I know you've been taking a break from building, but I am curious if you've figured out a solution to the routing for the pups?
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I know you've been taking a break from building, but I am curious if you've figured out a solution to the routing for the pups?
Not yet. I've now bought the materials to make up the basic jig to hold the body in and provide a flat surface for the router to sit on, but haven't put it together yet. I was working on the headstock yesterday as I needed to drill my own tuner holes. As the factory holes were normally a bit wonky, I asked for an undrilled headstock, which also let me choose the tuners I wanted without worrying about whether the standard holes were too big or small. The Hipshot tuners I ended up with require a 17mm hole, which is quite large.
However, after drilling small pilot holes I simply couldn't find the set of forstner bits I'd bought a couple of weeks ago (I was being forced to tidy up by the wife, mutter mutter). So I've had to order another set which should turn up later today. So at least I'm making some progress on it.
The new set of Forster bits turned up, so it was 'drill the headstock time'.
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Then time for a test fitting of the machine heads.
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I've since stuck the MOP veneer on for backing for the logo and name. Tomorrow this and the ES-1/330 headstock faces get re-sprayed with several coats of black nitro to get the paint to slightly more that the thickness of the MOP veneer.
I've also started constructing the routing jig. Did a lot of cutting out today and drilling holes, but only got the sides attached to the baseplate as I'm waiting for the glue to dry properly (its screwed as well) before doing any more.
What's the weird contraption on the E tuner? Is it a tuning dropper?
That's exactly what it is. I think Hipshot has its name from a detuner they made for Telecasters that was activated by the player's hip. They don't sell it any more, but one of their next big ideas was a thumb activated drop-D detuner for basses. They've been making them ever since ;-)Quote:
Originally Posted by blinddrew
To put in the FWIW category. I just did a couple of measurements, and have been looking at pups that will fit my next project. In the process I made an accidental discovery. It looks like the center block in an ESB-4 is about 96mm wide. The pups you have are about 89mm wide. That won't give you much extra room... Just FYI ;-)
Yes, its a Hipshot Xtender. Flip the lever and it allows the tuner to rotate a set amount (adjustable) to drop down to an D (or whatever drop you want within reason). You can even get an extra lever for them to allow you to drop to one of two pre-set tunings. Of course the more you drop, the looser the string becomes, so you need to use fairly heavy strings so the E string doesn't get too floppy.
I'm making the bass for a friend, and I've been fitting these to all his basses. He first saw one when I got my used Lakland Bob Glaub (P-style) bass, and that had one fitted and was very taken by it.
Guess you can't just use a banjo tuner on a bass. :)
You realise that you're now eternally damned for saying that. ;)
I think the reason for the standard bridged pulling out is the ridiculously soft wood used for the central block. I just drilled the two rear mounting holes out to 1/2" and a bit deeper to fit the wider and longer insert posts in, and each one took around a second to do, there was no resistance at all. There really isn't anything to keep the posts in place, especially the fairly short kit ones. I think I'll be strengthening the sides with some superglue, to help them hold together. Hopefully the longer inserts will distribute the load more evenly.
Just checked out your build, wow this guitar is in the right hands, imagine if a newbie ordered it he/she would be a quivering mess curled up in the corner.Quote:
Originally Posted by Simon Barden
Well. It's harder because it was custom ordered without the pickups routed and the headstock holed drilled, because a) I didn't know what pickups I wanted to fit and b), the normal tuner holes on these are a bit wonky and also I wasn't sure what size of hole I required (they are now larger than the stock tuner holes) or their placement (due to the Hipshot Xtender tuner requirement), and drilling them from scratch was a lot easier than plugging and re-drilling.
They are notorious for pull out even on mahogany bodies, so I am sure the soft wood does not help. The other thing I just noticed is that the width between the far edges of side holes is 96mm. The center-block is not much wider than that. Maybe just a couple of mm on each side.Quote:
Originally Posted by Simon Barden
On mine that was drilled a little off center and thus, off the center block. I reinforced with a piece of poplar that I glued, and then held in place for 20 min while the tight bond set. Then left it for a couple of days to fully cure. I am not sure how much that would help in your case. I would be inclined to find some sort of a string-through approach to pull the bridge onto the deck.
I just noticed this pic:
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Just a photo to show why the original Fender sized Hipshot tuners and Xtender wouldn't fit on the headstock and had to be replaced by Hipshot lite variants.
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That really is quite a small headstock for a bass isn't it?
Well, it's not massive but it was designed for four Fender style tuners. Standard tuners do fit on, it's the large footprint of the Extender key that's the problem here. Also, with the bass being semi-acoustic, the headstock doesn't want to be too large for fear of making it neck-heavy. Probably less of an issue on the original Gibson basses where the bodies were much heavier, but the basswood bodies and centre block wood on the PBG kits are much lighter.
