Andyjr1515

Well, a lot of set up still to do and a few remaining jobs, but we actually have a playing bass! First job was cutting the new nut from the Graphtech Black Tusq XL blank: Then a look at the Wal shim. The neck angle is dependant on the bridge height and I suspect the original Wal bridge sits higher than the new Hipshot because the strings are far too low with not enough saddle adjustment to reach even the minimum action height. It's a funny old business but folks are often very sniffy about shims - 'a decent luthier doesn't need a shim' is an oft stated opinion. Well, you don't get much more decent luthier than Wal and every Wal neck I've ever seen has one of these... And anyway, for starters it had to go. With it planed and scrapered off, I could get to normal action heights, albeit with the saddles adjusted pretty high so I will probably add a slightly thinner one than this to the front edge of the heel so I can drop the adjusters on the saddles a touch...but with is as it is, it plays! And even through my not-a-proper-bass-rig it sounds pretty darned fine So, still to do: - A bit more work on the heel angle to get the action range of the saddles a touch better - final set-up work on the frets - final tidy up of the fretboard, edges rounding, etc - string tree - tidy up the neck bolt recesses - fit the strap buttons

Having just fitted the bridge to the Wal save, it's fresh in my mind. There are two things that have to be right - the left /right position and the forwards/backwards position For the left /right, my preferred method it to temporarily fit the top and bottom strings, tightened enough for them to be straight and then position the bridge so the strings are equidistant from the fretboard sides and/or in line with (or at least symmetrical to) the pickup poles: Then, for the forward/backward you need to position it with enough saddle movement available to intonate the strings. For this, I do the following: - I check how much adjustment the bridge has (they vary!) from the furthest usable forward position of the saddles to the furthest usable rearward position of the saddles. Ideally, this is at least 5mm. - Generally, the top G intonates at around 1mm longer than scale length and the bottom E (or B on a 5 string) 4 or 5mm longer than scale length. It will NEVER be shorter than scale length - So I wind the G saddle fully forward - I then position the bridge with the G saddle at exactly scale-length, make sure it's square to the centre-line (and double check the above alignment) and mark the screw positions - I then know that all of the other saddles are capable of being adjusted to positions longer than that scale length by up to 5mm and that therefore all strings will be capable of being intonated correctly. -

I agree

Makes sense...

I was posting at the same time you were. I probably have some thicker veneer around too. That is 2.5mm. But yes - there's a bit of work to do at the back of the heel to get that to fit better.

Yes - as @PaulThePlug suggests, a strip of veneer either side. Veneer is generally 0.6mm thick so should get pretty close. If you don't have any, PM me your address and I'll send you a couple of pieces from my bits stash.

And the neck is on! The edges of the holes will be tidied up, but everything fits and the neck is on nice and tight. So now I can position the bridge. This needs to be at the correct scale length and also line up with the neck and - preferably - the pickup poles. I threaded a couple of 'test strings' through the back and loosely over the tuners, then positioned at the 1st fret with a capo. This allowed me to position the bridge until it was all lined up and mark the hole positions: So bridge holes drilled and bridge fixed. It's not playable yet because I have to plane off Wal's original neck heel shim to reduce the neck angle a touch - but it all lines up Phew! So tomorrow is about adjusting the neck angle to get the right action range, fitting the string tree and cutting the graphtech nut blank. Then we can see if we can get any sounds from it And then, it's just the final action and intonation set up and strap buttons...and then, unless I've forgotten anything major, it's pretty much done

Excellent

If I charged £8k for a build, I'd feel obliged to give the new owner my car as well, which wouldn't please MrsAndyjr1515 a great deal....

The bridge is well back putting the front button almost in the goldilocks zone so it probably wou!d have been OK. But what would have been more a challenge with the body shape would have been playing over the knee. Because the waist is so far forward, you play with the large rear bout resting on your knee and, with the bass held head slightly high, it balances comfortably. With a headstock, this would have been more of a challenge.

Wow! Thanks indeed!

Great news! The UNF bolts and cup washers have been shipped In the meantime, amongst the final prep stuff for the body, the ferrules at the back have been put in: And the all important 'This is not a genuine Wal body' mark stamped in:

When you say strip down? All you need to do for electrical contact is sand some of the paint off the bottom of the bridge to make sure the earth is touching bare metal. For the wire itself, you can just splay it out (making sure there is no wire insulation above the hole. You separate and splay out the wire to make sure there is not a big lump of wire that would stop the bridge fully seating) and let the bridge clamp it down into the wood surface. The alternative I use is I pop a small square of copper foil near the hole, including a piece the presses into the hole and then solder the earth wire to the copper in the cavity. That way, the solder joint is out of the way but there is good electrical contact with minimal thickness:

Yes - black looks good to me

Thanks I meant to add that. It's spot on 7 lbs

Oh, I'm sure. Trouble is, SimS - excellent as they are - are already in king's ransom territory, so I think you'd probably be talking king's ransom squared To be honest, I think that the - what was it: 125; 130; 126; 138? - number of combinations in sound might keep @Jus Lukin busy enough for long enough.

