Jabba_the_gut

I’m guessing there are two strips top and bottom running horizontally that the vertical pieces are glued to and the fretboard sits between these (if that makes sense!!)

I do like their stuff - could spend ages looking though their catalogue!

The Axminster ones are really good: Here's one I found earlier!!😊

You should just be able to replace the EMG passive tone with the BTC unit as far as I am aware. I've used a few of them and swapped out the passive tone pot with a BTC unit or an active tone pot and this has just been plug and play (quite literally). https://www.emgpickups.com/pub/media/Mageants/b/t/btc_control_0230-0206rc.pdf

Fantastic tools and couldn't live without mine. Good quality cutters, decent templates and patience are the key things in my experience.

I’ll be there! Cheers

You might also be surprised as to how little you need to change to make it feel different. I built two basses essentially the same but one felt slightly nicer (to me as this is a personal preference). I measured them with calipers and rechecked the profile. I probably only took a mm off the back of the neck and changed the profile by a similar amount in places and it felt much better to me. He interested to see what you think as you do this. Cheers

That really is lovely. The quality of the routing that really shows the quality of the build. I like to see things being done well even though they will be hidden in the final assembly. The neck pickup route on this is just such an example - many builders will just route a big hole for the pickup to go in, not a nice tidy job like this. Proper craftmanship.

Very nice - I think those pickup covers work better with this design rather than the standard EMG look. Every cloud has a silver lining!!

I like that!

Pm'd

Great idea. Twice as much food....

I reckon I’ll have half a dozen new basses I haven’t taken there before!! Absolutely!!

Yep, the two I built were 23" scale so a little longer. I'm going to make another couple of necks to try; one will be 27" the other 17". You're quite right about headed versions in particular as they require custom strings but headless ones with strings clamps allow a wider choice of strings. As Ped says, these super short scale basses are really great fun but also sound the business. And you don;t have to stretch so far.....

Neil is really helpful and the product is great too

I’ve used Newtone strings for the two 27” scale headed basses I build recently. Really impressed with them. Not sure who else supplies strings to this scale but there are more very short scale basses appearing all the time. The two 23” headless basses use any strings you like as they have string clamps at the head stock. I’m going to make an additional neck for one of them at 27” scale to see how that feels. I built the first of these as a travel bass but since then have found the 27” scale really comfy to play. They’re all tuned at normal pitch and all sound like ‘proper’ basses. Cheers

I like the EMG preamps and they are really easy to install and very compact. Just get some new knobs though - the EMG ones look a bit cheap and would take away from a lovely build! Cheers

Looking really nice and not too far to homie!! Are you planning to use an EMG preamp with the pickups?

Nice! How about a black and white checked scratch plate or black scratch plate and white cover for the neck pickup....

https://www.premierguitar.com/articles/19686-guitar-shop-101-how-to-shim-a-bolt-on-neck

If the issue is the strings being too high at the bridge then you add a shim to the neck end of the pocket. If the strings are too low then add a shim to the body end of the pocket. The shim just changes the angle it meets the body and will either raise or lower the strings at the bridge. StewMac sell angled shins https://www.stewmac.com/tonewoods/electric-guitar-bodies-and-necks-and-wood/electric-guitar-necks/stewmac-neck-shims-for-guitar.html?utm_source=google&utm_medium=shopping&utm_campaign=2020-09-gp&pref_currency=P&shipcalc=UK&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIxuf3u4XX6wIVUe3tCh3LSA52EAQYASABEgJnyPD_BwE if you just don’t like the neck being high in the pocket, then it’s router time.....

I would either make a template to cut the pocket deeper using a router or I would use a shim. Using a wedge shaped shim that tapers to virtually nothing would probably work. The thick end of the shim would be at the neck end of the neck pocket which would angle the neck into the body so the strings would be lower at the bridge. You can just try this by putting some strips of cardboard in the pocket at the neck end. I’d guess that something like two strips of a cereal packet would be about the thickness. Otherwise, I’d make a template to route the pocket as there is no support for the router on the lower edge. Cheers

Next task was to sort a neck template for this. I used the same method as usual to centre the neck on the template by using two straight pieces of wood and measured the distances to the centre line. I used an old template to cut the heel curve out of a scrap of MDF and used that to complete the template. Cut the bulk out then trimmed with a router to make a neat pocket. After making the pocket template I them made another template for the outline of the body. This template was used to draw the outline of the body onto the wood and then to use as the routing template once the bulk was cut away using a bandsaw. The template was tacked onto the body blank using a couple of small tacks where the neck pocket will be and where the bridge will sit to stop it moving when trimming. The two tack holes will then not be visible on the finished bass. I trimmed the body in a couple of passes and this is where I'm at now: You can see in the picture below how the body looks where it has been made from three pieces of wood. I'm really chuffed with how good the match is between the piece I had lying around and used for the centre section with the wood that makes the wings that @Frank Blank gave to me. I've no idea what the wood is though - I'll have to try and look it up. Next job will be to cut the neck pocket and to sort the template to route the control cavity and the pickup cavity,