the fish are on the floor standing up.
WilliePlayz I was thinking that but it has been years since I’ve filmed my fish and other things in the collection. I just never liked the bullying or the comments I gotten about can you fix this or fix that? Now I’m almost a master at fixing fish but not all of them. There’s one person which I think has an amazing collection, Lakewi44’s collection is sick! :)
I hated these 20 years ago and I hate them more now. Thank you so much for making me listen to those two sodding songs. I hoped I’d never have to go through it again.
These things were everywhere when they first came out - I remember my stepmother received three from separate family members, and she wasn't even into fishing!
Hella late, but I have a couple ideas: 1: Modernize the power delivery system by replacing the old batteries with a rechargeable battery pack and adding usb charging. 2: Get that name plate engraved!
I wonder if this could get a sequel, since you said to mod it would be a choice. Speaker, amp, sure, what about some bypass to add a lot more music tracks and some routine for it to pick up on the mouth/tail motion depending on what happens in the tune. Billy could go into GB of musical awareness.
Years ago, there was a company which sells various items to my previous employer. They left us samples so you can see and touch the items and if you are interested you fill in a form and later they delivered it to my employer. One of the items is Billy Base and a sample is on display. We kept pressing the button until it started screaming at us. We certainly broke it.
I actually cheered when Billy first started singing. My brother had a Billy Bass. I had Tommy the Freshwater Trout. He sang Do Wah Diddy Diddy and Rock the Boat. In terms of pimping it, maybe you could stick an LED in Billy's eye - that would be really freaky!
Like many a 90s kid I wanted one of these, haven't yet got one but one day I will. I'd want to try and find a way to make him work with other songs as well as upgrade the audio as I think a lot of the irritance came from repitition and taking that out of the equastion would likely make old Billy more likeable.
There’s a knockoff Billy Bass made by a company named Jiada called “Singing Fish”. The main differences are aesthetically, with the audio quality and some other small differences, but the main difference is the build quality. It’s dreadful. The boards can fry out super easily if you play the fish on an adapter.
I bought my dad a billy bass from a grocery store here in BC Canada. It was not in the budget for that trip but it my first time seeing them and just had to have it. He laughed LOTS when I gave it to him. He has since passed away and my mom has Billy bass in a box to give back to me.
If the button is pushed in it crashes it until the button is no longer making the connection. Big mouth Billy bass also has sensor on the front which is motion activated, which also triggers it.
@@StezStixFix hi i have 50 of these fish and i collect them i went to goodwill this weekend and was hoping i would find one of these and i was shopping and my brother came over to me and said look what i found and it was a big mouth billy bass and bought it for 3 dollars and i didnt expect it to work got it and it fully functions and it works great and i was shocked but what is crazy is i missed another one by 30 minutes that same day and i was so dissapointed i missed out on 2 but i got 1 out of 2 and it works perfect
Rotary lit disco ball (maybe a moterized Christmas tree ball all) possibly a led lighting up the face on an arm too for those nightime lights off encounters.
I was hoping you were going to hack it and turn it into a dancing and singing blue tooth speaker. Maybe a revisit? I loved your Alexa hack you did into an old 70's bed side radio! BTW, I jsut discovered your channel earlier this week and I can't stop watching. Great stuff!
I'm totally bingewatching StezStix Fix at the moment and this is one of the hardest to HEAR episodes... I mean, how not to become crazy at the 30est "HERE'S A LITTLE SONG I WROTE"
You need to mod this. Suggestions: Sam Kinison scream Gansta rap Machine Gun sound effects Vomiting noises. What would be even better is if you set it up to work normally for the first 50 or so presses and then randomly start inserting the "bonus features".
This is the cheaply made sun star model because of the green eyes the normal gemmy models have brown eyes and the on and off switch is for the motion sensor not the button.
Thabks Collector. Yeah I worked out the switch afterwards, didn't realise st the time but it makes perfect sense now! Interesting detail on the eyes, thanks for letting me know! I'll keep an eye 👁 out for that in future! 😊
Mine has an issue where primary on the song “don’t worry be happy” the fish’s head shakes uncontrollably when moving the mouth. Im assuming some gears aren’t moving correctly? Not sure tho
Hi Angel. Yeah, it sounds like you have a gear problem there. I looked at another one of these last December and I had to replace a gear in that one. It may help you! Video here: ua-cam.com/video/tX6124JrXfc/v-deo.html
Put an arduino in it along with a sound module and add more songs to it - it looks like the motor turns one way to slap the tail, and the other for the fish to face out and move the mouth. The arduino could be easily programmed to select a random song on the sound module, yet still know which songs playing so it can slap the tail and move the mouth to the lyrics :) edit: turns out theres 3 motors, even easier to control. One runs the jaw, one runs the tail and the third runs the front half of the fishs' body.
i still have the one i bought when they first came out. hanging on to it so i can mod it to use my own audio. can’t believe it’s only been 20 some years. feels much longer.
