BITE Guitars

6ers no, 5ers yes: https://bite.guitars/product/5er/ 2+3 headstock 4+1 headstock

Yeah, we had something like this our mind, but first, the ideal spot is hard to find, and second, it's hard to route, so we went with a plain accent line instead. What matters to us is that the accent line does not follow the body contour in parallel but has a life of its own.

@wateroftyne We've meanwhile enabled customer ratings to allow for first-hand feedback: https://bite.guitars/customer-ratings/ and BITE Buddies including 5 test locations in the UK: https://bite.guitars/bite-buddies/

.. or order the 4-in-ine headstock: https://bite.guitars/product/4-in-line/

@Skybone We've manwhile introduced our 24-fret premium model Evening Star with our proprietary body shape: https://bite.guitars/product/evening-star/ 34" with figured top 35" XL scale with artwork

A new review is out. Bass Gear Magazine scrutinized the BITE Jawbone Bass. They had a close look at the build quality and listened to its 1000mV growl. The result: 5 out of 5 stars! https://www.bassgearmag.com/bassic-review-bite-jawbone-pj-bass-review/

@LukeFRC @Stub Mandrel Frequency of comments: I am very appreciative of the fact that users of Basschat UK took note of us small builders from Vienna and raised questions, which in turn gives us the opportunity to make our point. Thta said, as much as we are trying our best to stay on top of things happening online, we are only a small team and we've got basses to build, so we don't have the physical resources to monitor and comment on everyhting about us, so please don't be too harsh on us on this count. Also, some posts, such as on Youtube or FB, can be commented on in passing while others would need a quiet weekend morning to consider and respond to. @binky_bass @prowla Union Jack: My sincere apologies. We changed the flag. I hope the one presently on display gives no further cause for complaint. @BigRedX About the headstock: - Is a straight one cheaper to build than an angled one? - Yes. - Is a straight one less prone to snap one day? - Also yes. No leverage working against one's beloved neck. - Is a straight one "better" for sound? - My desire to keep replies short and simple may have gone down the wrong way with some, so here's the long version: We take neck stiffness extremely serious. Our headstock is thicker than the conventional standard (routed at 17 vs. customary 15mm), we leave extra wood under the nut as pictured in my earlier statement above, and we also shifted wood from the neck pocket bottom to the neck heel (neck heel thickness 28 vs. customary 25,4mm) so that the neck screws have some extra stretch to "bite" into the neck (if done properly, the screws are never supposed to "bite" into the neck pocket bottom, otherwise you won't achieve direct coupling). Why all these efforts to make the neck thicker, while leaving the playable stretch as thin and comfortable to play as everyone is used to? A tuned 4-string set exerts a tension of 1000 newton (100kg). The neck spans 2 thirds of the scale length and its cross section measures only a tiny fraction of the body's, so in terms of wood, nothing matters as much as a good, stiff neck. We consider a strong, present, resonating growl the most important sound property in a bass. Others may have other priorities, we don't judge, but strong and well-defined output is ours. That's why we went to great lengths to develop our own pickups which generate 1000mV output (as opposed to an average 300mV of pickups with comparable passive design). Without the support of a solid, stiff neck, a strong pickup is of no use. We found that we could implement OUR sound intentions best in a bolt-on, straight headstock design and that's that. Sceptical anyone? Of course you are, you've never heard of us before. Whoever wants to try our sound and building quality, you can do so in Vienna, New York or the comfort of your home, as we offer a generous return policy, you'll find all info on our front page. @wateroftyne @binky_bass Headstock shape: You may have a point, I have to say interest notched up notably since we introduced the short headstock and even more so its matched version which we offer without extra charge. Generally speaking, it really would have felt wrong to us to be the 100th builder with a 4-left headstock just slightly different from 99 others for trademark reasons. We felt way more comfortable with 2-left-2-right and our distinct bite, but here's a question, how would you go about "offering a more traditional headtsock"? @Skybone Here's our take on custom: in many people's minds it is tantamount to handmade, not in ours. We never pinned "handmade" to our chest. By contrast, we consciously bank on means of digital production (and transparently say so), thus yielding the benefits of consistent quality, cost and time efficiency, and it also enables us to explore new ways of applying artwork to the bass guitar. That body surface together with the pickguard is a big area. We are trying to make something of it in our secret menu for those who want options beyond our configurator. Here's a glimpse on what comes out of it. Quite a number of orders come into being by way of the ASK US A QUESTION button at the bottom of our configurator. People make use of configurator options as much as they are avialable and then hit this button to ask us if this or that can be done beyond their selected configurator choices.

A fresh review of a BITE Jawbone out now: Also, what is that now?

Yes, but wrongly so. We elaborate on this misnomer here: https://bite.guitars/neck/ under the heading "Reinforced Headstock Heel"

Thanks a lot! And no neck dive known to mankind. Our longer headstock is still ard. 20 mm shorter than Fender's and carries only compact tuners. Our bodies are made from alder, a bit downsized and pool routed, so the average BITE bass weighs between 3,8 and 4 kg and is well balanced.

