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Ding Ding Ding....now that is an idea I like. Thanks Simon. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Simon Barden
Investigation for alternatives to follow.
Edit:-
This is one of a number of colours available.
https://www.bunnings.com.au/bondall-...rosol_p1580425
I ventured to the big green shed today and grabbed a can of this tinted varnish stuff.
https://www.bunnings.com.au/bondall-...rosol_p1580425
I had a choice of only CEDAR and JARRAH. Cedar on their website looked very red....the Jarrah not so much.
I put another group of coats over the veneer today....three sprays separated by ten minutes each.
This veneer has some very deep holes....heaps of them.
I will let it hang now and then do a light sand over it and see if I can fill some of these pits. Wow.
Lots of coats of the spray poly had not filled the veneer. Even though I did three chunky custard coats of timber mate beforehand.
So YouTube prowling I did go.
Well I tracked three different consistency CA glue down for a good price on E Bay....did two coats of each, and a sand with 320.
I have a couple of pits left...but wow is the finish hard.
Back to work now, so will attack the pits next week.
https://youtu.be/-YNF0O7Zjvc .....the video
The glue....from here in Australia...and delivered quick.
https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/324261161494
I put her together today. The headless part is a pain....had to replace the E string with another A string to get the string through the top of the headstock. The E string lip where that fat section tapers down would not pass through the mount and there was not enough adjustment at the bum end.
Have to say that the Overlord of music bridge is an interesting effort in futility to get in the right location, mount, get strings on, and adjust.
I did not notice that this neck has a zero fret and no nut until I started to add strings. This may prove interesting to get a low action with.
Intonation is the next issue.....the zero fret to 12th fret measurement was 432mm. I allowed an extra 5mm for the run to the bridge saddles....and even then it was not enough to get the big adjusters out in the space at the bottom of the guitar. I had to go back about 12mm all up. I hope that once I get the string height etc down....the intonation is close.
Pic 1 is a headless bass kit neck photo with a nut. (Google search of one from an E-Bay listing.)
Pic 2 is the kit neck with a zero fret.
Pic 3 is the TIGER in her glory.
It looks very nice indeed.
Are the stings new ones or are they the kit strings?
Drill out a bigger hole for the low E, or is it the physical orientation that's wrong?
Looking very nice. I just took a small round file to just about every aspect of the nut casting to clean it up and it was enough to get the thick part of the e string through. Just.
Out of curiousity, what's the action height like on yours?
I have it together and settling. The action height is enormous and I will have to think about what I do from here. With a normal Bass I would use a cut up business card deep in the neck pocket to try and reduce some of this.....not even close on this build.Quote:
Originally Posted by blinddrew
I think I may have to make a wooden veneer full length neck pocket shim this time.
Nice thoughts with the E string...thanks. But my A substitute sounds just fine at the moment.
Simon....the string end mount has two bends of 90 degrees the string must traverse. The fat section of the E string will not make even the first bend.Quote:
Originally Posted by Simon Barden
I see Drews idea of the small file....but right now I think I will let the neck settle in under tension and then look at my options.
"The Action" is a chasm away from the fretboard, and I will have to consider options on this.
I like the feel and the look of the Bass....just the correct mechanics for it to be instrument will need some caressing.
Yep, the action on mine is huge as well. I've ordered some maple veneer to make a shim, or two...
I am thinking I may have to recess the bridge.
I have tried ridiculous amounts of business cards...as they are disposable to try and get a thickness of wood veneer shim I would have to make to try and get the bridge height adjustment to actually matter with this Bass. Sadly, No go....6 was the limit for me...the pics are with 2.
I am thinking, from reading some other posts and threads, that I may have to recess the bridge. I saw one thread where the toploading Guitar Fetish big lump of metal bridge produced the same outcome.
I have little leather cutting chisels and an Aldi router that can freehand and fit a router table. I am worried that the chisels will not produce a level and smooth bass for the bridge to sit on.....and that the router will take off across the top and make one ungodly mess.
I am thinking that a 3 mm recess may be a good place to start and I am tempted to just try that with the chisels and one gouge shaped chisel thing I have.
One saving grace is that the bridge and headless nature of this Bass allows such easy string removal. So as long as I can work out how to take the recess right through to the bottom edge of the Bass, so I can hang the string winders out in space, I am good I think.
Some pics as she sits now with 2 business cards full length under the neck......yeah 2.....and all height adjustment wound out of the bridge saddles.
Maybe some graduated shims only at the back of the neck to raise the neck angle will work?
I'd definitely be trying shims before recessing the bridge.
That looks like about a 7mm gap. So if you wanted a 2mm action, you would have to add a 5mm shim under the neck, if they were parallel shims.
If you used the suggestion of a tapered shim, it would have to be around 1mm at the thick end. That is assuming the length of the neck/body contact surface is 50mm. You could test it by putting a 1mm shim - like a match stick shape - right up in the neck pocket to simulate the thick end of the wedge, and see how the action looks then. Or you could cut 5mm wide strips of business card and put them in the corner of the neck pocket.