It was def not brand new. Its been opened before. I could tell immediately when I saw the skin wasn't as shiny as its supposed to be when it's new. You can also see a price sticker mark so its most likely a thrift store find that they just repackaged and called new. The eye is also green, which is on the blue top box version, but somehow you got it in a green box.
i really wish they continued production of these and made more new ones everyone loves and collects them even my stepfather loves them and wants any of them theres very few fish they made of these it be awesome if they did ones of all the fish i mean they could of if they kept it up but they stopped in the late 90s early 2000 i can't remember really when and they focused making other things the company is still around to this day
Perhaps it could be modded so you could put in your own recording like cry me a river or slip sliding away or the most famous one " Like A BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED WATER "
I used to have the same exact model back in the early 2000's. Then i lost it. Then in 2010/11 i find a clone of the original singing fish ... and i "fried it" with a bad transformer 😅
I have got one of these lol mine not working as something rattling around in my mine. plus the batteries leaked corroded the metal in battery compartment
Don't mean to sound pretentious but I generally hate things like this. But I loved watching the successful repair. And it is neat how they did the animatronics. But it is just so crass and stupid (which I assume is the attraction in an ironic sense) that I don't want that useless clutter in my house.
Yes I've heard about that happening before and I'm always when I've been somewhere that it's annoyed me I've secretly sneaked up on it turned off the switch for the sensor never got caught and if they said why is it not working I said did you check it's batteries or if it was on an AC adapter if it was out of you I unplug the adapter from wall outlet or power strip or extension cord that works well or if it was convenient covertly unplug AC adapter from fishy wall decoration either one but I was a fan of these but sometimes if it was on sensor mode it get quite annoying and wore off quickly the novelty although there are people reusing these and hooking them up to something else including a way to hook it to Alexa
Classic Case of the kids hammer'n the button,making fish fall to floor trick! Father (as he takes his belt off)--OK,who broke my fish!?!? Children (running ,screaming,and crying) I dont know WHAT happened,I wasnt here. LOL
Should I PIMP Billy? Let me know what you think...
Thank you!
Pimp that fish!
@@StezStixFix Stick an Alexa in it!
I second that
@@StezStixFix yes please do it
Great video!
Also, I'm not sure if you've figured this out by now by now, but the ON/OFF switch is intended specifically for the motion sensor. Powering it on will direct activation to the sensor, while powering it off directs it to the button.
Thanks Captain, much appreciated! Yeah, I worked it out eventually ☺
I actually collect these fish and there's a BUNCH of knockoffs of these from many different countries, I have one really strange knockoff of billy called "Starry Fish", he came exclusively from russia too, just goes to show how popular these things were to the point even companies in other countries would try making their own variations to hop on the trend and make a bit of profit aswell, lol, wonderful repair job!
Yeah, I've since noticed a load of different versions out there. I never realised how popular they were, but there are plenty of collectors out there! I wouldn't consider myself a collector just yet. I only have 2 so far, but I'm definitely keeping my eyes peeled for more! 👍
@@StezStixFix yeah, these things are so cool and overall hilarious to watch, especially the cheap bootleg ones because of how sloppy the programming is 😂, but overall these are really unique, wish they still made them like they used to lol
@@yeeyeehaircut4964 I thought I had encountered some sad collectors in my time, like people who collect electric kettles, but you sir, take the cake. Congratulations!
im imagining entering your house and all the fish on the wall immediately direct their attention to me and singing in various languages
@@richardwadd9769 With even one of those fish in his home he definately won't be sad. Of course, anyone who dorsn't like them IS sad.
Between your surprise when it started up the first time and the AMAZING camera angles during the singing, this was entertaining from beginning to end.
I'm glad to know those things were not exclusive to the US. Don't worry, be Tacky :)
I fixed one of these during lockdown.
Head gear in the motor was split causing the head not to work.
Bought gears off eBay which were 9 tooth, took forever to get the gear on right but as I moved it closer to head worked again! Now he’s fully working!
