3rd Build?! 6 string neck through single cut bass!!!

[SIMpleONe89]

Sorry haven't been posting but I've done quite a fair bit of work.

After the glue dried, I had to clean up the laminates. For the headstock, I used my Shinto rasp to level the mahogany pieces, using the maple piece as the guide, since I had already shaped it to the correct size. I also used my orbital sander and a chisel to get the laminates flat.




I could've built a jig to route it flat but I didn't have enough material.

[SIMpleONe89]

Then I sanded the top edge to remove the glue and to make all laminates flat.


I really wished I had a drum sander, planer and a jointer to make life much easier!

But with the rock classics playing on Spotify, sanding wasn't so painful and I eventually got to this:


From this:

[SIMpleONe89]

Now it was time to work on the fretboard. I printed out a template for a 34" scale bass and cut the slots with my Hosco pull saw.


I had to make sure the slots were deeper to compensate for the radius later on because I was going to bind the fretboard. Because my plans call for a 79mm thickness at the 24th fret, and my fretboard was 75mm wide, I had to use some rosewood binding, 2mm each, to bring it to the correct width.

The rosewood binding would also help to hide the ugly fret tangs.

But before I could glue the binding on, I had to cut out the fretboard taper, taking into account the measurements without binding - 48mm at the nut and 75mm at the 24th fret.

[SIMpleONe89]

Then I cut out the fretboard with my jigsaw.


And tried to sand and plane the excess to the exact width.



This took too long and I was already tired from all the fret slotting and sanding. So I used a straight edge and routed it with a flush trim bit.

[wokkaboy]

great progress Simon it's coming along well so far !
I see you were even wearing shoes !

[SIMpleONe89]

Then I glued on the rosewood binding. I made a stupid mistake of trying to glue both at once. I saw a guy on youtube gluing the binding by driving the fretboard and binding into a wedge. I think I may have over done and one side of the binding wasn't flush with the bottom of the fretboard.


In hindsight I should have done one first with super glue and binding tape. This is what happens when you try to rush things, let alone rushing something I've not done before!

Anyway it turned out fine because it was only 1mm off the fretboard base. I then sanded it flat without sacrificing much. The fretboard blank was 8mm to start with and I took it down to 7mm.

After that, I proceeded to cut out the nut shelf.


Cleaned it up with a chisel and some files.


And now the nut sits perfectly.

[wokkaboy]

nice progress Simon, fingerboard looks excellent. It's ebony isn't it ?

[SIMpleONe89]

Thanks. That's Indian rosewood woks.

[vh2580]

Awesome Simon, and great step by step guide.

[dingobass]

Noice werk