Yeah I'd be using tapered ones to create a break angle and let you adjust the bridge saddles up a bit. As you say you can test the theory first by just putting something at the end of the pocket. I like using feeler gauges, they are cheap and neat and can give very precise increments of adjustment. It might not solve the issue, but it's something you can do without any drastic surgery.
It looks like the neck has a negative angle compared to the body, so it’s pointing down at it, which isn’t good/right.
Are you using just a sliver of card at the body end of the neck pocket, or a whole card sitting flat along the whole pocket? The first is far more effective at creating more of an angle as dwubyd says.
I presume the truss rod has currently been set for the neck to be as flat as possible? Any relief above a fraction of a mm will be adding to the string height issue.
With no card shims, what is the neck angle relative to the body?
The action is the same on mine. I'm going to try the angled-shim approach. When my shims turn up.
Thanks for all the ideas guys.
I tried the full length shims and no go.
Then I tried the 1/3 to 1/2 length shims...again just from business cards....I managed to get the action down to about 8/64ths of an inch over the 17th fret.
The frets are all levelled, and the neck relief has been set at 0.015 thousands of an inch at the ninth fret. The neck was dead flat prior to strings being attached. The neck joins the body at the 19th fret, and I figure the 9th fret is pretty close to halfway.
I have set the pickups to be 3mm under the bass strings with the string held down at the last fret, and 2.5mm on the treble side.
I will have to find something to go in between 3 and 4 business cards.....may actually have to make a shim out of veneer.
I have to say she sounds pretty gutsy when plugged in to my amp....the action is about 3/64 too tall for me.
I also took the extra A string off....found the kit E string...dug out a file and now the E string is fitted. The E string does the same as the A string that was fitted in its place....it has a funny metallic hollow sound when plucked as an open string. When it is fretted at any fret, including the zero fret it is wonderfully clean. I think it may be a challenge without a NUT. Maybe some fabric or felt under the strings may help to mute the string noise over the zero fret. I think that the E string is so fat it does not bend the 90 degrees under the string lock and through the headstock flat, and appears to have a wide arc that produces a noise when it is plucked.
I hope the string will settle down.
My last build on the table, and may be last one for some time, life does get in the way.
The kit was a customer return on the sales/seconds list. Maple neck, real rosewood fingerboard, Mahogany body with a thin zebrawood veneer...and she made 36 guitars/basses in my possession.
Issues along the way, as is the norm, and some very helpful ideas and suggestions from the forum. Thank You all.
Highlights for me:-
The veneer has pores and holes all over, and lots and lots of glue squeeze out on the top....showed as white dots and marks all over. (Thank you Simon for the tinted spray poly idea...worked well.)
The neck and fingerboard were super easy using my norm of Feast Watson Fine Buffing Oil and then Gillys cabinetmakers Wax and Carnauba Polish. That went through really easy.
The body finish only came together with the use of C.A. glue. The glue filled the pits, pores and holes. It sanded really well and gave a solid and very smooth, plastic feeling though, finish. Spray poly from both Cabots and Bondall stick to it like glue.
The front has many coats of CA glue and then about 6 coats of spray Cabots gloss poly. It then has one lot of three coats sprayed 10 minutes apart of the Bondall tinted poly gloss....Jarrah colour I think.
The back and sides are stained with Feast Watson Prooftint Maple stain....alcohol based. Then three coats only of the C.A. glue. Then just 3 x lots of 3 spray coats of Cabots poly.
Remaining issues:-
The neck height and the bridge saddles are pretty good now....three different lengths of cut up business card to create a slope is the answer.
The E string, as you can see in one of the pictures, is just too thick to push down on the ZERO fret. I will let it settle and then try again. I don't want to strip out the thread on the light cast string mounts and locks. So, the E string when played open has an annoying rattle...at the Zero Fret. It is therefore an #$@% to tune on that string.
The pickups are the normal low output humbuckers that come in the kits. I just punch the AMP a little and it sounds great.
Overall it is just weird to play with no headstock and no tuners. The weight is ALL down low and it lends itself really well to a strap even sitting down. However, it still remains quite light even with the OVERLORD bridge.
So ladies and gentlemen I present to you the TIGER. :)
And four more....
Looks great. Well done.
What strings/gauge are being used and how are they fixed? A 0.090" E would be more flexible than a 0.105" E here and may sit better . Difficult to see much detail in the pics. Are they normal strings with the ends cut off?
Is it a question of finding strings where the fat bit ends just as it goes over the zero fret, so just the thinner bit goes through the clamp? If you measure carefully, you may find that some brands of medium scale bass strings have just enough wound length - though it's an expensive experiment if they don't or the wound section is too long! And my experience is that regardless of what the official wound length is, the fully wound length can vary considerably.