Andyjr1515

Well, I was wrong on one assumption - it is basically an E Asia and N America species. And yes, it is also known in some regions as Kiri - but no timber suppliers seem to use that name other than a few in Australia where they are starting to use it for boats. It maybe it is an 'emerging' product as it is very light and, by all accounts, is a very effective CO2 absorber. Maybe all the folks round the world in the know are buying it up and no one here has caught on yet.

Hmm...I don't think so, but maybe. Good thought anyway I'll check on the Wood Database

It's a strange thing. Paulownia is becoming a timber of choice for an increasing number of the major builders for their lightweight ranges, it is easy to get cheapo bass and guitar bodies made from it, likewise chefs chopping boards, it is sustainable and, so I understand, it actually improves the soil quality that it's grown on. So you would have thought it would be possible to get hold of some. But no-one seems to sell it, except sent from Australia or China - and I'm pretty certain it isn't an Australian or Chinese timber. There is a Portuguese (or was it Italian) site that purports to only sell that particular timber but they aren't replying even to their own online enquiry form on their website. Anyone know of anywhere I can get some in UK or Europe?

Remarkable. Speechless (a first)

I have two and I don't even really play bass!!!

Yes...but while that is correct, that is also what is different between the commercial-quality (and in this respect, Switchcraft are broadly in that camp) and more general consumer quality. The point is that spring steel shouldn't lose its spring. So if it does, it is not good spring steel...and neither is it if you can bend the contacts closer - good spring steel would just spring apart again So yes - just before a gig with nowhere else to go - then it is definitely a get-out-of-jail card. But if it's lost its spring once, it will lose it again.

I love Yamahas...guitars, basses, saxophones - but their jack sockets aren't the most long-lasting. It isn't the plate - it's the socket itself. Some Yamahas are fitted with barrel jacks...and, as your luthier rightly says, they are a bit of a design compromise. They look like this : The design is flawed, but te best of a bad bunch are the ones made by Switchcraft...so if you have to have a like for like replacement, ask for Switchcraft to be fitted. Much more reliable are this type of socket, which is, I think what your luthier has adapted and fitted to your TRB: ...and this is probably also fitted (or the stereo equivalent) to your Nathan East. Again, the 'industry standard' for these is Switchcraft (and we're only talking a few £'s each). Honestly, a Switchcraft jack like this should last you out. Other makes last between 1 and 10 years max... In my experience, the ones Yamaha fit (and in all other aspects, I love them) are towards the lower end of that range. So, the jackplate itself on tbe Natan East is fine. But get someone to fit you a Switchcraft jack onto it and I don't think you'll have any more issues.

To be honest, the HB-JB75 headstock is pretty close to a 50's Fender other than the 'beak' they have added to avoid getting into difficult commercial cloning territory. So you could certainly round that off as long as you don't add a Fender decal. A 20 minute job with a sanding block just round the edge and a few coats of clear varnish would do it. But is it worth it?

I just hate sanding full stop...

Worth double checking with Gear4music. It is very unusual for a 'fenderish' neck pocket or neck not to be pretty close (certainly to within less than a mm). The necks and neck pockets are tapered. Is it possible one quoted measurement is where the pocket starts and the other is at the end of the heel at its widest?

Hadn't seen that - thanks!

I know what you mean ref the on/off...the V/V/T/T circuits often do cut off the whole signal when one of the vols is put to zero, even on a 'both' setting. But here there is no change in volume on bridge pup only at all until it's 'off' Chris is more than happy - he's after playability rather than the vintage look as long as he can return it to original if he ever wants to sell it. The Babicz will be perfect for him

Oh - and we may well be going for a Babicz FCH-3 replacement bridge @thodrik with Chris keeping the original (and my lump of ebony) in a safe place in the unlikely event he will be ever selling it. Electrics-wise, other than the loose and disconnected choke and some tweaks done in years gone by that I will undo, a decent squirt of contact cleaner has sorted all the crackles coming from the rotary and the tone pots. Neck volume pot fine and just the bridge volume that is on or off and needs replacing. Not bad for 50 years, many of which were heavy gigging! Truss rod seems to work OK and relief is adjustable to the correct level, but the frets definitely have some high spots that need sorting out. Pretty good. The main problems seem to be the ones that were there when brand new

Confirmed. Saddles are definitely original.

I can certainly measure the resistance...but, hmmm, the inductance? Not sure a standard multimeter can do that... Open to suggestions how - I will be disconnecting the choke

Anyway, my conclusion is that I will set this up for Chris with strings straight. I don't even have to change the saddles - the original grooves are so far off to the right, that the strings will sit straight without having to mess about at all (and if I need to cut some more to fine-tune the action height balance, there's enough room for that too.) But all that will have to wait a bit - domestic and family responsibilities, I am instructed informed, will be taking precedence for much of the coming week But when I'm locked allowed back in the cellar, the next task is sorting the electrics...so I am delighted at having found the correct circuit diagram as a result of the above discussion

Yes - pretty certain but can check too. If this had been the only one, then I would have been sceptical...but that a google images search flags up so many with identical saddles...and all with the same offset...then I'm pretty sure it is.

