Finished! Single cut bass - Alder and Camphor

WezV

looks good andy - I do like a nice modern single cut bass

Andyjr1515

WezV said:

looks good andy - I do like a nice modern single cut bass

Thanks @WezV

Sambostar

Looking at that wood.  Can you not make large pole pieces or hide a pickup behind the cap?  Guess not.  Seems a shame.

Andyjr1515

Sambostar said:

Looking at that wood.  Can you not make large pole pieces or hide a pickup behind the cap?  Guess not.  Seems a shame.

I do know what you mean - a lot of the interesting stuff will either be routed away or covered which is frustrating - but I don't think it is possible and be sure the final thing would work.  

Also - these things, well, just don't look right.  Think the early variaxes...I know it's daft, but they didn't look right

WezV

i think you can do more with basses than guitars - my basses have often ended up with wooden covers and knobs made from left over bits of the top.  I wouldn't do that on a guitar though

Andyjr1515

WezV said:

i think you can do more with basses than guitars - my basses have often ended up with wooden covers and knobs made from left over bits of the top.  I wouldn't do that on a guitar though

Lovely looking bass, @WezV.

Yes - this one will have covers too, but I think @Sambostar meant p/ups actually hidden under the main top (or have I misunderstood?)

WezV

I think he did too - but height adjustment is quite important so that is a no-no for me.. but using the offcuts of the top to add other features to the bass makes a lot more sense

Andyjr1515

WezV said:

I think he did too - but height adjustment is quite important so that is a no-no for me.. but using the offcuts of the top to add other features to the bass makes a lot more sense

Agreed. The guy I'm building it for wants ebony covers, but I'm going to see if I have any camphor off cuts big enough to be sliced as an alternative for him...

TTony

WezV said:

 using the offcuts of the top to add other features to the bass makes a lot more sense

Why is it that you can do that on a bass, but not on a guitar?

Is it because guitarists are so much more conservative in the design of their instruments?

WezV

That's pretty much it

Andyjr1515

I'm probably 'pushing the envelope' as far as MrsAndyjr1515 is concerned with the reckless neglect of jobs around the house and in the garden, but when it's not raining, bass building is simply what has to be done!

It's now starting to look like a bass proper - I've got the bandsawing of the neck done.

First of all, slimmed it down to body depth:

and then within a mm or so deeper than the final neck depth, got the basic side shape of the neck and headstock cut:

The fretboard shown is still the spare one and the headstock will have extra 'wings' and will also be ebony plated on the top.

For the slotted blank of the real fretboard, I've thinned that down by 1.5mm based on my calcs to get down to the slimness of the guy's favourite Warwick bass - a slim 23mm non-tapered depth. The reason is simple - with the blank ebony being a generous 8.5mm, once you'd added the depth of the truss-rod slot, there would only have been 1.5mm or so of depth left under the truss rod. Slimming down the ebony a tad has helped get that to a functional and safe thickness even when fully replicating his slim profile. There should be no reason why I can't fully replicate the dimensions and shape of the Warwick...

Now, for all of the reservations and downsides of my odd way of building, this is where is really comes into its own for me personally. Once I've finish sanded the top and sanded the straightness and radius on the fretboard, I can still final fit the neck depth and angle so that I know that the bridge is going to be in its optimum adjustment range for the correct action height of the finished bass. While you can calculate these things in advance and try to build exactly to plan, having glued the neck / top early, with hand tools and basic facilities, there are too many things that can be slightly different and which cumulatively can give you a problem. With a bolt-on neck, you just bung a shim in. But with a thru-neck that is already glued in, it can get a bit more complicated.

The other thing I've been looking at is the finishing (although that is still a little way off.  I've tapped into @WezV's experience with using zpoxy - thanks @WezV  - and will probably use that before rubbing right back down to the wood and finishing with the slurry tru-oil approach.  The reason for the zpoxy is that the camphor is quite open in places and I need a non-sinking but clear / sawdust matched filler to fill the voids before the final sanding and tru-oil treatment.  I'll let you all know how that goes  

I'm still enjoying this build enormously.   Thanks for looking!