Excellent! I imagine that's quite a common fault on these. Well done for rescuing your Billy from the scrap! 🙂
WilliePlayz When replacing the gear I find it hard to put the new gear onto the shaft as my hands aren’t as good for gripping onto things sometimes.
After my repair was successful I repaired another one named Rockin Singing Bass that had the same problem and that worked very nicely! Knockoff fish aren’t sometimes as good as the original as for cheap wiring and gears.
I’ve got into singing fish for years and I still watch videos of them to this day, wish I got more but unfortunately it’s space issues.
I’m in a house where everything can’t be put on the wall so the fish are on the floor standing up.
WilliePlayz I was thinking that but it has been years since I’ve filmed my fish and other things in the collection. I just never liked the bullying or the comments I gotten about can you fix this or fix that? Now I’m almost a master at fixing fish but not all of them.
There’s one person which I think has an amazing collection, Lakewi44’s collection is sick! :)
I hated these 20 years ago and I hate them more now. Thank you so much for making me listen to those two sodding songs. I hoped I’d never have to go through it again.
We need an upgraded Billy now!!
It's time!!
Great fix! …. but 17 minutes of this thing is enough to last me another 17 years without needing to see one again 😂!
My wife loved it in her throat
These things were everywhere when they first came out - I remember my stepmother received three from separate family members, and she wasn't even into fishing!
I have one exactly like that. Brought memories back seeing it in action again!
Hella late, but I have a couple ideas:
1: Modernize the power delivery system by replacing the old batteries with a rechargeable battery pack and adding usb charging.
2: Get that name plate engraved!
I wonder if this could get a sequel, since you said to mod it would be a choice. Speaker, amp, sure, what about some bypass to add a lot more music tracks and some routine for it to pick up on the mouth/tail motion depending on what happens in the tune. Billy could go into GB of musical awareness.
Years ago, there was a company which sells various items to my previous employer.
They left us samples so you can see and touch the items and if you are interested you fill in a form and later they delivered it to my employer.
One of the items is Billy Base and a sample is on display. We kept pressing the button until it started screaming at us.
We certainly broke it.
I actually cheered when Billy first started singing. My brother had a Billy Bass. I had Tommy the Freshwater Trout. He sang Do Wah Diddy Diddy and Rock the Boat. In terms of pimping it, maybe you could stick an LED in Billy's eye - that would be really freaky!
Tommy the Freshwater Trout sounds awesome!
Good info Michael, thanks for that 👍
Oh wow! Thats sounds awesome 👌
@@MichaelRadabaugh love how you make the lips flap along to the track 🤣
Truly the peak of 20th century technology
Like many a 90s kid I wanted one of these, haven't yet got one but one day I will.
I'd want to try and find a way to make him work with other songs as well as upgrade the audio as I think a lot of the irritance came from repitition and taking that out of the equastion would likely make old Billy more likeable.
There’s a knockoff Billy Bass made by a company named Jiada called “Singing Fish”.
The main differences are aesthetically, with the audio quality and some other small differences, but the main difference is the build quality. It’s dreadful. The boards can fry out super easily if you play the fish on an adapter.
Yeah, I've heard there are a few cheap clones of this. Can't imagine any of them being any good! 😳
We had one that came from Aldi. And it fell of the wallmount when it began flapping and singing. It was kinda fun 🤣🤣🤣
I bought my dad a billy bass from a grocery store here in BC Canada. It was not in the budget for that trip but it my first time seeing them and just had to have it. He laughed LOTS when I gave it to him. He has since passed away and my mom has Billy bass in a box to give back to me.
Just bought one myself.sadly all his battery contacts are rusted out so need to replace these first
Dammit he will live again!
Great video
Great video! Those zoom edits killed me
I laughed when you couldn't get it to stop. xD You fixed it a little too well at that point!
If the button is pushed in it crashes it until the button is no longer making the connection. Big mouth Billy bass also has sensor on the front which is motion activated, which also triggers it.
I love these things, great repair!
Thank you! Yes, it's a thing of beauty for sure. So glad I could revive him!
@@StezStixFix hi i have 50 of these fish and i collect them i went to goodwill this weekend and was hoping i would find one of these and i was shopping and my brother came over to me and said look what i found and it was a big mouth billy bass and bought it for 3 dollars and i didnt expect it to work got it and it fully functions and it works great and i was shocked but what is crazy is i missed another one by 30 minutes that same day and i was so dissapointed i missed out on 2 but i got 1 out of 2 and it works perfect
Billy is such a legend! I have 3 of these fish.
