GarethFlatlands

Day 4 The front of the neck was done, so Jon took the body away for a couple of layers of clear coat so that the staining could be done, and I got to work on the back of the neck. The heel and the headstock ends were done first, then I worked in to the middle using a flat file, a rounded file/rasp and a saw rasp, checking regularly until I felt like it was a shape I liked. Then lots of sanding and crossed fingers that no major re-working needed doing. There wasn't! Lots of detail sanding was done too. The holes for the tuners were marked out and drilled out on the drill press using a forstner bit. The body was stanined black with some stain diluted with acetone, being careful not to rub it in too aggressively and take any clear coat off. Once done, Jon's assistant rubbed this off until just the grain was black. Then more clear coat. The lion's share of the work done, Friday would be about installing the hardware and setup. I'd been travelling from Sheffield on the train all week but my fiancee and I decided to make a trip of it and stay at the Old Hall Hotel down the road on the evening of day 4 for a pub dinner and a sleep in a 4 poster bed.

Day 3 The neck and board glued and dried, the refining of the board shape was routed with the same template as the neck. The order things were done is a little hazy but the jobs for today were: Cutting the nut slot Rough shaping the back of the neck with a router Radiusing the board (16" I think...) and then levelling using a straightedge Adding some markers to the top and front of the board Here's the neck with markers and a nut slot, but no shaping. And here's a neck with shaping done and on the table where I definitely remember doing the radiusing and levelling.

Day 2 Body routing for the control cavity, pickup and neck pockets. I was terrified of routers before doing the course, but by day 2 I felt very confident using them and the woodworking possibilities seemed vast with them. I figured with a good enough router and the right templates and jigs, you could build the vast majority of a guitar with a router. The body roundover was also done and you can see the scorch marks on the edges where I lingered too long. Nothing too drastic that wouldn't sand out thankfully. The neck was also done in much the same manner as the body. A channel was done down the centre for the truss rod and a hole drilled at the heel end for adjustment. Once the rod was inserted, a strip of wood was added and glued into place to cover it, which was then planed back until flush with the body. The ebony board was cut to rough shape, glued and clamped and day 2 was over. Things were coming together nicely!

I did the Shuker build course back in February and thought I should should share my experience with any Basschatters who aren't sure if the course was for them. I haven't done any woodworking since high school, so picked a nice simple build. The specs were: Ash Jazz body (classic), stained black and rubbed back to highlight the grain Maple neck Fretless ebony fretboard Musicman style humbucker Passive electronics with stacked volume/tone to keep the front cleaner, but at Jon's suggestion a 3 way switch was added to be able to run the pickup in parallel/single coil/series for a few extra options Schalled elephant ears tuners and Gotoh bridge in black If you don't feel like reading the whole thread, here's the end result! Day 1 The 2 piece ash body had already been glued and planed, so once the centre line was found and the body outline drawn, it was onto the bandsaw for a rough cut. Then a template was used to guide a router around the body, removing about 2-3mm of material each pass until something that looked a bit like a bass happened. Once that was done, the forearm slope was cut out with a hand plane, and the stomach contour was done with a saw rasp. Then lots of sanding, starting at 100 grit paper, then moving on through 120, 180, 240, 320 and finally, 400. I'm a puny man and my arms were so gone by the end of the day I couldn't raise them horizontally, and had to buy a hot/cold pack from the train station Superdrug on the way home to try and get them ready for the following day's work. I decided I was going to take breaks if needed to make sure I got through the rest of the week. As it happens, that was the worst of the physical side of it, but I did get a good excuse to pet Jon's new dog lots, 10 month old Lily. Lily enjoys head scratches, singing the songs of her people and chewing everything, including my shoes, while I was still wearing them.

Yeah, worst one was completely blanking on the verse to Moonage Daydream on a decently paid, out of town gig. It's thankfully rare but I always run through any bits of songs I've fluffed recently before we go on now, and Moonage always gets a quick playthrough just to be sure. I feel like it's going to be replaced by Space Oddity now we've started doing that one.

Yes, I used it as a blended octave up effect with no exp pedal. Set the interval and you can turn it on/off as with any other patch on there. Maximum blend and you should be sorted. +12 is one octave up so I guess 1 = a semitone. It works in steps of 0.1 so if you've having trouble dialing in the exact interval, hold the tap switch while you turn the parameter and it should have less of a step allowing fine tuning.

SFX Micro Thumpinator > Boss TU2 > ZVex Channel 2 (always on for a bit of growl) > Custom COG Distortion > MXR Bass Comp. I don't think anything else in the chain would add the frequencies the SFX is removing, and the whole lot gets some light compression before it hits the amp. That was the theory anyway, now I'm worried I've done it wrong!

Hmm, I use the Thumpinator first (I have no octave effects) and then compression last!