Yes - and actually, this is why I am pretty sure that this is a neck alignment 'fix' - because with the strings down the middle of the saddles as the metal ones would have been, pretty much everything - including the bridge poles - lines up...except for the distance of the G string from the side of the fretboard progressively up the scale and the centre fret dots progressively down the scale towards the nut This is strings positioned down the middle of the saddles as they would be with the standard metal saddles as fitted to @thodrik's (in the same factory in the same year): Start off by observing: - The strings are pretty much over all of the poles - The centre dot at the 19th is pretty much in the middle of the A and D strings - the centre dot at the 3rd is closer to the A than the D So how do we builders line up the necks? Well, it is easier to envisage what happens when you line up a neck by imagining this is a bolt-on. Loosen the bolts and the neck would swivel around an axis at 19th fret (think clock minute hand, spindle at the 19th dot and nut at 12 o'clock). The strings are anchored at the bridge, so if you rotate the neck towards 1 o'clock, then the fretmarker will move to the right relative to the A string. The right hand corner of the minute hand, below the spindle will rotate the other way...but it is close to the spindle so only a teeny bit. The strings will angle slightly towards the right, but they are so close to the pickups, that distance would be teeny and they would still be over the poles: And that is broadly how we all do it. But - this is a set neck...that's set. And the problem is, that to fix it from the other end, you have to move stuff across a lot more to achieve the same effect...and you fix one small issue and create many more more serious ones. My suspicion is this...and I'll check a few stock shots of other basses with the bone saddles to see if I'm anywhere near right...that: - probably in those days, the neck misalignment from time-to-time was much worse than this actual example - that they had a fix for 'bodies with misaligned necks'. Which was a box of bridges with alternative set of saddles with an offset. It would have been that or scrap the body and neck. - this bass ended up in the 'misaligned neck' pile...even though it is actually relatively marginal - it gets the alternative bridge - the outer strings now match better in distance to the fretboard edges. Nothing else does. Of course, I might be totally wrong

Love it! Just like my teenage heart-throb - mad as a brush!

Again, another good suggestion, but I've just measured it and it is 7mm worth of bone, and that is in compression. Plenty strong enough. Also, why fit bone when clearly the bridge is designed for metal as fitted to @thodrik 's ?

Great - thanks Well, if that was the reason, then it clearly didn't work all of the silks are over the saddles still in the pic above, even thought 3 of the saddles are between 2mm to 4mm too far forward.

And so to the next enigma. It is unlikely that this is all down to folks changing stuff but: - if you google images of original mid 1970s EB-3's and you look at the ones that have the bridge guard removed you will see some have metal saddles and some have bone saddles - and the bone saddles are properly made. The saddle adjuster screw thread is actually cut into the bone (something I've never seen before). Posh job! - and...er...the string slots in the metal saddles are central. And all the string slots I can find photos of in the bone saddles are offset...and that makes the strings do slightly odd things at the bridge, because the ball end positions are central. In fact...it does this: - but...er...wouldn't the strings line up better with the pole pieces if the saddle slots were in the middle? "Not if the neck isn't glued in straight. Thunderation - this is 1975! This is Gibson, godammit! Do you expect us to send on offset neck out without a rectification? Offset the saddle slots, problem solved!" Well, of course, I'm speculating. But, having spent years in manufacturing management, that was a sentiment expressed by some of my factory managers from time to time. Shortly before I dispensed with their services... Anyone know if I'm right on any of this? - are the bone saddles indeed all offset? - is there any other reason for doing that? - @thodrik , the question I referred to above...what are your saddles made of? And if metal, are the slots in the middle and if bone, are they offset? My speculation is because of this - ignore for the moment the string positions vs the pickup - just look at the string to fretboard sides and string to fretboard dots (which, I can confirm, are in the centre of the fretboard): And what happens if I lift the strings out of their slots and put them in the middle of the saddles. The G string is now further away from the edge at the upper strings: When you are building a guitar or bass, one of the basic checks when you are fitting a neck is ensuring that all of the dots are in line up the neck and that the bottom and top strings are equidistant from the edges of the board. Just sayin' And don't get me wrong. I LOVE Gibson guitars and basses. But it's a bit like when, as a teenager, I was always attracted to the girl who was as mad as a brush...

So - extender. I found a piece of ebony offcut and cut it to the right depth, but 5mm longer than the extension distance I was planning for. I then filed an angle, for reasons I'll come to: Next, on the opposite face, I marked the position of the four strings and spotted them with a 7mm brad-point drill. Lining up with a square, I tweaked the angled face until a vertical drill would create me the necessary allowance for the break angle of the strings: Then to the little drill-press. 4mm holes for the bass strings, 3mm holes for the treble: A filing off of the angled ramp and a groove chiselled in so that the block would slot into the clasps and lay flat against the back of the bridge: And...to my admittedly great surprise...it works! Next is investigating those odd kinks in the standard string positioning...

Brill! In a couple of posts time, I have a question for you

And so...the notorious 3 point bridge. Very, very nice idea and, with a very small tweak they could be made to work really well. But the design is flawed and yet they still make them and sell them. So what's the problem? It's simply that the distance between the string ball joint clasps and the saddles is too short. Much too short. Result - the string ball joint windings and/or silks go over the saddles. This is all set at scale length, so in reality, the D, A & E need to be at least 2-4mm further back than this: Ignore the kink in the direction of the strings, I'll come back to that. And most EB-3 owners (and that's most since the mid 70's) have this problem. Can you leave it? Well yes. But it means one of the key impacts of tone (orders of magnitude greater than neck wood, fretboard wood, body 'tonewood') - the contact between the string and nut and between the string and bridge - is compromised. There are a couple of solutions: - cut back the silks and put up with the fact that the string at that far end is often different to the rest of it because of the reverse wind from the ball joint - fit or make an extender Ref the latter, there is a guy in USA who makes and sells what is basically a steel bar with the four string holes that hooks under the clasps and moves the ball ends back 10-12mm. It works, but is quite expensive with the US shipping and adds more weight to what is already a fairly heft bass. So - what about making an extender out of a hardwood, such as ebony. And that's what I've done. I'll cover it in the next post.