He certainly is! I think I need to add more to my collection 🙂
I have three of them too edit I now have four
They made different models like catfish trouts and more
Great Job, finally!!!!!!!!!! You didn't give up.
it also works on adapter
Rotary lit disco ball (maybe a moterized Christmas tree ball all) possibly a led lighting up the face on an arm too for those nightime lights off encounters.
Love the background music. Reminds me of Ridge Racer Type 4 and Gran Turismo 2
I always wanted one too.
I was hoping you were going to hack it and turn it into a dancing and singing blue tooth speaker. Maybe a revisit? I loved your Alexa hack you did into an old 70's bed side radio! BTW, I jsut discovered your channel earlier this week and I can't stop watching. Great stuff!
I'm totally bingewatching StezStix Fix at the moment and this is one of the hardest to HEAR episodes... I mean, how not to become crazy at the 30est "HERE'S A LITTLE SONG I WROTE"
You need to mod this.
Suggestions:
Sam Kinison scream
Gansta rap
Machine Gun sound effects
Vomiting noises.
What would be even better is if you set it up to work normally for the first 50 or so presses and then randomly start inserting the "bonus features".
I couldn’t stop laughing when it starting going off, I haven’t seen one of these I could see how it would be fun after a few drinks!
This is the cheaply made sun star model because of the green eyes the normal gemmy models have brown eyes and the on and off switch is for the motion sensor not the button.
Thabks Collector. Yeah I worked out the switch afterwards, didn't realise st the time but it makes perfect sense now! Interesting detail on the eyes, thanks for letting me know! I'll keep an eye 👁 out for that in future! 😊
Why did the resistor come loose though ? I'd love to see it after you pimped it.
Mine has an issue where primary on the song “don’t worry be happy” the fish’s head shakes uncontrollably when moving the mouth. Im assuming some gears aren’t moving correctly? Not sure tho
Hi Angel. Yeah, it sounds like you have a gear problem there. I looked at another one of these last December and I had to replace a gear in that one. It may help you! Video here: ua-cam.com/video/tX6124JrXfc/v-deo.html
Put an arduino in it along with a sound module and add more songs to it - it looks like the motor turns one way to slap the tail, and the other for the fish to face out and move the mouth. The arduino could be easily programmed to select a random song on the sound module, yet still know which songs playing so it can slap the tail and move the mouth to the lyrics :)
edit: turns out theres 3 motors, even easier to control. One runs the jaw, one runs the tail and the third runs the front half of the fishs' body.
Put in a bluetooth receiver inside Billy, adjoined to a 3watt amp and usb input.
Now, that I can do. If I could get him to also flap around whilst singing some Backstreet Boys, that would be the ultimate.
Will wait for the modded Billy in a future vid of yours.
Good luck with your channel.
You brought him back to life just by messing with the red button contact and the logic board
i still have the one i bought when they first came out. hanging on to it so i can mod it to use my own audio. can’t believe it’s only been 20 some years. feels much longer.
As an added bonus you can also make a fish-shaped jelly with the plastic cover
Still have one somewhere. I bought it for my mum lol it was next to the front door and it frightened the gran kids
It was def not brand new. Its been opened before. I could tell immediately when I saw the skin wasn't as shiny as its supposed to be when it's new. You can also see a price sticker mark so its most likely a thrift store find that they just repackaged and called new. The eye is also green, which is on the blue top box version, but somehow you got it in a green box.
Well spotted! Yes, I think you're right on all counts.
This is like doing a medical operation on a singing fish
How does the Billy Bass know to open its mouth in time with the music?
I knew there was something "fishy" with that item. Good thing you dodged it. 😂
Connect it up to a Amazon Dot , so that the mouth moves when you ask Alexa question.
Yes! Yes! Yes!
Now you just need 3 more of these things to wire them up to play sea shanty
I'm so glad these things aren't gifted anymore to people hahaha
I got my one too and fixed it , played with a bit after that I moved and poor billy got smack around and now is in storage
i really wish they continued production of these and made more new ones everyone loves and collects them even my stepfather loves them and wants any of them theres very few fish they made of these it be awesome if they did ones of all the fish i mean they could of if they kept it up but they stopped in the late 90s early 2000 i can't remember really when and they focused making other things the company is still around to this day
Combining it with Amazon Alexa would be fun, and funny.
