neepheid

Sales tax varies by state, some states have none. None of them are anywhere near our 20% VAT. There is no US-wide sales tax. "The five states with the highest average combined state and local sales tax rates are Louisiana (9.56 percent), Tennessee (9.55 percent), Arkansas (9.45 percent), Washington (9.38 percent), and Alabama (9.29 percent)." - from https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/state/2024-sales-taxes/

The point is (been made by a couple of people now) that the L-2000/ASAT should already have one, if it's wired properly. Don't need to fit anything, just fix what's already there.

That is at odds with my experience - admittedly with a Tribute L-2000 - it would play fine in passive mode even with the battery removed, never mind dead. In that case, the active or active with treble boost settings on the switch became an effective kill switch.

Negative, captain...

Oh don't worry, there'll be a skill swap soon - guy who helped me with the long drill and the cleaning out of the neck pocket on my other bass project is needing a laptop for his daughter, so I'm gonna sort him out with something.

Funny you should mention that... Straight DI - tone 100%.mp3 In order: T-40 pickup (series), T-40 pickup (single coil), both pickups (T-40 series), both pickups (T-40 single), original bridge pickup. All 100% tone control open. TC Electronic BH250, pre EQ DI, straight to interface.

Eh, maybe one day, but only if one of the tuners currently on it die - they are a bit cheap and a bit wobbly when the string tension is taken off. They're also tiny - so if I do come to replace them, I'll need to ream out the holes anyway...

It's done! I went to the Mech Engineering Workshop at work today, because I needed some help to get a hole through from the new pickup route to the cavity. Yes, they had a sufficiently long drill bit to be able to enter from the neck pocket and drill through, into the new route then onwards and into the bridge pickup route... Bridge pickup is foam suspended, so the foam will simply deform around the chunky multicore wire. After that, it was pretty much just a case of wiring it all up. Except it wasn't - because there were a few wrinkles in the plan (isn't there always?). First thing I learned is that the T-40 pickup, while splittable, doesn't give you access to all four ends of the coils - it only has three wires plus a shield coming out of it, so all you can do is series/single by shunting one coil to ground. So I had to change from a three way mini toggle to a two way. Then gotcha 2 happened - the new switch had less of a threaded section on it than the previous switch, so out comes the drill again with the forstner bit to remove a little more control cavity to make the new switch poke through the top of the guitar enough. With those little issues out of the way it was just a case of wiring it up... Quick tap test on the pickups made me suspect that the pickups were out of phase when both engaged, so I swapped the wires of easiest one (the bridge pickup). Then I tested it for real. IT WORKED! I am delighted with this mod - I've had to learn a lot of new things, and I hope to never have to route an already finished bass ever again

Thanks for the detailed explanations. Looking forward to seeing progress. Following.

What price are you seeing? According to Andertons, they'll be £999 here in the UK. Honestly, SBMM can just eff off with their UK/EU price hikes.

I'm willing to bet that the ratio of headed/headless basses in the world makes it a reasonable assumption to make. Anyone who ventures into headless land really ought to be able to solve for X. Also, I've seen a few headless basses have a little sticky out vestigial "head" which might get caught by the mechanism of these stands? I say "might" - I've never tried.

Today I tackled the sloppy, oversized problem that is the neck pocket. In a super janky, homespun way, of course! A few days ago, I said that the neck angle (for string alignment was just right with a small piece of veneer at the open end of the neck pocket, so I made that official and glued a small piece of veneer up there: Super janky! To add to the jank factor, I used one of those furniture repair/touch up pens to try to disguise the top of the veneer... Then I got to the yawning chasm which is the right hand (treble) side of the neck pocket. Aye, that's the edge of the neck. Ouch. So I spent quite a lot of time cutting, shaping and gluing veneers to the offending area (a 2mm thick then a 0.6mm thick) And did the same cover up job with the touch up pen. And now the neck pocket looks like this... Real luthiers - look away now - heh, too late! So, a final check of everything with the fake strings... It's far from perfect, but it's a damn sight closer to what it needs to be. From a distance, no-one will know. I think I'm ready to fit the neck now. Still have to decide what to do about all that spare material - but I know I'm putting off the inevitable which is that it'll probably have to be routed off and the offending area refinished. Yay!

Tiny inch forward today (well, I was gigging last night) - but I did a wee bit of pickup route finessing with the Dremel, then screwed down the pickup ring.

