lettsguitars

amazing. how dare he? he obviously does though, and respect for that. my only worry would be the weight. gotta wiegh about 10kg

whats the bass in the last pic? the natural finished un.

[quote name='Bassassin' post='1108196' date='Jan 30 2011, 02:58 PM']I've got two placcy basses - an Ibanez EDA900: [attachment=70417:EDA900.jpg] And a see-through P wot I made: [attachment=70418:pink800.jpg] Makes a change from plywood... Jon.[/quote] did you make the perspex body yourself? if so how? is it just like working with wood (generally speaking)

i know how you feel. i think most comapanies long scale is max 34" with your average hardtail bridge. anything with a bridge tailpiece or as you say, string through is a pain to get strings for. some strings say extra long but i think they mean that there regulars are already extra short. i seem to remember warwick strings were ok and regular slinkys also long enough for my 34's. i'm actually going to deepen/lengthen a neck pocket for a customer, just so the strings he bought from the U.S will fit the bass. silk creeping over the nut slightly. bizarre way to go about things i know, but if he likes these strings, and they are real beauties, he's gonna have em.

you're actually bang on. most non players tend to think they are plastic. i think my dad still thinks my wooden guitars are not proper guitars, strange. the paint they use on most guitars is plastic, so it's quite understandable.

[quote name='Annoying Twit' post='1108044' date='Jan 30 2011, 12:31 PM']Hi Jon, I'm not in a position to justify buying a handmade custom instrument. But I'm really pleased to see local people actually making stuff. I wish you well for your luthurial future! I think I saw one of your basses, a 5 string fretless in Intasound Music in Narborough road. It looked very well made.[/quote] hi mate. yea one of the early ones. i may take another one down sometime. i think the guitar workshop in ibstock would have one as i know warren and duncan pretty well. but you know, all the shops want 20% and i've always managed to sell em online so far. speaking of which have you seen the [url="http://www.lettsbasses.co.uk"]website[/url]?

it looks well made. and smacks of 'offcuts'. though i'm sure that aint the case. cool bass, not sure about the back of the nut.

actually, having said all that, i'm going on my experience using nice quarter sawn mahogany. a stiff maple neck may take a little longer if you have to wait for the wood to respond to truss rod movement. they say quarter turns and 24 hour wait but i'm not so sure. just experiment and keep your eye on it and you'll figure it out.

where was it made? something thats recently been built in a humid country that comes to live in blighty is gonna go through some changes. truss rods are no problem at all. this is what i do. get your action set so that the height is the same from the 12th up. there should be a minimal amount of upward bow in the neck. if the height decreases from the 12th, your saddles are too low and vice versa. to get the correct relief (upward bow), just turn the truss rod clockwise to tighten (back bow) and anti-clockwise to give more relief (ooh). the height at the nut/1st fret should be almost zero, actually about .010 to .020 (20 thousandths of an inch). when you have your neck relief and saddles set, you may have some fret buzz. to fix this, look at the neck relief and remove the strings. now, turn the rod in order to acheive the same amount of upward bow the neck had while strung up. find a very flat 6-8" 2" wide block of wood, or preferably buy a radius block matching the radius of the fretboard (ebay). with your 'leveling stick', and some 320 grit sandpaper, lightly go over the frets nice and evenly while constantly checking your work. what you are looking for is a very slight flat spot that is present on every fret. some frets may have larger flat spots due to them being the higher frets that were creating the buzz. clean up your board with a light rub over with a fine grit sanding pad, any gunk will need scraping off the fretboard with a razor blade, frets shouldn't need re-crowning after only a slight level, but if those flat spots dont dissapear after smoothing over with a sandingpad, you will need a crowning file and some other grits of sandpaper. the final step would be to mask off each fret (i use a metal fret protector which cost a few quid and makes polishing a breeze) and polish with wire wool. it sounds like a lot of work but if you try and visualise each step bfore you set off it really is a simple and enjoyable process that is only an hours job at the very most. whew, in fact typing all this sh*t took longer.

adding a great piece of metal over a pickup has the effect of 'opening up' the pickup the sound and balancing the fields of the pole pieces. i think. something like that any road. metal and magnets have a huge effect on each other so i'm told. needless to say, yes, they were there for a reason and not to rest your hand on or whatever.

anything you can imagine is an option if you go custom, (beerholder anyone?) but yes, you should make sure you know exactly what you want before forking out 3 grand on a bass that won't change the most important factor, CAN YOU PLAY? tonewoods, neck thru adds sustain and all that hocus pocus means nothing. it's all in your playing. having said that, custom instruments are the only way to go if you want something special that will turn heads. factory made basses have absolutely no soul, and someone like acg build some absolutely stunning instruments. as for wood choice, just go for colours/grain pattern that appeal to you and forget about tone coz none of that matters until you start playing.

ebay auction ended. i'll probably relist in a week or 2. in the meantime, any offers around the 450 mark would get you a very nice one of a kind bass. i'll even throw in a case. visit my [url="http://www.lettsguitars.co.uk"]WEBSITE[/url] for details. any sales through bc include a 5% donation to bc. thanks y'all. jon

evostick is certainly hard enough, but is not the traditional choice for guitarwork. you generally want a glue with a longer drying time. evo clearly says quick drying on the bottle. titebond original is the one if you're not using hide glue. it's supposedly the yellow stuff you want although i believe thats just a dye. you definately want wood glue, and not adhesive.

