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I'm the fatty on the right. 8 year old is mastering the drums and now starting on the bass. Pound shop Peter Hoot and Jack Bates...

I'd suggest that while we are in lockdown you stop washing your clothes. No one will notice.

The LORD tells us that Idle hands are the devil's workshop... and thus did it come to pass that I unexpectedly stumbled across this unholy beast. Almost immediately, voluminous clouds of sulphurous GAS appeared. Eww! Save me, Jebus! But I've been yearning for one of these - on and off - for many years, particularly in Polar White. After an epic struggle with my inner thoughts and feelings the planets all lined up and lo, it fell into my hot 'n' heavy heathen's hands. It has accumulated a fair number of dings, dents and scuffs over its 37 years and the Hipshot tuners are clearly not original - but the rest of it is, including the monstrous 3-band EQ-B Tone System, Sure-Grip Controls, P5S and J5S pickups, Accu-cast Bridge, 5-piece maple and walnut laminate through-neck (with steel tone bars), ebony board, ash wings and original green velvet-lined leather case. Serial number dates it to May, 1983. Build quality is superlative. Finish is a heavenly cream pearl under a light amber lacquer with highlights of gold and green. Very lush. It looks like butter, but plays more like silk. A stunning range of big, bold, very usable sounds on tap. Incredibly responsive, hugely playable and punchier than Punchy McPunch, winner of last year's 'Mr Punchy' competition. It's alive! Once I get more acquainted with it, I'll record and post an audio clip. But for now, I'm pretty stoked. Praise be!

@ped’s old KS getting its own YT video here, together with a BC shoutout...

Lidl and Aldi do them at around £100 every now and then. They are better than the pro ones I used to use. make sure you get one of the ones with decent automatic control, you can set the humidity level and they are pretty accurate. The only other thing to look out for is the size of the tank, they can fill up quite quickly. The other thing is you will have a supply of endless distilled water. It's pure enough for going into car batteries and great for use in irons and the like, or for watering your acid loving plants.

The essential thing about drying clothes (or houses...) is ventilation. If these 'drying rooms' are normally ventilated (open window..?) there won't be any build-up of condensation, as the moist air gets changed for fresh air from outside. If, on the other hand, there is no ventilation, the clothes won't dry, and the room (and its contents...) will start to become mildewed, and eventually rot. A free flow of air is the key element, even more important than heat.

This is an example of bass slapping done well and tastefully. It fits the song beautifully.

After all these years I liked Dire Straits and had never listened to this particular album until I heard this record on the radio. Everything I was doing stopped as what happens when I hear a great record.The whole album is just fantastic..