Perhaps it could be modded so you could put in your own recording like cry me a river or slip sliding away or the most famous one " Like A BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED WATER "
any idea where I can find dual C Battery Spring Plates for the central two batteries? These seem to be very rare.
I used to have the same exact model back in the early 2000's.
Then i lost it.
Then in 2010/11 i find a clone of the original singing fish ... and i "fried it" with a bad transformer 😅
i own one of them great video
Thanks! Yeah, I have 2 of them now 😊
1st class video to watch thank you take care kind regards from me kenneth👍👍👍
Was just waiting on it still to be working after you removed the batteries 😂
Several years later, Walmart sold a singing Moose head which was a hoot too.
Think this would have been so much fun to see if you could get the mini alexa working through the fish...
8:00 This is like resuscitating a dead fish with a defibrillator.
I think there might have been dust on The button Circuit
he found the problem
Your case is differently a first a Loose Transistor
I’m pretty sure mine has a fried circuit. Do you know how to repair that?
I have an idea, you can make it possessed by connecting it to a buck converter and cranking down the voltage till it browns out.
I think you might have had the fish on sensor mode that's why it kept on running I had one of those before
Oh the nostalgia
8:12 as it started singing, he just standing there.
I have got one of these lol mine not working as something rattling around in my mine. plus the batteries leaked corroded the metal in battery compartment
I don’t know if you ever realised that the switch on the back doesn’t turn it off it just turns the motion sensor on or off
you could ad a aux input to play your own songs?
Don't mean to sound pretentious but I generally hate things like this. But I loved watching the successful repair. And it is neat how they did the animatronics. But it is just so crass and stupid (which I assume is the attraction in an ironic sense) that I don't want that useless clutter in my house.
Totally agree! It's a novelty item and nothing more. 😊
You should add an output port.
Good idea! 👍
I don’t know which is worse, always off or always on!!
I don't know if I ever thought that it was that funny, back then... BUT I DO NOW. It might have something to do with senility :O)
We gave my dad one of those many years ago.
All those batteries just to power that little motor (crazy)
Steve I sometimes wonder about you 🤣🤣 but an entertaining video 👍
Btw the switch is for the motion sensor
Mine is 23 years old 1999 and he still sings
I don't know whether I'm imagining this but I'm sure you could get a rude version called Bad Mouth Billy Bass. Has anyone else ever seen it?
That trout was plaster-of-Paris.
Lights speaker's would be fantastic do an update
There are lots of different versions of this
DONT FIX IT! LET IT STAY BROKEN FOREVER!
Just watching this video, that fish annoys me. My in laws had one, and it wound up “missing” one day.
Yes I've heard about that happening before and I'm always when I've been somewhere that it's annoyed me I've secretly sneaked up on it turned off the switch for the sensor never got caught and if they said why is it not working I said did you check it's batteries or if it was on an AC adapter if it was out of you I unplug the adapter from wall outlet or power strip or extension cord that works well or if it was convenient covertly unplug AC adapter from fishy wall decoration either one but I was a fan of these but sometimes if it was on sensor mode it get quite annoying and wore off quickly the novelty although there are people reusing these and hooking them up to something else including a way to hook it to Alexa
Classic Case of the kids hammer'n the button,making fish fall to floor trick!
Father (as he takes his belt off)--OK,who broke my fish!?!?
Children (running ,screaming,and crying) I dont know WHAT happened,I wasnt here. LOL
subscribed - thanks to my mate vince
Thanks Andy, much appreciated 👍
Just because you can doesn’t mean you should 😅
Them things used to make me cry with laughter.
That first close up of Billy's face singing had me nearly pishing my pants mate. 😂 🤣Brilliant editing. 👍
Jeez they were everywhere in the early 2000's
Put Alexa on it, when Alexa talks the fish looks at you.
In this episode, we dissect a fish to make it sing and tell jokes.
ps. Billy the wonderfish sings once again.
Utterly obnoxious, landfill is the only place for those things.
Maby a little kid dropped it in a river 🤣🤣
You put Alexa in a radio now put it in big mouth billy!!
"Always check continuity with voltage present." -Nobody
it kind of sounded like when it cut out it was haunted by a demon
😂 very true!
@@StezStixFix are you suprised that goodwill had 2 and then one i got full works
@@benwilliams2469 yeah, that's amazing. Shame you missed out on the second one!
i love this fish
Nostalgia? - 1999 was only yesterday .