Well, theoretically if you turn them all round with the poles facing the back... ...but that would be very silly... (that'll be a No)

Just as a post-script, it's worth going into a bit more detail of the two things that I think have got folks here particularly interested - the Nova headless system and SimS Super-Quads First the headless system. And what a nice, great to use and looks good too is Andre Passini's Nova Guitar Parts headless system! String fitting (2 minutes for a full string change - I timed myself) and tuning up is effortless. The tuners are as smooth as silk and very accurate. The only challenge I had was getting enough height adjustment of the saddles while still being able to clamp then in the normal way - but I have some thoughts how this could be easily and cheaply improved which I will bounce off Andre shortly. But for 'best bang for the buck', this system absolutely gets my vote and I will be fitting them on all future headless builds. And that includes guitars because the guitar versions are just as good The other is the SimS Super-Quad system. They are fully passive pickups - the 9v battery is simply there to light the LEDs to tell you if you are in 'Split' 'Single' or 'Humbucker' mode. All the tech happens in that fancy switch, including some very clever work that means that there is NO volume change from the humbucking to single/split coil modes. And this is fully passive - remarkable. Here are the options: The three switches at the bottom are the SimS Tri-logic switches, then the 3 at the top are simply on/off toggles for each. There is a master volume and master tone and that's it. They are a synch to fit - for each pickup you attach the loom and then solder an earth, the hot out and the 9v feed for the LED. Mind you, it does take up quite a bit of real estate...especially with three!! And this, to Martin Sims' and my knowledge, is the first bass in the world with three of these remarkable pickups Oh...and they sound great

That's better! And they are all spot on 18mm spacing as preferred by @Jus Lukin And forgive the indulgence, but the inevitable arty farty shots : ..and, finally, with lights on: Thanks for looking, folks

OK - if the light is OK tomorrow, I'll do the arty farty shots....because it's all done! Wahaaaaaayyyy! I'm MUCH happier with the string positions, both relative to the pickups and relative to each other - and it's all invisible; top horn strap button on; back cover drilled, countersunk and fixed. So just optimising the string and pickup heights and the wait for Boris to decide that @Jus Lukin and I can meet somewhere just north of the M25 for me to pass it over. All being well, final photos tomorrow

It was the 'life flashing before your eyes near death experience' I remember the most Mind you, useful in a way. I remembered where I'd hidden my pocket money a few years earlier...

I don't have a problem with it. Assembling a bass from parts, kit or separates, finishing it, setting it up and then playing, or seeing someone who's asked for it to be built playing it, is a VERY satisfying thing to do. Designing a bass from broad requirements, choosing the timbers, solving the 'how-to' challenges, finishing it, setting it up and then playing is a VERY, VERY satisfying thing to do. Building from components and kits is also a very instructive thing to do to understand how the instrument actually operates, those things that have to be right and those things that you can take liberties with, and I often advise folks who want to try a full build (that's how I personally refer to them: full build; part build; kit or bitsa build) for the first time, that they should build a kit or bitsa first to learn those essential differences. This is our old gits band a few years ago before infirmity set in (I was the youngest...it wasn't a good look ) All are Andyjr1515 guitars or basses. In the way I would describe them: 1 Modded 1 Modded Kit Build 1 Bitsa Build 3 Full Builds I played the modded kit build for years (in fact I retired an own-design full build to play it) - and was very pleased with it. So I'm cool with it. But don't get me onto how a guitar company that makes copies of classic models are allowed to call their company 'Vintage'

You mean the ones where I destroyed the 3/4 finished bass with the router and had to start again? No, it's OK, he doesn't know about that. Oh...wait a minute...

Indeed. But he doesn't know about that yet. Oh...wait a minute...

It's the bridge positions. There's been a bit of cumulative creep that has put the strings too offset towards the treble side. Normally, that wouldn't really need sorting, but you have to remember that these pickups are two rows of two side by side coils. In that it is fixable, that the fix can be invisible and relatively straightforward, I'd rather sort it