I plan on starting my AGB-30 build this evening. This will be my first instrument build. I can't actually play bass but I figure that isn't a good reason not to build one. I've been abusing ukuleles for a couple years and I figure a Bass has four strings too so how hard could it be ! Actually I owned a Yamaha 504 for a couple of weeks and it was very hard. It also felt like I was hugging an anvil and it made my elbow ache so I returned it and started looking for a short scale bass.
The kit was very well packaged and I've very pleased with the way they tried to match the grain of the two pieces of the body. I really don't like the look of the head stock and wanted to change it but yesterday I realized that the AGB-30 is based on the Epiphone/Gibson EB-0/EB-3 so I'm just going to leave it as it is.
During the mock build I found that the holes for the threaded inserts for the bridge are too large. Also the surround for the front pickup is interfering with the seating of the neck but that shouldn't be too hard to fix.
The fanciest thing I plan on doing for the build is bit more contouring to make it more comfortable and using some black dye for black/bright finish. I would like to use tru-oil for the finish so I'll have to test to see how it reacts to the alchohol based dye (Solar-Lux NGR Dye Stain).
Here's a link to my gallery. I'll try to figure out how to get the photos to post inline later.
https://1drv.ms/a/s!AnXWCJ4NsjaiioQedzY8Z-tTeuQYGQ
-Hugh