@jazzmanb @jrixn1 @Richard R @stewblack @wateroftyne @edstraker123 @mcnach @Pea Turgh @Graham @Jean-Luc Pickguard @BrunoBass @Lfalex v1.1 @BassApprentice @PeteHantzios Yes, we now offer a shorter headstock option in our configurator (still full 34" long scale), and it comes with a more traditional logo (pictured here with our original headstock for comparison). Since we were experimenting with different logo colors, we still have a limited number of logo variations on stock: black-outlined gold, black-outlined silver, charcoal and brown. If you want any of these on your short headstock, just add a line in the comment area of our online checkout or send us your configuration without any commitment via the ASK US A QUESTION button and we take it from there. Have an awesome Sunday! Wolfgang

There are two ways you can go about building an angled headstock. The first one is pictured below, you route it all from one piece. It's a bad idea because it gives you the short grain in the headstock, prone to break and bad for resonance. Alternatively, you can glue it together from two pieces as a so-called scarf-joint, still you have a glue joint where you don't want to have one for strength and stability reasons. The second picture shows the leverage forces at work in an angled headstock. The third picture shows how we route our neck-headstock transition: we leave an extra amount of wood underneath the neck's weakest spot. You can compare our drawing with Fig. 4 pictured. This is the extra plus of stiffness our basses have for strong output and sustain. Source: https://www.premierguitar.com/articles/26529-whats-in-a-neck?page=2

Hi everyone, This is Wolfgang from BITE Guitars. You guys have been sceptical but fair, thanks, I appreciate this. Yes, we do things differently, from the product design to our online configurator to the way we organize production. Whenever you do things differently, it's bound to raise eyebrows and questions. I'd be surprised if it didn't. So here are a few explanations. We are not in it for the quick buck, we do nothing on the cheap and we do not source in China. We try to be as transparent as possible, pls check out "Guitar Building 4.0" on our ABOUT US page. Our production is highly digitalized for consistent quality and still our head of production is a licensed luthier who also builds violins with the craftsmanship of his own hands (in Austria you need several years of training, a craftsman examination and a compulsory license to build guitars). Our basses were developed in cooperation with professionals from the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna, the venerable luthier school in Hallstatt, and scrutinized and tested by the knowledgeable audience of the Guitar Summit's boutique area, notably trade journalists and bass professionals. Response was overwhelming and till this day we havn't had a single quality complaint. How many bass manufacturers employ graduate bass professionals to QC and test slap each instrument? We do anyway. A straight headstock like ours gives maximum firmness for output and sustain (unlike an angled one). As for straight headstocks, we all have grown to appreciate the 4-left tuner arrangement as industry standard. So why does BITE arrange its tuners 2-left-2-right? 4-left is a pretty crowded party. All 4-left shapes differ slightly between manufacturers for trademark reasons. There are clearly beautiful 4-left shapes out there, but elbowing our way into the 4-left crowd just didn't seem right to us, we wanted to create something of our own. Our headstock is almost an inch shorter than the ubiquitous 4-left headstock. Since our bodies are also a little reduced in size, the overall proportion between body and headstock is right. This counterweight is important for eliminating dead spots. In addition, our necks have a D-profile that players generally find pleasant and relaxing and that also adds strength along the entire neck and thus contributes to consistently strong output across the whole fretboard. Another reason for our headstock shape could be called contingency product planning. You don't want to go through trademark registration every time you add a product variation. Our headstock leaves enough space for adding a fifth or even a sixth machine head and also to flip it and reposition the logo for a left-handed version. To put our headstock in perspective, here's a video of Overdriver Duo (Brazilian sensation with over 2bn clicks and counting). It shows their Jawbone PJ from various angles. We are talking custom bass. Over a billion choices in custom quality, a fast and visualized online configurator, immediate ordering, worldwide direct shipping, zero tropical wood, high output pickups, etc. This is completely new terrritory in many aspects. It's impossible to offer all of this at entry level prices. Yes, but we meanwhile offer our pickups also with plain white and plain black covers. Why did we brand them in the first place? They are a proprietary development. We had Germany's foremost scientific pickup experts contributing, GITEC president Prof. Manfred Zollner, GITEC board member Tillmann Zwicker and renowned pickup physicist Helmuth Lemme. We finally achieved what we had in mind: passive pickups with a record output but still a clearly articulated growl that cuts through the mix even with tone rolled off, no muffled mud. Hear it for yourself in Nathan Navarro's review. For technical reasons and for easy use we focus our configurator on the most popular choices. We can do a lot more than that, ranging from special body finishes, including oil & wax, all the way to implementing special wiring ideas. Those are things that need a little interaction between you and us and require individual pricing, that's why we offer them separately in our SECRET MENU.

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