I did consider fitting extra wings to the headstock to make it wider, but then it would have looked almost square and all wrong.
The best part about this model is it's weight. I am getting to like the neck better over time, although it feels wide to me. But I keep picking it up because my back likes it so much better than my solid body basses that weigh in at ~9 lbs. I would guess its around half the weight. Still the long maple neck and full sized tuners (even w/o a hipshot) produce a little neck-dive. Nothing extreme, but the light tuners should help.
I'm still working on the headstock for this as the last attempt was another failure. But yesterday I though I'd check that the neck and bridge all aligned and that the neck angle (height-wise) was correct.
But of course as the great Albert King sang; ' If it wasn't for bad luck, I wouldn't have no luck at all'.
Both of these were wrong. The neck centreline, by the time it got to the bridge position, was about a full saddle out, and the neck angle meant that the strings were about 1cm high.
I first tackled the neck break angle by sanding down the heel until a straight edge along the neck hit the bridge about 2mm below the top of the saddles. I didn't want to have to raise the saddles too much (on the Hipshot bridge I've got, the saddles were at their lowest position so can only be raised), as this would increase the upwards leverage on the bridge post inserts. So I'm happy with that now.
Remember that I'm fitting my own pickups which are a body-mounting soapbar style, so I don't need to worry about the strings clearing pickup rings with a lesser neck angle and the associated drop in string height across the body. The pickups just get lowered until they have enough clearance.
Then on to the neck angle with relation to the bass' centreline. You may remember that the neck pocket was originally too wide, so I glued a strip of maple veneer to each side of it for a snug fit. So the original pocket orientation was kept, which meant that it was just very poorly routed in the first place. So the first step was to sand away at the veneer strips with a small drum sander and a sanding block, to angle the neck back towards the centreline. I did this but it was not enough. So some more sanding was required until I now had enough space to angle the neck correctly. But this left big gaps down the sides of the neck, so it was then time for more bits of veneer, trying to form at least a reasonable filling of the gaps with wood to minimise any actual filler required.
However, this awkward neck join now means that I won't be doing my original single-colour finish idea on it, as it's going to need something fairly solid in colour to hide the mess around the join, so I'm now thinking some sort of sunburst is required.
Glueing the veneer pieces:
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And the two sides of the pocket this morning with the clamp and tape removed:
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I won't touch it until tomorrow now until the glue's all dried properly. I'll then need to do some more sanding and see what's what after that. I may then fit a full sized piece of veneer along the treble side and sand that back a bit until the neck fits in tightly again. We'll see. After that, it's time to make the routs for the pickups.
Mmmm some delicate work mate, it’s looking like a tricky fix
I am really looking forward to seeing how you do the routs... What sort of rig you make, and tools you use.
When I had a gap on my ESB-4 I used a fillet made of maple that was just short of life-threatening to cut on my small bench saw. It never occurred to me to use veneer, and I really like the idea.
Sorry about the problems with getting things to line up. This seems to be a pretty regular issue with this model. From the way things line up, I think they are using separate jigs for the holes, the neck rout and the pickup routs (I know you don't have the latter)...and they are not getting them to line up perfectly.
So far, by my count, Gavin has been the only one to get a fully transparent finish on the top of one of these. I am getting sort of fatalistic about it.
These ES style kits all seem to be a bit of a challenge around the neck pocket fitment area. The 6 stringer I am doing at the moment wasn't too bad but as rough as inside the neck pocket that required very delicate sanding back, and yes, there were tell tale gaps that needed to be filled making it harder to get a smooth clean look with a stained finish.
I am guessing that you have not routed the pickups yet? I am about to do a small route to the neck pocket...I am away next week, so I'll either try it this week or the one following next week. If you have your approach sussed out, I'd love to hear it. If not, I'll post (somewhere) how I did it and how it ended up.
My basic plan is to use parts of the body that already have a hole or are routed. In my case that will be the neck pocket and the pickup routs. In your case it I would do it with a wood block clamped into the neck pocket and the pre drilled bridge holes. You could put a dowel in the hole, and a screw through it to secure the routing template platform to the wood under the bridge holes. You could screw the platform down to the wood block clamped in place in the neck pocket.
Once the platform is secure, I plan to use some wedges that I got from the big box hardware store that are normally used for leveling door frames. I will work these in place so that the platform can't rock or move. Once it can't wiggle, I'll use bungies or bicycle inner-tubes to make everything secure.
I'll use a slight modification of the routing platform template that I posted a pic of a few pages back in this thread. Anyway, FWIW it's the best idea I've had. Would love to hear your thoughts, since I know you've been noodling on the same problem.