[quote name='Crazykiwi' post='1103156' date='Jan 26 2011, 08:17 AM']Moses just designed their necks differently to other manufacturers. I didn't like the one I had on my custom jaydee jazz bass because it lacked rigidity and moved around with temperature extremes. But moses never designed those necks to be like other graphite necks, they were designed to more like wood. Their steinberger necks are pretty damn good - very rigid, warm and not brittle sounding in the slightest.[/quote] uhhuh. i've seen em vacuum form the graphite/epoxy lasagne over a wooden core which seems quite do-able. [url="http://www.cycfi.com/2010/10/neck-thru-construction-part-3/"]HERE[/url] in fact.

there's always [url="http://lettsbasses.co.uk/root/coco5.html"]THIS[/url]

[quote name='yorick' post='1106643' date='Jan 28 2011, 07:45 PM']OOOOOH OOOOH, consider my interest piqued!!! Any idea of a rough cost? I'm a lefty as well, if that makes a difference. Nige[/quote] hey nige. this guys looking at about £600 with all the extra pickups, hipshot supertone bridge, string retainer and all that stuff. 50% deposit to get the bass built. birdsey maple top and laminated neck. i'm looking forward to it, i must say.

[quote name='Bass_Guardian' post='1105580' date='Jan 27 2011, 09:10 PM']Oooh cant wait to see how this turns out [/quote] yea. it'll be interested to see if ben feels like winding 16 seperate coils on the wal style humbuckers.

ben sent me some pics of his latest design. THE TOASTER! check it out. dual rail light wound for a brighter sound, by hand! 4 string bass guitar or shorty guitar. basically a paf humbucker with steel rails attached to a bar magnet instead of lugs. bens idea of ligthly wound would be about 9-10 thousand winds. 4 1/2 on each coil or something like that. parallel or series wiring. can be made with tapped coils and also available in single coil versions. more of bens work [url="http://www.lettsbasses.co.uk/root/imp.html"]HERE[/url] i'll try and get some sound clips on the web site over the weekend.

been workin on the wal shape for a copy request. still needs refining to match perfectly. when the deposit comes through, i'll get on it. mahogany and maple body and neck (bolt on). hipshot supertone bridge, and tuners. imp pickups. rosewood fretboard etc etc

maplins switch cleaner? new switches?

just sounds to me like the off positions have rarely been used and are dirty.

[quote name='KiOgon' post='1100724' date='Jan 24 2011, 01:06 PM']Cocktail Sticks, wooden Kebab skewers, small dowel rod or even a piece of wood whittled down to size - any of those tapped in to old holes with plenty of Wood Glue - Evo Stik Resin W highly recommended, small bottle about £2 from any hardware store. When dry clean off excess, sand flat & drill fresh holes. Cheerz, John[/quote] +1 but you forgot matchsticks.

there seems to be a lot of mysticism attached to guitar work, like some sort of magic circle. but i think the reason a lot of 'luthiers' overcharge is down to the fact that work is thin on the ground and the bills do need paying. most of the work on a guitar can be done at home with minimal tool requirements and a little knowledge. everything you need to know is on the net. electrics can get confusing though.

[quote name='k-sad' post='1098498' date='Jan 22 2011, 11:33 AM']This is gorgeous... How does it sound at this point? Pliz put a pickup near the bridge, sometimes people just go for the "neck" one, and lots of us can't bear it... (argh, i'm guessing this is just what u did and i've seen this bass in the "for sale" section haven't I?) Beautiful fretboard, beautiful bass... Cheers Flo[/quote] and regarding bridge pup. i am considering adding a a bridge bucker and maybe a single coil to the 4 string build if i get no offers. i'm considering hanging on to it as i don't have a bass of my own.

[quote name='k-sad' post='1098498' date='Jan 22 2011, 11:33 AM']This is gorgeous... How does it sound at this point? Pliz put a pickup near the bridge, sometimes people just go for the "neck" one, and lots of us can't bear it... (argh, i'm guessing this is just what u did and i've seen this bass in the "for sale" section haven't I?) Beautiful fretboard, beautiful bass... Cheers Flo[/quote] actually, no. this body is now knocking around with no neck ( like sandi toksvig). i used the neck on the cocobolo 5 string also in the for sale section. i wasn't keen on some of the wood on this. i'll revive it at a later date.