My First Scratch Build

Hi all :)

Last year I applied to join a Men's Shed because my access to tools was much more limited after moving from 4 bedroom on a 1/4 acre block with a small work space under the house, to a 2 bedroom villa with higher density neighbours to deal with.

Due to Covid restrictions I wasn't able to fulfil the requirements to complete the joining process till now. As it turns out, one of the guys there makes guitars, and I have been instructed that I must make scratch built instruments in future

OK I says. Since the kit for Mean Gene is on a slow boat from China, and I'm still waiting for my pups for Dora to leave Frankfurt, I figured I'd crack on. And here it is! the completed bass... Bomber!

Attachment 39152


Isn't it awesome? It sounds realy kewl. Shame I can't enter it in to the GOTM. For some reason, I seem to be the only one that can hear it. I suspect I'll be asked to make another.......I have a feeling he will argue that MDF isn't a tone wood......

I saw what you did there! I have an MDF Jazzmaster underway at the moment!

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Originally Posted by FrankenWashie

I saw what you did there! I have an MDF Jazzmaster underway at the moment!

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Kewlies! I think we should start a movement promoting MDF as a tonewood.... I mean it's soo much easier to deal with than mahogany or maple, and you don't have issues with tear out when you machine it! I'm still having a hard time finding an MDF truss rod........

Heh, when I did my flying V it used an MDF Fascia, did the same thing on the recent white offset. I just refer to it as 'Reverbanite'.

Comes in handy as a cheap way to mock up a custom pick-guard before committing it to acrylic.

cheers, Mark.

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Originally Posted by king casey

Comes in handy as a cheap way to mock up a custom pick-guard before committing it to acrylic.

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Acrylic as a tone wood? AWESOME!!!!!

Bugger! Seems I've run into a snag with MDF as tone wood. Aside from not being able to convince him that MDF was a legitimate tone wood, apparently you aren't allowed to use MDF in the shed. Something about the glue that binds the fibres being carcinogenic apparently .......I dunno, as far as I can tell, *everything* causes cancer!

Yep, got to take care when cutting MDF.

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Originally Posted by DarkMark

Yep, got to take care when cutting MDF.

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Erm, I think ya kinda gotta be careful when cutting *any* material!

(I hear it's very important to line up the v made from thumb and forefinger with the blade of the band saw when pushing timber into the blade........)

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Originally Posted by Rabbit

Erm, I think ya kinda gotta be careful when cutting *any* material!

(I hear it's very important to line up the v made from thumb and forefinger with the blade of the band saw when pushing timber into the blade........)

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Only if you have a spare thumb or a suitably skilled Igor close by.

Well, I went to one place looking for timber... a bit too pricey. Sadly I will have to go back there to get one timber which apparently the next shipment they get will be the last... it's now listed. No one else has it, and the piece they had that was long enough is about 4 times as much as I neeed! I looked at average densities, and I'm thinking about using cherry for the sides of the body. It's a neck through .

Any thoughts?

Where did you go? Depending on where you are there are always options.


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Trend in NSW.AnnaGoat and Mathews were a no go, and Harpers has turned into a hardware store!

I'm spoiled. Anagote is 15 minutes from my place, and Swadlings has two places within 10-15 minutes drive of my joint. I'd not come across trend or Mathews before. Picked up some nice slab sawn maple from Anagote a couple of weeks back. They also have boxes of offcuts which can yield some great little pieces for smaller projects and box work etc.

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Originally Posted by FrankenWashie

I'm spoiled. Anagote is 15 minutes from my place, and Swadlings has two places within 10-15 minutes drive of my joint. I'd not come across trend or Mathews before. Picked up some nice slab sawn maple from Anagote a couple of weeks back. They also have boxes of offcuts which can yield some great little pieces for smaller projects and box work etc.

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Great little pieces? Unfortunately, little pieces usually means short. This is for the neck of a neck through bass... so I'm talking 1.5m length, x2 (I'm doing a rick 4001 replica later. Everything is a long drive for me, exept maybe Harpers. Both Harpers (when they were a decent soucrce) and Mathews cater more towards furniture maker. Mathews have way better prices, but the pieces are a good length. They have rock maple, cherry and mahogany in ample supply. Not so much some of the other exotics. When I built my canoe I had a hard time finding stuff like cherry, and every time I needed timber I had to order it and wait a couple of weeks or so for it to come in. It was never the dimensions that I needed and I didn't at the time have access to tools to take over sized stuff and cut what I needed, so I had to also spend money on wasting timber. White The white Oak I orderd I needed 16mm and it only came as 25mm, so I paid for 25mm, only got 16 and the rest became wood chips spat out by their thicknesser. Now I have access to a bandsaw so I could do something with the excess now.

Still need a few people chiming in with my question about using cherry for the body?

We went shopping!

I went back to Trend to pay too much for a piece of Ovangkol (pics of cutup Ovangkol posted on my second scratch build thread). Thursday I went to Mathews to get rock maple. I was going to get some cherry as well, but I only needed about a meter. This place caters for furniture makers. Prices are much more reasonable, but good luck getting anything under 3m :rolleyes:.

Luckily they also are prepared to cut the pieces into sizes you can fit in your car (I could have roof racked it, but then I'd have to put the roof racks on and strap it down... better to get the 3m length cut into 2 x 1.5 meter lengths... perfect for cutting into laminates for a neck through bass :cool: . I got lucky in that the guy I was with was after 2m of the 50mm stuff and I was after 1m, so we pooled together to get a 3m length cut accordingly.

https://hosting.photobucket.com/imag...080&fit=bounds

So, 2 x 1.5m x 36mm x 224mm and 1 x 1m x 50mm x 280mm.

I did a quick mock up of the side profile of Bomber (the bass for this build) and realised I didn't need to cut 100mm laminates, it will fit inside 50mm. The upshot is there is enough material for this build, my 2nd scratch build (precipice), and the extra material I need for my 3rd Pit Bull build (Mean Gene). The down side is ... Rock Maple = heavy.

Finally making a little progress. I cut my maple and got the glue-up going for the blank... it's a neck through bass.

https://hosting.photobucket.com/imag...gh_glue_up.jpg

And after the glue set, cut it into two blanks:

https://hosting.photobucket.com/imag...ugh_blanks.jpg

The one on the left is the blank for this build (bomber). The one on the right is for the Clifenbacker.