LukeFRC

[quote name='Meddle' timestamp='1442440611' post='2867067'] Not sure there is such a thing left really. I can only think of Backtracks Records Tollcross and Chariot Express in Newington. Neither seems to be a source of rough diamonds, sadly. [/quote] I would avoid le chariot express at all costs. Would rather throw my money in the sea than give it to him.... anyway... [quote name='Big_Stu' timestamp='1442445152' post='2867098'] Mev Taylors was a cracking shop when it was on Morrison St, turned to crap when they moved in with Sound Control. Rikki's was usually over-priced, one of them with about 20 guitars all the same apart from colour. [/quote] Mev's a lovely fella but I from talking to him I think he got royally screwed with the sound control shambles.

[quote name='mcnach' timestamp='1441894600' post='2862733'] I went for the standard Jake design with a number of variations: Passive electronics - volume/tone Ash body Maple neck/fingerboard, vintage tint glossy lacquer 3mm diameter side dots 43mm spacing at the nut and 21mm deep at 1st fret (wide and wide spacing, but not chunky in cross-section) Hipshot ultralite tuners ETS bridge (20mm spacing, top-loading) Delano PMVC 4 AL-H pickup The pickup is in reverse orientation and slightly closer to the bridge than normal. Essentially, the DG coil is about 5mm closer to the neck than the standard Precision DG, and the EA coil just below it. I was playing with pickup placements a while ago on an old OLP, and that was roughly one of the positions I liked a lot. It was fat, but a bit more defined than a Precision, yet it still share a lot with the Precision. If I moved it closer towards the bridge then it started getting too much into Stingray territory, even using P type pickups, so that looked like a good place for a "hybrid". I love the Precision, but I miss the extra definition I get on a Stingray. This is my attempt to get something that would sit in between. Oh, it also has my band's logo on the headstock [/quote]Interestingly that pickup placement is pretty much bang on where a Warwick Streamer (stage 1) has it. Love the bass- and not wanting to distract you from playing it, but reading the thread and seeing what you're going for tonally - if you've not tried one add a G&L L1000 onto the GAS list...

Update.... Sanded back the pink, rub through on several places so second coat on. May need to get second can of clear coat.

[quote name='owen' timestamp='1442092543' post='2864436'] There are one or two in the wild in the US so there are real world opinions floating around TB. [/quote] ....to save me reading 500 talkbass posts what's the general gist? You still loving that ip310?

[quote name='allighatt0r' timestamp='1440680769' post='2852913'] Whoa! Super jealous of your floor. I thought for a moment you were going to copy the floor pattern onto the bass... Making some awesome progress, I'm enjoying this build a lot [/quote] Just got back from my my holidays.... yeah the floor is awesome - fantastic surprise find in the house - intreaged what else we're going to find down the years! [quote name='Meddle' timestamp='1440847197' post='2854287'] I quite liked the rubbed blue/pink look! Like Herbie Flowers' bass! [/quote] yeah it looked quite nice - unfortunately the blue is the nastiest colour known to man! [quote name='alyctes' timestamp='1440850956' post='2854334'] Looks good so far. I love the neck dots Also, please tell more about your Vox Standard fretless. I've been wondering about doing something similar for a bit. [/quote] Really or sticky out tongue you don't love them? they are the oddest thing ever visually. I dunno they might look ok. Otherwise stick on blocks? hmmm The vox standard body was a pile of poo butchers block hard maple thing that weighed a ton. Some cheap peavey neck took the frets out (easy) glued in laminated maple into the slots - easy. Read about Jaco epoxy on his neck - I used Ronseal diamond hard floor varnish - it was diamond hard like it said and wouldn't sand back to put the radius back in .... so the thing was ugly, heavy and more or less unplayable. Fun project I think I gave it away after a year of gathering dust.

[quote name='Rich' timestamp='1441574674' post='2860029'] I agree entirely [IMG]http://www.shukerguitars.co.uk/j36.jpg[/IMG] Whoops [/quote] well there are exceptions to every rule. That bass looks very nively done!

Worse than a burst... a burst with a matching burst headstock...

Not sure if im more excited at the great project you have or jealous its not me doung it!