Andyjr1515

The 'real' fretboard is now radiused to 12" and I have agreed the headstock shape with the guy I'm building it for.

He was looking for a medium-sized, ebony-plated non-symmetrical that reflected the vibe of the body.  This is the design we've agreed:

What it tries to do is give a passing nod to the shape of the body, with the cutout exposing the mahogany and walnut to balance the colour.

In proportion, it will be like this:

The neck will, of course, be slimmer than this when it's finished but I think it bodes well for the overall finished look.

Andy

Andyjr1515

There are two items in the design brief I have been getting my head around - to try to make this as light as possible without neck dive and to have covered pickups.

 

I have combined those two requirements by routing the pickup chambers both to the largest width / length - which is basically the neck pickup, squared up, taking a bit more wood and weight out. It has the added advantage that if the guy who I’m building this for ever wants to replace the PJ's with super-triple-gargantuan-flipper buckers, it'll be a doddle

 

The challenge was covers. Never made those before and I only had enough camphor left over for a single shot at it. I decided that I would go for free-hand routing the chamber and then cut the shape out. The camphor offcut still has the wenge veneer stuck to it, but I thought I would leave that on for the time being. Here it is during the chamber-routing process:

 

I went for the small router base on the little bosch because it's easier to see what is going on. I was aiming for a 1.5mm - 2.0mm thickness at the top and 5mm max sides (which will probably be sanded down a bit)

 

I then cut the shapes out with a pull-saw and did an initial tidy up with the sander. They will be sanded further to angle the sides a bit and dome the top a touch, and will have the veneer taken off and sanded down to finished height, but at least I now know I don't have to revert to redoing them in ebony! They finished at 1.5mm thick which I'm very pleased about  

strtdv

Looks fantastic.

@Andyjr1515 I don't suppose you've previously made a Thumb bass have you? I seem to remember seeing one with the twin birds on the headstock over on basschat.

Andyjr1515

strtdv said:

Looks fantastic.

@Andyjr1515 I don't suppose you've previously made a Thumb bass have you? I seem to remember seeing one with the twin birds on the headstock over on basschat.

Yes - that's me.  Well spotted 

strtdv

I thought I'd seen that headstock inlay before!

Well the Thumb was beautiful (although I have a particular soft spot for Thumbs), and I have no doubt the finished article here will be stunning too.

Andyjr1515

strtdv said:

I thought I'd seen that headstock inlay before!

Well the Thumb was beautiful (although I have a particular soft spot for Thumbs), and I have no doubt the finished article here will be stunning too.

Thanks

Andyjr1515

I've capped the truss rod and started the final rough body sanding before I glue on the ebony fretboard and start the neck carve.  Here's the front and back:

Also, I will be doing as much of the general sanding before the ebony goes on.  The alder won't need much, but the camphor is VERY open on the end grain, so I've started slurrying to give it plenty of time to fill dry and shrink.  I was going to use Z-poxy as a clear filler but, after a few trials, wasn't entirely sure about it on this particular wood.

The first slurry coat (tru-oil) immediately shows the potential!

Andyjr1515

Bit more done on this.  

The headstock faceplate and truss rod cover and routed and inlaid.  Bit of gap filling still to do for the large swift:

The body has been final sanded and initial seal applied.  I like the shade the alder is settling down to:

...and the fretboard has been slimmed to finish size, glued and clamped.  Forgive the mess resulting from last night's gig and bringing everything indoors out of the incessant rain.  Note the pack of printing paper preventing the bench tipping over and ruining everybody's day (and the threadlock stain on the rug that ruined Andyjr1515's day when Mrs Andyjr1515 saw it)

Me and Kert, the guy I'm building it for, are opting for restricting the number of frets to 20 and 21 to avoid having to cover up this feature of the figuring:

paulnb57

Have a wow!