Andyjr1515

Well...there's a funny story here As the saying goes (well, it does now), "The best laid 8-Point-for-not-c**king-up-the-neck-pocket Plan's of mice and men..." Because in checking the machine screws I have in my bits box I realised - and should have thought - that the inserts in the neck are imperial. This is an old bass. They are definitely 10- (3/16") but it has been so long since I used imperial machine screws, I can't be sure that my guess at UNC is right - they might be UNF. Yes - I can source them in the right sizes and in black ( @Fishman 's preference) from Accu.co.uk - a supplier of good quality Stainless fastenings - but, as they are made to order in this size and spec they will take a couple of weeks to come through so I thought I'd better check I'd got the right thread first In the meantime, these beautiful Schaller lightweight machine heads have come through - drop in fit, including the rear pegs:

Another 'Phew!' It looks OK: Still waiting on Superquads which should arrive later today - then I can work out how much space I need to leave for the three plug-in wiring looms

That's great - thanks for posting.

Oh, I so do... Yes - I took the cup of tea as an optional, rather than a full, step in the 8 point plan

The upper wing doesn't need any cable channels or control chamber provision building in and so can be weight-relieved and glued on first. Normal stuff, I hog out the weight-relief chamber with a Forstner bit: Then tidy out the edges with a sharp chisel so the edges act as the guide surface for the diddy flush bit (Axminster - I use this SUCH a lot) that is used then to deepen the chamber to final dimension: And now this can be glued to the neck/top assembly. I use side clamps to ensure the laminations with the neck are tight and then the spool clamps to make sure the top to back joint is gap free. I'll know whether it is all gap free in the morning once the clamps can come off. Fingers crossed!

Well - no pictures, but I think I've worked out the sequence to do things. - Trying to create a pocket to fit a neck that already has screw holes is always a challenge. - Fitting necks with machine-screws is also always a challenge, because they have to be absolutely spot on, both in dimensional and angular terms. - Creating a pocket to fit a neck that already has machine-screw inserts fitted is therefore (a challenge)2 .... So it needs a plan. And this is my plan: * From the neck, I will take a paper template, using the 'thumb pressed to make an impression' trick. ** From the template, I will mark the 4 screw-hole positions on a piece of plywood *** I will drill the 4 holes with the drill press and check the fit with some short machine screws **** I will then temporarily attach the plywood template to the neck and line up the neck on the body, intended bridge position and pickguard position. I will mark the position of the template. *****I will probably have a cup of tea, before... ****** ...taking the plywood template off the neck and lining it up with the positional marks made on the body and mark the 4 screw hole positions ******* I will then drill the four holes through the body on the drill press using a good quality brad-point drill bit ********Next, I will screw the neck to the top of the body and mark the outline of the neck pocket *********Finally, I will cut the neck pocket and then everything else relating to the final carve of the body (which has a few mm wiggle room) can then use the neck and neck pocket as the datum I call it my '8 Point for not c**king up the neck pocket Plan' Or, in short: I'm going to try to drill the fixing holes in the right place first. Oh...and I might have to buy some longer screws first, so don't hold your breath

I've just heard from @Jus Lukin that there are a trio of Superquads on their way to me - which is VERY exciting In the meantime, I've started getting my head round pre-glue internal carves of the two mahogany wings. I'll wait for the Superquads before I sort the bottom wing - to be honest, as much for the challenge at accommodating the wiring looms as the switches themselves - but the weight relief of the top wing is more straightforward as there are no cable runs or anything to worry about: So this afternoon, I will be getting my little (but super) Proxxon drill press out and hog some mahog out with one of my larger Forstner bits. Which is useful, because the first job on @Fishman 's Wal save will use the same drill . If only I had done this much 'in-cycle efficiency' when I had a proper job With the back wings trimmed now to within a couple of mm of final size, I couldn't help a quick mockup: I have a good feeling about this...I think it's going to be a delightful little thing (of course, with the Superquads, a delightful little thing fully capable of knocking a house down)

I could tell he was tempted by my suggestion of plain maple veneer stained a muddy brown....

And today, with the bandsaw still out from cutting @Jus Lukin 's tailstock relief (photo in the morning once it's light) I got to work on the great big - but surprisingly light - lump of swamp ash: I've left around a mm or so wiggle-room larger than the paper template @Fishman sent me. Looking at the above, this is why I wasn't overly troubled by the sensitivities of re-bodying a classic - the shape is, I think you will agree, 'maybe, itself, influenced by the styles of the era in which it was built'

That's a very nice paint job. Black is notoriously difficult to get right

When I've finished the fret levelling, etc, I will scrape in between each of the fret pairs with a single-edged razor and then see how the ebony looks. With some pieces you can get to an excellent shine just with going up the grades of microweb up to around 12000 grit. Some benefit, though, with a light tru-oil or linseed oil & buff. I'll see when we get there.

