Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Share Posted December 24, 2008 Build Diary: Five String Fanned Fret Bass with pre-amp I want to put together a fanned-fret 5-string, low E to high C, 34.5" scale for the low E up to 32.5" scale for the C. 46mm nut, some wood left over from previous builds include some nice sawn and planed maple for a bolt-on neck, and a mahogany-zebrano sandwich body. Here's first plan sketch Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 Started work on the body. Here's the shape copied onto Simo's Sapele, I sandwiched a thin veneer of white wood into the join, which adds a nice centre-line mark and also helps to hide any of my bad jointing. Here's the basic body shape jigsawed out, sanded smooth and some countouring started. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 A little more progress on the body. Back edges rounded over, control cavity routed, sunken recess made in the tail cut for locking Neutrik jackplug. Since I seem to have got a bit of a Dingwall thing going here, I thought I'd make use of some of their really cool little design details. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 Progress started on the neck. Maple blocks glued together with a thin light wood veneer centre stripe to match the body. Here the truss rod channel has been routed, truss rod installed and the wood fillet inserted over the top and and planed flat. On previous builds I have really struggled to get a nice neat trim fillet after mucking about with planes and sanders. This time I used a rasp and surform and got it flush and smooth in about 30 seconds. Marvellous! Never neglect those little hand tools, these silly little jobs can be a real pain with the big power tools and a small surform stands far less chance of taking nasty chunks out of your neck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 Work started on cutting the neck and head profile. The extra length of channel I stupidly routed for the truss rod has been filled with a strip of rosewood left over from trimming the Ricky fingerboard to size. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 Fingerboard arrived, nice thick slab of ebony. Almost feels like stone. Started cutting the fanned frets. [Note to self for next build: I'd be happier with the pickup an inch or two further back, and about quarter of an inch wider neck to play with where it joins the body.] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 More progress; fingerboard trimmed, radiussed, slotted and dotted. Body has acquired a jb bridge pup and a mini three-way toggle. Wierd perspective tricks with these fanned fret and staggered bridge builds, the photo makes it look like the pickups are skewed but they are perfectly perpendicular to the centre line. I have a few MOP inlay circles left of various size, and was going to add some sort of extra design at F12, but with the small and simple circle markers against the dark ebony, i think it looks a lot more classy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 face-on shot with the hardware positioned and fretwires cut, ready to be bashed into place with the heel of an old shoe. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 Small inlay detail, bloodwood set in copper. Fingerboard's still a bit damp from the oil Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 Some more progress. Neck trimmed flush (pocket routed deeper) and the electrics all wired up. Neck given a few wipes of Tru-Oil - more to follow. I also inlaid a little copper-ring bloodwood circle into the headstock. Now just waiting for the machine heads, then the nut can be cut, and frets levelled. Then she's done Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 Finally got the machine heads on and a set of strings. Nut cut rough, needs a good setup now but she's all working and making some of the right noises. A fair bit of fret buzz in places for now but nothing that a bit of levelling won't solve. I must say it does feel very comfortable virtually striaght off the bat playing fanned frets, far easier than I was expecting. I've really enjoyed putting her together and learning a bit more about this great craft. I think a decent pre-amp system is on the shopping list for the end of the month. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
velvetkevorkian Posted December 24, 2008 Share Posted December 24, 2008 Woah! That's f***ing awesome! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnnylager Posted December 24, 2008 Share Posted December 24, 2008 Bloody hell, nice work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigRedX Posted December 24, 2008 Share Posted December 24, 2008 Nice to see that again (and the slightly scary eggs!) Any extra news to post since this was up on TalkBass? Have you upgraded the pre-amp yet? You should post your Rickenfaker build here - there's more than a few people who would be interested in that who might have missed it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kiwi Posted December 24, 2008 Share Posted December 24, 2008 Lovely job! You're right about the fanned frets creating an optical illusion. What did the eggs think of it? They look worried. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wizbat Posted December 24, 2008 Share Posted December 24, 2008 Thats a sweet bass there!!! If you have a Rickenfaker then you really should post some details and pics in the 'rickenbuggery' thread in gear porn. This sounds fun!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 [quote name='BigRedX' post='362775' date='Dec 24 2008, 01:20 PM']Nice to see that again (and the slightly scary eggs!) Any extra news to post since this was up on TalkBass? Have you upgraded the pre-amp yet? You should post your Rickenfaker build here - there's more than a few people who would be interested in that who might have missed it.[/quote] Thanks mate! I've reset the neck and added an active/passive switch since last time but stuck with the same pre-amp. Need to start playing it more, at the moment I'm in love with my jazz bass. I will port the Lemonbacker project over shortly... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mikey R Posted December 24, 2008 Share Posted December 24, 2008 (edited) [quote name='Al Heeley' post='362798' date='Dec 24 2008, 02:08 PM']Thanks mate! I've reset the neck and added an active/passive switch since last time but stuck with the same pre-amp. Need to start playing it more, at the moment I'm in love with my jazz bass. I will port the Lemonbacker project over shortly...[/quote] Hi Al, good to see you over here! This bass was the original inspiration for me trying my fanned 5 So Im guessing resetting the neck made all the difference? How did you do that? Re-routed then shimmed? Edited December 24, 2008 by Mikey R Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 24, 2008 Author Share Posted December 24, 2008 Hi Mikey, I fashioned a couple of thin shims to raise the height a couple of mm and tighten the pocket. A snugger fit has helped improve action and resonance from neck to body. The whole bridge thing was a major pain on this bass, I wanted slightly closer spacings to go in line with the neck profile. Add that one to the learning curve. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peted Posted December 24, 2008 Share Posted December 24, 2008 Wow! I read the thread on this on Talk Bass just this week (I very occasionally lurk there, not signed up). This is an awesome bass. I've got Jon Shuker making me a fanned-fret 6 string singlecut with not too dissimilar scale lengths to what you've got there. The fanning looks far superior to the 'extreme' stuff you get on Dingwalls. Awesome bass. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
d-basser Posted December 24, 2008 Share Posted December 24, 2008 SUPERIOR TO A DINGWALL!?! nothing is superior to a 37" B! that build looks awesome though, lovely piece of work Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mikey R Posted December 26, 2008 Share Posted December 26, 2008 [quote name='d-basser' post='363142' date='Dec 24 2008, 11:16 PM']SUPERIOR TO A DINGWALL!?! nothing is superior to a 37" B! that build looks awesome though, lovely piece of work[/quote] I think I remember its strung with a high C rather than a low B Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Heeley Posted December 26, 2008 Author Share Posted December 26, 2008 You're right Mikey - I already have a Warmoth 5-string with a low B, wanted to have a High C 5-string to play, hence kept the scale length more conservative. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
d-basser Posted December 26, 2008 Share Posted December 26, 2008 ah well that makes sense Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
josh3184 Posted January 9, 2009 Share Posted January 9, 2009 this is amazing, wonderful job on this man! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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