Dropped in on here to say after years of occasional Ashdown use, I went into a new practice space and noticed the amp was a little 12" Ashdown combo, the snappily named RM-C112T-500 EVO. I was a little dubious as over the years, my experience of their amps has ranged from perfectly decent to disappointing and the single small speaker had me worried. I was hugely impressed with the amp! My P-bass sounded fantastic through it and it held it's own against a full band despite being next to the drummer and under a stand mounted PA. Tight, punchy sound with just the right amount of breakup. Pleasantly surprised. Played a few Stranglers riffs through it and they were spot on (apart from the playing).

I'm not getting any response from Ovnilab so I'm considering starting up a complementary site that helps out with compressor comparisons but doesn't tread on Silas' toes. Unfortunately, it's a big job and I'm not sure where to start. Not only that, my ears are obviously nowhere near as good as his! It's going to be a (very ongoing) project if it ever even gets up and running so I'll keep re-checking this thread so any input will be considered.

Pete is a very good seller. He was extremely easy to deal with, posted the pedal the day after payment and kept me updated on the sale. Thumbs up or whatever the BC equivalent is.

Bought an Eden WTX264 head off Simon, the amp was posted promptly and he maintained very good communication throughout. Arrived well packaged and sounded great. Can recommend.

Really gutted, he was a fantastic player and had such a good heavy singing voice. Spent my afternoon figuring out Cave In bass lines in tribute.

I'm not sure, I got in touch with him a few months ago and have been learning web dev stuff in the meantime so haven't spoken to him in a while. Even if he's not, I might carry on with it anyway, it'd be a good resource and useful if I applied for a web dev job later down the line.

Thanks for the suggestions so far. A noise rating is a great idea and one thing I'd thought of but neglected to mention in my original post. Controls possibly fell under "ease of use" and as there are too many possible options, I don't think it'd be feasible or useful to use this as a criteria for comparing comps, although it would be great in a comments/other information box somewhere. Power supply and dual/single band are certainly possible, as is metering (a simple yes/no or something more in depth?) as is valve/analogue/digital. Clips are a great idea but a huge amount of work and out of the scope of what I'm hoping to do. Maybe once a list is generated from the options available, being able to dismiss options would be useful to narrow down potential candidates?

First up, I wasn't sure whether to post this in the effects forum or somewhere else so feel free to move it if needed. I'm not sure if anyone has clocked but on the main page for Ovnilab it states they're working on a system to compare compressor options. In the hope of re-training myself in web development, I've offered to help out if I can. Before I get in too deep into coding and find it's not what people want, what are people's thoughts on how such a tool would work? What kind of features would you like to be able to compare comps by? I've got as far as searching by maximum price and think scores for ease of use, transparency would be useful, as well as format (small/large pedal, rack) and type (1176, Ross clone etc). Please let me know your thoughts and I'll take them to Cyrus and hopefully get something up and running before the sun runs out of fuel and expands to engulf the Earth before collapsing in on itself. Thanks Gareth

Best - The Japanese Fender P I posted about elsewhere. Black with a maple neck, SD Quarter Pounder pickup and Badass bridge. Like with the Mexican Strat I got a few years ago, I wish I'd been playing Fender for much longer. Worst - Not a bad buy but it was a bit "impulse", the Maya Jazz I have a mod/repair thread on. A decent bass but I lack the skill, time and inclination to do a really good job fixing her up, and I was £200 down in initial outlay and bits when the Fender above came up, so that was an expensive time. I'll slowly finish getting it to a nice state and then probably just end up selling it on for a loss.

Thanks all, you've confirmed my assumption that its basically an iPad or nothing when it comes to tablets and music production. I doubt it's up to anything strenuous looking at the specs so I think it's a case of wiping it, selling it and sticking with the laptop.

I picked up a cheapish tablet from a friend in a job lot of stuff he was selling due to leaving the country. I don't think I have any use for it generally but was wondering if anyone uses a tablet for making music and had suggestions for what to do with it before I decide to just sell it on? Any good soft synths for touch screens, Kaoss Pad style uses or just anything creative? It's an Acer Iconia W4 running Windows 10 so not top of the range but OK by all reviews I've read.

Do you need effects/amp sims? I got an EHX headphone amp, 1/4 inch input, mini jack out and one volume control that cranks the gain when turned up. Nothing else but sounds surprisingly decent with bass. £42 ish.

I'm a casual fan, got a couple of albums which I like but no urge to work my way through the back catalogue. The documentary was interesting but not very revealing. They're all too nice! I'm always in awe of the musicianship, no idea how Geddy plays bass so well and sings. It's made me want to practice to get be able to play faster for rockier stuff we do, preferably with my Jazz and a nice burpy tone.

[quote name='NOIISE' timestamp='1420535432' post='2650281'] No problem. We are also considering making a vst/au version, but this will be down the line. For now we are concentrating on v1.1 of FLUX:FX iOS version! [/quote] So it's been 2 and a half years! Any word on that VST version? Recently picked up a Windows 10 tablet from a friend who's leaving the country and have no reason to keep it at the moment, but if there's some interesting stuff like this I might keep hold of it.

I'd have met Rick Savage if I'd been 10 minutes earlier to a function yesterday.