Top glued and frets trimmed: Other than the cut at the rear to give finger room access to the tuner knobs, the next major task is working on the back wings - working out the weight relief chambers, the cable runs, the control chamber before routing them before they are glued into place - so a few days on the drawing board rather than cutting or gluing wood. The adage of 'check 3 14 times before you cut or glue anything' springs to mind

The fretting process is very similar to @Fishman 's Wal save, only difference being the fretwire (Evo Gold coiled as opposed to Nickel Silver straight) and that it is being done before attaching to the neck. A light run along the slot with a triangular needle file to take the brittle corners off: Fretwire cut to length and de-tanged at the sides: Small bead of Titebond along the tang, then mallet one side, then the other side then the middle. The squeeze-out confirms that the fret has seated: Then wipe off the squeeze-out and clamp a radius block to hold the fret to shape while the titebond hardens: And it really is starting to look like a bass now

Not sure how I missed this. Love that shape and figuring

All frets in ready for trimming once the Titebond has fully set:

All looking good from here

Well done It's splendid!

After scraping the fretboard edges (easier before the frets are in) if was time to start fretting. @Fishman has gone for nickel silver rather than the harder - but slightly brass-coloured - EVO Golds I tend to fit to my builds. The nickel silver are no more difficult than the EVO Golds to fit, but this being a flat board - and the fretboard already on the neck (On a 'new' build, I would generally fret the board and then glue to the un-profiled neck) it needs a slightly different approach. For the flat board, I went for flat wire rather than coiled. But what's this??? Why would crazy Andyjr1515 take flat wire and bend it to fit onto a flat board?? Well, the theory is to hammer one side of the fret, then the other. This leaves a 'hump' in the middle because the wire has been bent. Then I hammer the middle and it forces the barbs that have already gone into the slot sideways, locking the fret in. On the actual fretwire, I made the curve quite a bit less than in the photo above. I also use tang nippers to ensure that you don't get the sharp tang ends protruding from the fretboard as it settles: The last two things I do before hammering the fret in is run a triangular needle file gently along the fret slot to take the sharp corners off and also run a tiny bead of titebond along the tang. Then it's the 'hammer one side; hammer the other side, hammer in the middle; wipe off the glue squeeze-out': You can see the hump in the middle here before I flatten that with the mallet. Finally, I clamp a caul on (a radius block in the case of a radiussed board) for 10 minutes or so to hold it firmly flat (or radiussed) while the glue grabs: 5 done, 16 (I think) still to do

Happy New Year, everyone. Fingers crossed... And so to - the important test. With that unusual graphite/carbon/whatever plate representing the greatest proportion of the gluing surface to the fretboard, was it going to be able to stand reasonable tightening of the trussrod without a sharp *CRACK* and a demonstration of the removal of the fretboard around 45minutes quicker than using the iron and steel sheet? It is an interesting difference, of course, between the 'traditional' style of single action truss rod and a modern one. In the modern ones, the rod itself bends, pressing down at each end and pressing up under the middle of the fretboard. Here there is a possibility of the rod popping off the fretboard. With the traditional single-action anchored ones, the shortening rod bends the neck wood and the fretboard bends along for the ride. So the theory is that there is less force on the fretboard joint with a traditional anchored rod. Leastways, that's how the logic seemed last night after a couple of cans of 5.2% marshmallow stout! But the test has to be done because there's no point in fretting this if the joint isn't sound under normal strain. So this is the before - my aluminium box-section straight edge laying on the neck with trussrod loose: And this is after tightening the rod to a normal extreme - the kind of back bow typical of when you remove the strings on a set-up bass: And the glue joint held. Which makes it my first 'phew!' of 2021 So over the next day or so, this should be able to be fretted up

Don't underestimate how much difference to the look of the headstock happens when you add the tuners. Take an Ibanez - without the tuners it looks positively skinny but with them if looks absolutely fine. I agree with @TheGreek - your original in the pics looks fine to me By the way, to look back at the original headstock design I re-read the saddles issue. I'm still a bit bothered at the desire for the saddles themselves to be lined up in a particular way (this might be an interpretation problem my end). Just for the avoidance of doubt - the position of the saddle blocks themselves are determined by the physics and geometry of the bass and strings. They will have to go where they need to go to intonate. In very general terms, that tends to be G=scale D=scale+1mm A=scale+2mm E=scale+3mm. For safety, I make sure that the G has at least 1mm extra backward movement (that is, scale + 1mm) and the bottom E a further 2mm (that is, scale +5mm). The bridge elements themselves - the saddle holders - or bridge in the case of an integrated bridge, can be put anywhere as long as that allows the saddle blocks to have the above movement or more.

Some important progress. First I drilled the trussrod access hole. This end has some excess wood to the length and sides for @Jus Lukin and me to sort some degree of carve, chamfer or rounding: Then the trussrod channel routed, happily successfully breaking into the access drill hole at the head (phew!) and the taper cut oversize, leaving also the head oversize on the basis that you can always take wood off but it's more challenging to put it back on! Long way to go yet, but it's looking closer like a bass at each step Next will be sorting the head carve and achieving the final 'spine' depth of the neck while the blank is easy to handle - leaving the rectangular cross-section of the neck until quite a bit later - before then gluing the top to the neck.

