how low is a good low action?

[4000]

[quote name='EBS_freak' post='1071820' date='Dec 29 2010, 03:17 PM']You subscribe to the same school as thought as me. My necks are pretty much flat radiused and dead straight. The fret job has to be absolutely spot on. One slightly high fret and the whole setup is ruined. Bit of rattle - but nothing you can hear in the mix. Solo playing and my touch is light enough to escape the rattle.

Playing a lot of chordal stuff up the neck, the neck has to be flat otherwise the instrument just won't stay in tune properly. Think about it - the frets are spaced on the fretboard perfectly. The second you but relief in the neck, the fret spacing changes. Maybe it's not enough to realise when playing single notes but it certainly is when you are playing multiple notes.

The stuff you try in shops rarely have had a fret job- the frets are hammered in and that's it... bass ready to go. You have to be really lucky to find a bass that plays low without doing a fret job first.[/quote]

+1 again, although I like my radius (on a 4) around 12" or so.

[EBS_freak]

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' post='1071863' date='Dec 29 2010, 04:00 PM']Im one of the most people, A perfect Daryl Jones ruined![/quote]

What do you mean? That bass was set up to perfection!! (the shim on that was a lovely piece of burr walnut too -makes all the difference )

[JTUK]

A penny will do for me as long as the bass is set up and still sings.
It is pointless going low if you then get all the noise from it.
Mine are normally rattling if I am learning back and playing on the couch or something..just noodling..but when upright they are fine. How that measures in mm..don't bother to measure it.

[Martin E]

I think that's a neat idea to use a pound coin as a quick reference - which I see is 3.15mm thick.

A quick Google reveals we all have a handy pocket full of feeler guages which in descending order of thickness are:

£1 – 3.15mm, £2 – 2.5mm, 10p – 1.85mm, 50p – 1.78mm, 5p – 1.7mm and 1p – 1.65mm

[tauzero]

[quote name='Martin E' post='1072801' date='Dec 30 2010, 03:03 PM']£1 – 3.15mm, £2 – 2.5mm, 10p – 1.85mm, 50p – 1.78mm, 5p – 1.7mm and 1p – 1.65mm[/quote]
I just measured up a clearance using a couple of 20ps...

They're 1.7mm too, I now know.

[gub]

Some really interesting points guys ,decided to try and lower the action on aria a tad and see what happens , may get all sorts of buzz and have to take it up again .

[Badass]

Just raised mine to 1.65mm ( a pennies width ) it was lower, but now seems to play better than ever !

[Fat Rich]

I thought I had fairly low action but it seems not after reading this thread!

I have approx 3mm for the E (or B on the Status) to approx 2mm for the G, although the fretless basses are about 0.5mm lower.

Feels great to me!

Edited January 4, 2011 by Fat Rich

[Shambo]

I can't afford a £1 action so I've had to settle for 50 pence worth. High tension Labellas help and I can get a bit of clank if I really dig in, but no buzz thankfully.