Perhaps better described as an assembly rather than a build in deference to the many luthiers at work......... maybe one day I'll have the necessary tools or at least access to them to be able to embark on a personal design/build........ Lockdown (although fortunately in full time employment) seemed to present itself as a time for being creative is a new way. I had thought of putting together a "Bitsa" but never quite committed to it. I began by ordering a "Precision Type" natural alder body off of the Bay, which looked great, was reasonably priced, as seemed like it would fit the bill. I could see myself learning to spray a nitrocellulose lacquer over it at some point. But alas the body was "Precision shaped" but in no way standard and it would have meant purchasing custom parts to make them fit and, I suspect, would have given me all sorts of other issues. Seemed like an expensive option. I managed to send the body back and obtain a refund, the builder saying that there had been a mistake....... I wasn't entirely convinced! So I thought I'd play safe and source a Fender stock Precision body. I had in the meantime sourced a roasted maple Fender Precision neck at a reduced price owing to a small crack in the headstock, which had been professionally repaired. It seemed like a way to go. When I saw the repair, it immediately filled me with a sense of concern as it was highly visible and seemed to be in a vulnerable position. However I ploughed ahead and, the task of inserting the new bushes proved too much for the repair and the spilt in the headstock represented itself........ I was horrified! The company, based in East London with a storage facility in Germany were excellent in organising return shipping and refund. I paid the difference and received a pristine roasted maple neck (albeit several weeks on). Coupled with this I had purchased a scratch plate from these very pages, which arrived cracked, for which the seller kindly refunded me. There was a time when I thought I'd give up the idea of a build and just purchase a ready made precision from these same pages! However, the rhythm and routine of the lockdown helped me to be patient and continue in my quest. The intervening weeks gave me time to learn about the effect of capacitors and their values, showed me the need to get a digital calliper and re read my Haynes Handbook on The Fender Precision Bass.... a wonderful and well informed tome which had been on my shelf, largely unread for many a moon. I also found time to investigate You Tube, digging out various maintenance clips including the wiring process for a precision. Whilst I had plenty of printed diagrams available on the internet, I found the video clips helpful and informative with plenty of advice and tips. That was my first job whilst awaiting the arrival of the new body and neck. I really enjoyed the soldering once I had got back into it. I did everything I could less the earth wire from the bridge and the pick up wires. They would be soldered in the last instance. As a lover of all things Aguilar (using a TH500 & 2 SL112's for the last 8 years) I decided to go for their vintage 60's pick ups and certainly haven't been disappointed with the initial sound. It's early days and I will need to experiment. Once the neck arrived I embarked on the assembly which I did over a day and a half. It was only as I arrived towards the completion of the assembly that I began to realise that I had quite a task ahead in setting up the bass I had built. It wasn't something I had given much, if any, thought to in the past. I used the manual to refresh my memory re procedure for neck assessment, truss rod adjustment, nut setting, intonation and action etc............ a fulfilling and satisfying learning/recalling curve. I've included a few pics telling the story and would encourage anyone in my position with few tools and minimal bass knowledge to "go for it" especially in these days when we can neither rehearse nor gig it can provide an equally creative outlet. All in all it took about 6-8 weeks gathering the parts and finally assembling and was, in the end, great fun, even if at times a little daunting.

Got the frets in. Quite pleased with how they grabbed in the composite.

Everyone's posting about hating slap, but all the examples are of "circus" slap bass. The sort of bass playing that is irrelevant to music/songs. Slap in the context of a song, ie Ashes to Ashes and Never Too Much, Thank You etc, can and does work very well.

Ok so you've all had fun with me for suggesting something might be easy but in my defence all I meant was that at aligning the fretboard with the neck should be easy I said nothing about gluing or clamping

This man drives a capri and has never known the touch of a woman.

Eddie Van Halen is an accomplished and tasteful guitarist, an innovator like Larry Graham. The problem is not the innovator nor the technique, but those who follow and think more=better... Tap isn’t the problem, it’s tappers. And slap isn’t the problem either, it’s slappers (the other kind 😁)

It's probably easier if you just name the 5 for 6 Straits songs you do like, and then give it a rest for a bit 😄

You can hear bits of the chorus in the middle eight of Love Over Gold. Incidentally, the band on Tina's version is Dire Straits, but with Jeff Beck instead of MK.

Nitro tack coat and first day spraying.

This has turned out to be a joyous, enthralling thread. Well done to all contributors. (I know I need to get out more 🙁)

It was an excellent post, thank you. You, the OP and @bassfan have just cost me £60 on a meter and dehumidifier. But have saved me a bunch of unnecessary stress and £several thousand on divorce lawyers 😁

Is a small dehumidifier a practical and fairly inexpensive solution?

Agreed. Throw away tosh to my ears, at best - filler.

One of my favourite bass albums is Travelling Without Moving by Jamiroqui with Stuart Zender. Mostly finger style but his slapping is subtle and tasteful.

Wee trim to tidy it up.

And here’s a brand new video for one of the tracks off the last album “A Certain Fractal Light”.

There’s a video here by Josh fossgreen you may find helpful , I’ve also got a good one on intervals, I’ll try to find it 🙂

I bought the book on the strength of the excerpts and couldn't put it down. An excellent story teller. Well worth the price. Just a shame the Kindle version doesn't have the pictures.