Get well soon man!

wonder if you could do some kind of T40 market place where the price varies according to the weight....

this thread being bumped makes me want a t40 again

Is there a knack in getting them? Quite fancy a jazz...

that looks nice!

and a nice smooth finish all around! white goes on bit more and the pink

So the pussy pink went on.. and I didn't have much of that - so i turned to this blue colour I had leftover. Both the pinked and the blue were from our wedding decorations. and then sand the thing back Messy!

after a bit of sanding to finish it off nicely... we're ready to start painting. Now I'm doing this on the cheap - and I had a couple of cans of Molotow paint in the shed so rather than shell out loads for sanding sealer and undercoat and then car paints... I'm going to spray the leftover cans on as a grain filler/basecoat - sand it back flat - then do a white coat, pink coat and clear top coat - cost me £9 to paint the thing.... not bad! hmmm pussy pink colour!

Now the sensible person would drive 2 miles to see his mate who owns a couple of routers and use a machine to cut the wood away. Me, being an idiot and impatient, set about it with a drill and a wood chisel! and slightly out of focus but it ended up okay!

holes drilled for the bridge and marking out the control plate caverty

Lining up the bridge

Part 5 - Thoughts on construction. What makes a good bass? I have no idea. I've bought cheap things and they have been amazing, and played expensive things and they have been awful. I've played basses that felt alive and reverberant, and others designed to decouple that resonance and sounded great. I can buy a load of pre made parts from a supplier and put them together - or I could buy essentially the same parts put together by someone else.... and sometimes theres a massive difference - and sometimes you can build something brilliant. One thing I have always found to be important is how tight the neck is bolted on.... and stealing an idea from far far highly skilled luthiers based a few miles from me (Alpher) I wanted to use bolts on the neck. Body on the workbench... Threaded insert ready to thready.... Drill depth gauge bigger holes drilled and inserts installed.... and the neck bolted on as tight as a tight thing There was a wee lip on them inserts but a wee bit of work with a chisel in the neck pocket and it's super flat good.

Part 4 why this is taking so long and what I'm trying to do. In april we bought a house. I've always had wee projects and things on the go, then I got married and moved into a tiny little flat and couldn't - I missed that part of my life, the tinkering side of me. Anyway this bass was bought and sat there for ages - I could sink loads of money on this and find out the woodwork isn't great - or it could bolt together into the greatest thing ever - I have no way of knowing. So it's got to be cheap. and then we lifted our hallway carpet and found and are restoring this... ... early victorian floor... anyway - what finish? I spent ages over this, swatch books, a Photoshop file where I could retint them. I loved Jim Ryan's blue glitter finish and would like a sparkly bass. I would;t mind a british racing green bass. Sparkles would be good.... argh so much indecision! Apart from my indecision with glitter finishes I've had one idea in my head from the start.... There's a busker on Glasgow's Byres Road who plays a very old shell pink jazz master - its one of the sexiest old things I've ever seen. It looks amazing. It's got tort guard and the rosewood fb and this aged yellowed battered shell pink flesh tone finish. Now ideally I would build a jaguar bass and do that in those colours... but I don't have a jaguar bass. So I decided on the shell pink. More aged fender tone than the light pink sweetshop pink the stingray classics used for a short period. Oh and a matching headstock - just because.

Part 3. The one where I Improvise to strip the body.... So paint stripper... is rubbish - it hardly ever seems to do ouwt. And I have fundamental problems with the idea that sanding is the best way to get a finish off a bass body - you've got something finished relatively well and painted, and to get the paint off you're going to take heavy grit paper and rub the thing for hours - taking off the original paint - oh and that smooth finish to the wood - and possibly re shaping bits of it... and suddenly the whole thing gets a bit wobbly... anyway heat gun is the way forward - easy stripping of paint Except I don't own one. If you turn your head sideways and see the world differently... a gas hob is a little bit like a heat gun isn't it? Even got a fume extractor built in! So that's how I stripped, with a scraper and holding it upside down over the cooker! It got a wee bit singed on the edges but that doesn't matter. If Earnie ball can do roasted maple necks - I call this griddled ash body - improves the tone 13.224% This is what I ended up with. The red patch is a wee bit of paint I stuck on and wiped off. Its 3 bits of ash - two halts and a random bit on the corner. Grain wasn't sealed so it's still stained with the paint finish - that and the random corner mean we're going for a solid finish. coming up ... Part 4 ... why this is taking so long and finish quandaries...