neepheid

Walnut is towards the lower end of the hardness scale, so I'm assuming that it'll be warm but slightly brighter sounding than Mahogany for example, but won't approach the brightness of Ash or Maple. I'm not sure that a cap has a huge amount of influence on the sound of a bass, but if it does then it might serve to mitigate any harshness in the denser woods of Ash and Maple.

I'd agree that it depends upon the size/shape of the neck heel/pocket. If it's a fairly standard Fender sized thing then 4 ought to do. I suspect that 6 screws in a tight spacing might actually weaken the neck pocket, depending on the type of wood we're talking about here.

Well, it's been a while since I looked at this so I did a little work on it. The hole which was already there for the jack socket was rather thin and I always planned to use a Neutrik locking jack socket which requires a 24mm hole. Redrilling into an existing hole on the edge seemed rather risky so I decided to grind it out with the sanding drums on the Dremel-ish. Took a while, but at least I was able to work up towards the required size. Of course, the flat plate of the Neutrik doesn't sit well on a curved surface, so I had to carve out a recess for it. And for the final problem, Farnell or Neutrik forgot to give me screws with which to fasten the socket. Thankfully, I had some old black tuners I could steal some screws from. Enough yap, here's the result:

[quote name='steve-norris' post='331221' date='Nov 18 2008, 06:50 AM']some truss rods can be unscrewed and removed ( Warwicks spring to mind) if it was me i would see if it could be removed while it's still possible, after a while those little tweaks may finish it off and lead to a major issue.[/quote] Oh, for sure. I was just amazed that it turned it at all. It was one of those things you randomly read online when you're trying to solve another problem and you think "no way, that'll never work" but you're intrigued enough to try it anyway If it stops turning with this then it would be a case of cutting a slot in the head of the nut and using a large screwdriver, I guess.

I recently decided to adjust the truss rod on my Takamine acoustic bass. Imagine my dismay when the truss rod nut had been chewed by some nitwit before me. I discovered something today which may or may not help, depending on how badly chewed the hex nut is. Try turning it with a Torx driver, I found a T27 went in and turned the nut! Result! I'm not saying that it will work in all instances (if the nut is totally chewed then it won't work, but if there are still some edges to work with it seems the Torx can move it. Just thought I'd mention it here and see what people thought before putting it in the wiki somewhere.

Surely loosening the truss rod will increase the amount of relief that the string tension will pull and therefore make any dusty end problems due to the bow in the neck worse? Sight a line down the neck and check the relief. If that is the problem, then it sounds like you have too much - you need to tighten the truss rod in that case. But like the burpster says, check it isn't other things too. The fact that it affects one string in particular means it's less likely that it's the neck as a whole. Bear in mind also that necks can take time to settle in after truss rod adjustments.

[quote name='Happy Jack' post='330725' date='Nov 17 2008, 03:27 PM']Define "improve". My coffee cup hasn't changed its shape in a century. It was a pretty good design for drinking coffee then, and it still works perfectly well now. This is a classic example of [i]If it ain't broke, don't fix it[/i].[/quote] +1 I tried really hard to design my first bass from scratch to be original, but it ended up being a slightly offset waisted Les Paul Money bass (which I didn't know of at the time). Bah, humbug. I'm still going to make it though I think it's really hard to make something original which is such a stellar leap forward it will convince people to change the way they think about basses. There is also the problem that a radical improvement is so far ahead of its time that it doesn't overcome traditional and conservative outlooks. Think of the guitars Andrew Bond came up with - stepped fingerboard instead of frets, digital readout of the settings. What happened? Disappeared *shrugs*

That's mad. What a shame it's J profile, I'm all about the cricket bat P. Hope you manage to find a helper.

You can put that down to the rose-tinted Fender Vintage Madness that seems to be prevailing at the moment.

It is feasible that someone is fastidious about looking after their gear... the assertion that if it's been played for 20 years then it has to look like crap (sorry, I mean "have heaps of [i]mojo[/i]") seems short sighted to me.

Welcome to the forum

Welcome to the forum

Just bought an ebony thumbrest from this basschatter. Posted it straight away and kept me updated throughout the transaction. Excellent stuff

[quote name='NJE' post='328183' date='Nov 13 2008, 10:11 AM']Firstly well done on the badass, i dont think a fender is right without one. Secondly what were bass parts like to deal with? I fancy some parts for a possible upcoming project and was wondering if its worth dealing with them. Is the shipping much and does it take long? many thanks, Nathan[/quote] BPR are cool, they ship pretty quick, never had a problem with them. Trouble is that it isn't so cost effective to get stuff over compared to the start of the year with the whole two dollars to the pound thing.

Thumbrest is coming Regarding boosting the output of the pickup a little, I'm wondering what's best to do. 1) Put in a simple booster like a Bartolini TC1/TC3/TC5 (depends on the amount of boost I need) - these are 18dB, 12dB and 6dB gain respectively. Was thinking of going with the middle road and getting a TC3. 2) Put in a 2EQ active circuit on a concentric pot I'm worried that a 2EQ will colour the sound unnecessarily, and as Rich said above I've got a good range of tones with the passive tone control already.

Just bought a fancy pants networked external hard drive from Marc. Smooth easy transaction, good comms and quick to dispatch the goods, can't say fairer than that!

[quote name='rasher80' post='323300' date='Nov 6 2008, 11:29 AM']Having decided that i might have to abandon my quest for a Fender Japan bass, and from getting some good advice from members of this board, i'm now considering doing a build my own project using Warmoth. What i want to do is have a 54 P bass body with the matching neck, but with the Jazz profile at the nut. The trouble is i'm a bit thick when it comes to guitars, and once i have all the pieces the eye can see, such as tuners, nut, knobs, control plate, bridge, scratchplate and pickup - then i have no idea about the innards. I wouldn't be able to do the work myself cos i'm useless, so i was going to enlist the help of a local luthier to put it all together. I saw a Lindy Fralin pickup which they will overwind to give the sound a bit more oomph! I just need it to not be overly expensive, or there's no point is there? I'm not concerned about re-sale value, as being a left hander there's by and large no such thing sadly! So is this a worthwhile option or should i just forget it?[/quote] What is "overly expensive"? If you mean "more than a Fender Japan", it probably will be. Not as cost effective to import from USA as it was at the start of the year, unfortunately. Not forgetting that time is money, your time spent building it.

[quote name='yorick' post='325736' date='Nov 10 2008, 10:12 AM']Plus i wouldn't advise using lighter fuel.... The wood will absorb some and as it's flammable........[/quote] In my opinion lighter fluid (naptha) evaporates too quickly to be absorbed in any meaningful way. I have no qualms about its use in this context, save for the usual safety considerations whilst actually handling/dispensing the stuff out of the tin.

[quote name='LukeFRC' post='325629' date='Nov 10 2008, 12:59 AM']thats the funk, why would you want to take that out?[/quote] Because it's disgusting, that's why. It shows a distinct lack of care for the instrument.

I used lighter fluid to clean up the manky fingerboard of the old Hagstrom: Left: before, right: after