Decided to move away from the individual bridge/tuner idea and try out the cheap all in one offering, must admit it seems to work better although the individual ones may be better suited to a 6 string rather than bass, I may keep hold of them or let them go cheap as i used the string retainer part, if anyone wants them gimme a shout. Anyway, it`s almost finished, just waiting for new strings, strap buttons and give it a set up then it`s ready to go. here are a few pic`s of project CV-19....

Nah I’m just glad he likes it. It was a great bass for sure and I’m happy to have had it for a while. Really glad he’s keeping his word on the puppets 😂

Thanks very much ... sounds like I should try moving my thumb to the A and let it touch the E at the same time ... will give it a go

Nice to see bass player and drummer so closely in synch.

Thanks @Raymondo you are too kind! I certainly will be tuning into this this evening!

This was taken a couple of years ago, but I don't change much

You might be lucky. Normally one says roughly 50% humidity is good (40 - 60), but I've seen a piano maker demand 65%. Many living rooms (often used to keep gear) spawn a much varying humidity that might sometimes fall below 20%, which is way too low and actually doing damage (though humidity shifts are the really dangerous part). So the question is how moist the drying room gets, and it's my guess you may be pleasantly surprised. Effective drying means exchanging the air, so without calculating or looking it up, I'd be surprised if the room goes above 75%. A hygrometer shouldn't be too expensive. What you do not want is an ice-cold room where any moisture condensates on your ice-cold musical gear. Keep it normally warm.

This one, really pleased with it, modern sounding compared to my usual tastes...

Walk of life is indeed a big stinky poo💩. That keyboard haunts me wherever I go. WOO HOO

While we're on DS endings, here's what I reckon is one of their most under-appreciated songs, with another great ending.

Isn't the idea to be able to stay in the room yourself? I'd be first out the door with most of this stuff.

New York Rock & Soul Revue . 👍

I scratched the itch in the end btw by purchasing @TorVic lovely Sandberg. Very happy with it too, the neck feels super comfy and really responsive.

Stuck some strings on. I still have to level and dress the frets, but amazingly there’s only a few buzzes and a very low action!

Nail➡️Head

I recently noticed a bit of thin black plastic sheet emerging from the back of one of the tuners on my 2008 MIM Jazz. A bit of search turned up this thread on Talkbass: https://www.talkbass.com/threads/machine-head-problem-fender-mim-jazz-bass.1235882/ and this was clearly the same problem. The "slip sheets" (washers) described in that link are 0.3mm thick plastic. That thread didn't go into detail about good ways to fix it so I thought I'd document the process here in-case anyone else has the issue. Materials needed are some 300um or 350um (0.3mm or 0.35mm) Mylar sheet plastic. This is available cheaply for use in stencil making in the UK. I bought an A4 sheet of 350um thickness from ebay for just over £2, so a very cheap fix. This material is suprisingly stiff and pretty tough & slippery, although it can be cut with sharp kitchen scissors. The tricky bit is making a tidy circular hole in the plastic - I used a 7/16 hollow punch of the kind used for leather work/gasket making. I had to sharpen the cutting edge with a grinding wheel in a dremel to enable the punch to cut the mylar and it took a hefty whack with a mallet to go through cleanly in one go. Once the hole was made it is easy to hold the steel spring washer and mylar together and cut round the washer to get the shape. I didn't follow the concave cutout as this is under the worm gear so isn't really visible. Reasemble with a tiny bit of silicone grease (e.g. clear plumbers grease) on the mylar washer and the job is done. I did all four tuners on my Jazz as all the slip sheets were damaged when I dismantled them to check. Of course, the tuners can be replaced with Hipshot HB7s (footprint compatible) at £100+ the set, or other quality tuners at £60-ish if some drilling+filling of holes in the headstock is done. There is nothing much wrong with the original tuners when they are working properly though (22:1 ratio and 315g for the set of 4) and the fix is very cheap. [I also ran a 2mm drill bit down the string hole in the middle of the tuner post while I had the tuners apart to make it a little easier to install the string] Pics of the process (the light grey material is the new mylar):

I'm always here 😀 P-bass wiring looms a speciality 😎