You are the maker of your own problems

Aberdeen bass players, you are cordially invited to my TED Talk gig on Friday 5th September at Krakatoa on Trinity Quay. I will be playing with my originals band "The Inevitable Teaspoons", alongside some other fine local acts. Heckling encouraged. Afterwards, I will be available for your best "I wouldn't have played it like that" or "did someone pay you to wear that hat?" which I will accept in good humour. Hope to see some of you there.

Last night, played at Wilsons in Aberdeen with Nine Lives. Gig went well, pretty busy, decent crowd interaction. Nice to see a few of my mates came down to support - much appreciated, lads! Including two guys I met for the first time at a mate's house the night before. For once, the casual dropping into conversation about me playing a gig the following night paid off! Playingwise, I played pretty well, no major oopsies, and new song in the set went without a hitch (apart from me forgetting to engage my OD like I said I would, oops). Really emptied out about five songs before the end though - I guess people had other places to go! Ahh well, from the start until then it was decently busy. Good night, really enjoyed it. Gear was the Greco LGB-700 followed by the Epiphone Em-bassy into the ISO standard modular bass rig.

I know (now) that Hipshot do conversion rings to take them up to 18mm, but I thought I'd save myself twenty quid with my homespun solution.

Small step forward today - tuners arrived. Because nothing ever goes smooth, the (pre drilled) holes in the headstock of my neck were way too big - and in my opinion having way too much slop to fix by wrapping tape around the tuner bushing. So, in steps some 0.6mm basswood veneer I have. Did a quick and dirty test fit and it worked pretty damn well. That one was a bit short though, so I cut some new strips of a more correct length: You've got to steam them first - they snap if you try to bend them that much when dry: After steaming, they're pliable enough to curl into shape and drop in the hole. Nice and tight, tuners fitted. Small job done.

If you do go for the K&M - I recommend buying it from London Guitar Studio - https://www.londonguitarstudio.com/p/k-m-memphis-pro-deluxe-guitar-stand - £40 and I think delivery is only £2.50. You can get it from Thomann/Bax for £35, but unless you're buying other stuff to trigger their free postage, their postage will make it same/more expensive. Buying in the UK you'll get it quicker too. The reason I want to shout out London Guitar Studio is that they were super helpful when I broke one of my K&M stands (mostly through my own bravado/stupidity), turned around the return/replacement with no fuss or hassle.

That reminds me, I did have one break on me - one of the telescopic sections blew past its stop (because I was being a twit and I helped gravity plus the heaviest part with the legs to extend it at great speed) and bits of it came flying out and disappeared on a dark stage - oops! I reported this to them via the shop I bought it from (possibly glossing over how it came to break, lol) and it was a no quibble straight replacement - send the broken one back and they sent me a new one right away. Seems like they stand by their products, and idiots like me! Yeah, so don't do that then

I just received some Hipshot Licensed Ultralite tuners from Pete. Guy's a legend - I was a bit brassed at the end of last month because the car's MOT was a bit of a sair one. Pete very kindly agreed to keep a set of tuners back for me for a week or so until pay day. Deal done, tuners arrived (eventually - courier snafu, not Pete's fault) and I can crack on with my project. Thanks Pete!

Hah, you old farts! See you in 10 years and 4 months

Well damn, I've just plugged the holes in a neck with ordinary dowels. I've clearly screwed it up then. 🙄

Bruce Millers in Aberdeen - where I bought my first bass. Closed 2011.

So I found a nicer piece of pine to practice on than that scabby old thing I found. It went... OK. A few wobbles (including setting the depth of my cutter a tad low at the beginning. But lessons learned, and praise be, the pickup fits (using the 1/4" cutter in the corners). I thought about having another test run, but I thought "F it" and decided to proceed directly to the real thing... First off, remove the bulk of the hole with the drill and forstner bit. Then deep breath and get out my most hated power tool, the router. Took my time this time, double checked everything. Did the main shape with the 1/2" cutter, then swapped to the 1/4" cutter for the corners. Howzat? The wee deeper holes in the corner are because I had to poke the 1/4" cutter down sufficiently so that enough plain shaft was below the baseplate so it would not cut the template. IT FITS, YAS! I am very pleased with my afternoon's work. This is the first pickup route I've ever routed in my life. Glad it went well, but won't be sorry if I don't ever do it again, lol. It most certainly has not "given me the bug" - it was stressful and horrible work, but I am very pleased with the results. Next job - figuring out how to make a dirty long hole from the control cavity to the pickup route without ballsing the entire operation up. I might need a bit of professional help with that so I might pay the Engineering Workshop at work a visit on Monday and see if I can cadge a disgustingly long drill bit at the very least. Or they might take pity on me and do a "give it here" - I won't complain!