This morning was about tapering the fretboard and starting to think of options with the trussrod and headstock. Using last night's calculations, I marked the cutting line on the fretboard in pencil (best thing to use on ebony - it shines, giving a decent contrast...and it rubs off if you mark it in the wrong place ) then onto the bandsaw and finishing it off to the line with a sharp plane: I'm sticking with the string spacing of the Nova headclamp and so should not need a 'nut' behind the zero fret. Instead, once it has been fretted, I will chamfer the fretboard overhang and cut some relief grooves down to the clamp holes. As such, the clamp unit will butt right up to the fretboard end. The fretboard thickness also gives me a decent break angle over the zero fret without the need to step the neck at the head: The pencil line beyond the clamp block is the closest I will go at the top to allow any string ends to be still protected by the head, hopefully leading to less mysterious holes in @Jus Lukin 's , his band-mates or their audience members' jumpers I will give some thought to end detailing/shape and bounce them off @Jus Lukin One thing that will be there is the truss-rod access hole that will be drilled just below and under the clamp block. Albeit 10-12mm lower and in the centre of the neck, orientation and lengthways position-wise the rod will go here with the slot, running up to the zero fret, meeting up (hopefully) with the hole drilled under the block that the adjuster will sit in: So this afternoon's tasks are: - rout the trussrod slot - drill the rod access hole - finalise the profile shape under the zero fret - rough taper the neck a couple of mm oversize to the fretboard (which is already at finished dimensions)

And we're back on this one too I'm doing some of the stuff for this project and @Fishman 's Wal save at the same time because they are using similar tools and set-ups. So next steps on this is about preparing stuff for the fretboard to be glued. But on this there are a few things to be done first. The swifts have been tidied up and the fretboard is now ready to be tapered and cut to final width and size: We are going for an 18mm string spacing at the bridge and for that I received a set of the individual bases for the Nova bridge from @Andre_Passini just before Christmas. The reason I needed these are that the 4-element base is 19mm spacing. I really like how the same tuner/saddle assemblies can be used on either types of base - very cool! So my next job this afternoon is drawing the string runs full size so that I can determine the fretboard taper. I will then pencil that onto the ebony and, in the morning, bandsaw/plane the board to finished size and taper. Then the next job after that will be to sort the best arrangement for the trussrod - because it is a LOT easier to rout a trussrod groove before you taper the neck! And once I've done that, I will be gluing the top onto the neck! (Remember, folks. While I'm always happy to share how and why I do stuff...never assume that it is the way it should be done )

So - scary day. Attaching the new fretboard. First job was to make sure that the mating surfaces were absolutely flat. When you are making a neck from scratch, generally you leave the neck as a rectangular section until after the fretboard has been fitted - that way you can clamp firmly along each of the sides of the fretboard to avoid any gaps. But with a finished neck, you can't do that. You can only clamp along the spine of the profiled neck and therefore you are relying on the flatness of the fretboard itself - and the neck mating surface - to fully squeeze out the glue and close the gap at either side of the fretboard. So both the bottom of the fretboard and the neck itself has to be completely flat. I used a scraper to make sure all of the glue residue from the old fretboard was gone and then ran a straight edge all the way along the neck - with its graphite/carbon core - to ensure absolute flatness all the way up. And it wasn't quite. The graphite/carbon (I say that because I don't actually know what the fibres are) was just a teeny bit raised one side. Normally this wouldn't be a problem because the clamping would just force the side gap closed. But with the replacement that wasn't going to be good enough. So some very careful scraping and sanding (I made a small sanding block for the job) ensured that it was made flat. And for this job - with the very fine graphite/carbon/whatever dust - it was the full A1/P2 spec respirator...this is no time at all to end up at A&E with a severe respiratory problem! The neck was masked off to keep the glue off the original finish, the truss-rod adjuster was protected from glue squeeze-out and a clearance channel in the fretboard added to ensure no binding: Then the Titebond, spool clamps, cauls and G-clamps: Note that all of the clamps are running down the centre. This is different to how I will do @Jus Lukin 's where I will have the luxury of being able to clamp along each edge. So in this case, it is the fretboard stiffness that is applying the clamping pressure across the width, and itself protected by the caul on top. The result was better than I expected and as good as I could have hoped: This will now sit at least 24 hours for the glue to fully harden before I do anything with it

And what is this cunning plan? Well it's to use the spool clamps in the photos above, but with a mod. At the heel, all is straightforward because the sides of the heel and the freboard are both square and so the fretboard just can't move sideways at all: But here at the nut, the fretboard is tapered and so I have to mod the clamps otherwise they are just clamping the widest point, which is the top of the fretboard which would allow sideways movement of the fretboard to the neck: And so they are modded to give clearance of the fretboard and clamp the narrower neck/board join: And then - other than the G clamps - I should just need this: - Good quality masking tape for the neck up to the join - A flat hardwood clamping caul for the fretboard - a softer caul for the bottom of the neck. I will scrape a 'C' shape into this so the load is spread a touch But it's still worth sleeping on it before taking the action. And then, while this is gluing tomorrow, @Jus Lukin 's headless will be getting some attention