Maude

I confused, but it is late. Why would the B string be any shorter from ball to silk than the E string? If anything I'd expect it to be longer as the saddles generally get moved back progressively towards the lower strings to achieve correct intonation, meaning that length would probably be longer on the B than E.

Here you go. Maybe different repairs and tools but techniques that can be adapted maybe.

I watched a video on a luthier repairing Willie Nelsons guitar. Just to make it structurally sound but keep the mojo. I'd guess that's what you'd like to do here? I'll have a look for it in the morning. Also in my Aria FEB thread in this section Matt P posted a link to a luthier with lots of content on acoustic repairs, really interesting if nothing else. Here you, hopefully there's something in there with similar repairs. https://youtube.com/user/twoodfrd

Yeah save that. The soundhole is only where the finish has worn away isn't it? Glue a few cleats under any splits. Have you seen Willie Nelsons? https://images.app.goo.gl/y2TsvXRE7oggToCX7

Definitely worth steaming that and then see where you stand. It's amazing what will come out, then a fine sand and some oil and you might just be surprised. My doublebass fell over from standing with the fingerboard hitting the edge of a granite step first. It crushed a string into the board and absolutely destroyed loads of windings on the string. Being ebony it's very dense and hard. I steamed it with wet kitchen towel and a soldering iron to really target the two inch long dent, a strings thickness deep. It took a good few goes but it came out completely, finish with 800 wet'n'dry and lemon oil. The rest of the band couldn't believe it the following week. You've got nothing to lose. 🙂 This was the string so you can imagine the board.

Hot, Hot, Hot - The Cure

Completely separate to the 4003 bass. More of a answer to the repeated asking to re release the 4005, albeit with a different body shape, pickup spacing and tailpiece. Yours for £5k 😆

Pssst, that was Avril Lavigne. From what I hear Swifty is a pretty shrewd, and ruthless if needed, business woman, and if you're her target audience then she writes a pretty catchy pop tune. Good luck to her.

Or........ well, you know.......find someone who could make a new neck about 20mm wider at the body end with the Takamine headstock grafted on with a scarf joint. You don't know anyone do you? Ha ha, now you wish you hadn't joined in this thread. 😄 I going to leave it for the weekend as I want to try and get my Hofner pickups in and wired up. This Takamine wasn't meant to take over but the excitement of flame throwers and sledgehammers got the better of me. I might get a fingerboard ordered and go from there. I'll order some veneer of some kind as well to shim the dovetail. In one of the vids mentioned earlier he glued a veneer to edges of the dovetail and filed/chiseled/scraped to shaped after changing the neck angle, seems like the simplest way.

Raspberry Beret - The little purple one

Crash - Primitives

No, I had the 'embarrassment eraser filter' on so they didn't come out. 😁

Crawling - Linkin Park

😉👍

It was T. S. Eliot that wrote, "This is the way the bass ends. This is the way the bass ends. This is the way the bass ends. Not with a bang, but a splinter", or something similar. Final score, Me 1, Aria 5. That's to say I'm in one piece, the bass is in, well more pieces than I'd planned. I now have a body, a neck and three parts of a heel. I managed to drill the joint and get some heat into the centre following couple of the videos posted by @Matt P, (thanks for those, very interesting) where he used an electric element on one and a soldering iron with a long tip on another instead of steam injection. He mentioned that the steam can get under the finish causing misting and just get water in places you don't want it, so as our old steam mop had been thrown out I thought I'd try it. I cut spoke from an old bike and wound a coil into the end of so my soldering iron would slip inside. Squirted some water down the hole and slipped the spoke in and waited. I could feel the joint warming so occasionally turned the bass over on two wooden blocks with the neck between the two, and firmly tapped the heel with another block of wood and rubber mallet. Nothing. More water, more heat, more patience, another whack, tiny gap opening between the heel and the back, but also glue starting to squeeze out of the heel joints. The heel is made up of three individual vertical parts with the neck glued horizontally on top then the whole thing dovetailed and glued into the body. Basically all four parts of the heel/neck started to ooze glue and move independently, but it still wouldn't let go. I guessed as the joints had all moved then there's no going back, the neck has to come off to re glue the four bits. This is where things got messy. I used a heat gun on low as well as the soldering iron to warm the joint completely as it now had to come out somehow, but still burnt some of the finish around the heel. Nevermind, roasted necks are all the rage aren't they? I'm not worried about this as I had a plan in my head as to finish which meant these areas would be a lot darker anyway. It's not black, just darkened it. The neck came out leaving the three bits of heel still in there so I drilled the hole slightly bigger so the ceramic element of the soldering iron, with the tip removed, would fit directly in the heel. More cooking and it's all out. It's not pretty but it's all out. I've put it away again now to mull it over but as it was built from four parts I assume with some careful cleaning, glueing and clamping, I can refit all the bits, after reshaping. I have had another idea but I'll mull things over before air that one.

Over And Over - Hot Chip

🙈

At Dawn They Sleep - Slayer Edit- Too slow again, well I'm not changing it now! 🙂

You're all mocking him but it took balls to make that guitar! Apologies. I've had a closer look and it turns out he didn't.

English Rose - The Jam

Run Like Hell - Pink Floyd Edit. Damnit, too slow again. Learn To Fly - Foos

Idly browsing eBay for woods to make a bridge, tailpiece, body end reinforcement etc, and I come across 'Pale Moon' black and white ebony. This is a bit special and unusual. I've no use for, especially at that price but it's rather lovely. 🙂 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Pale-Moon-Black-and-White-Ebony-guitar-bass-fingerboard-fretboard-SPECIAL-GRADE-/284149049742?_trksid=p2349624.m46890.l49292

When I first started work in '87 there was a bloke about ten years older who lent me loads of albums including Tygers of Pan Tang. There was also Graham Bonnets band, Alcatraz, although thinking about it Yngwie Malmsteen was guitarist so can't really be classed British, they had that sound though from memory. I ended up in my first proper band with that bloke from work. Happy days.

I know a few people on here have a TB-10 (or B10) but I can't remember who, or more rightly who has still got one as I think one did the rounds a bit. If you have one could you measure the width of the fingerboard at the wide end for me please, and if it's much less than 95mm or so, does it still feel doublebassish to play with tighter string spacing? Thank you. 🙂👍

I've measured up for fingerboards. The Aria board is 41mm at the nut, 65mm at the body end and 657mm long. I'd like about 770mm length for the new one. All boards vary slightly but in general cello boards are all too short, even for the standard Aria one. So it's going to have to be a double bass one. On average from looking at adverts 3/4 & 1/2 size are 41mm nut and 1/4 size are 36mm, so we're down to two sizes. The 3/4 is 860mm long and 96mm at the thick end, the 1/2 is 780mm long and 94mm at the end. Now although I want a wider string spacing it'll have to be a compromise between getting the width and looking/feeling rediculous. So although the 1/2 is the closest in length, if the 3/4 was cut down to 770mm then due to the taper, it would be narrower than the 1/2 at the wide end, so probably more suitable. So a 3/4 size board to cut down is on my shopping list. I realise this is boring but I've written it here to get it clear in my head and to remember it.