Maple necks

[Spike Vincent]

[quote name='henry norton' post='1179588' date='Mar 28 2011, 03:03 PM']Why don't you try swapping the maple neck onto one of your darker sounding Ps and seeing whether it makes such a difference when you're comparing just the neck rather than a maple board [i]with[/i] a different body and possibly different magnets/windings/capacitors? All you need is 5 minutes with a cross head screwdriver and you might just be able to answer the big question for allot of people on here. It would be even better if you could get someone else to change the necks over and play them to you unseen so you're listening without prejudice [/quote]


Done it,on a Tokai P.Even used the same strings,and it made a difference.Not a huge one,but there was definately a perceptable difference.

[kerley]

Even then you have changed more than just the fretboard materials. The whole neck, head, nut tuners etc, etc,. have also changed. Any of these other changes could have also contributed.

There is a good test on Talkbass (although aimed at body woods) but proves the point very well that the woods are pretty low in the order of contributors to the overall sound. All things were kept the same except the body was swapped for an old bit of wood. Can't find it now but it was fairly recent and went over many pages.

[iconic]

I reckon the treble n bass on my amp makes the most difference....

I always find this tone thing amazing, between bass's yes, between the same bass but different fretboard well I can't see it, but I'm not the brightest on this forum?

....I mean, when I think about it the string doesn't really touch the maple as such, well OK if ya gonna be an anorak yes at the fretted point, but it's length and hence tone is either twixt the plastic/bone nut and metal bridge of open, or metal fret and metal bridge....and the metal based strings simply act on the magnets in the electronic pick up's so I can't see how the wood 'would' effect the tone or am I missing something....most likely!

[BigRedX]

[quote name='Ou7shined' post='1231256' date='May 14 2011, 07:12 PM']I doubt there's a bassist alive (or dead) who would argue with that.[/quote]
Actually I don't really like the look of a maple fingerboard unless the rest of the bass is also a light coloured wood. I'll go further than that and say that I don't like instruments where the neck is a different colour to the body IMO it looks cheap and nasty.

[Ou7shined]

[quote name='BigRedX' post='1231714' date='May 15 2011, 10:28 AM']Actually I don't really like the look of a maple fingerboard unless the rest of the bass is also a light coloured wood. I'll go further than that and say that I don't like instruments where the neck is a different colour to the body IMO it looks cheap and nasty.[/quote]
See the bit I highlighted.

[BigRedX]

[quote name='Ou7shined' post='1231716' date='May 15 2011, 10:32 AM']See the bit I highlighted. ;)[/quote]
But by quoting the whole thing IMO you are endorsing the whole thing...

;-)

[LawrenceH]

Talking about compensating for any difference using treble controls is missing the point that resonance alters sound in a [b]time-dependent[/b] fashion. Pickup position, type and equalisation settings are all constants that don't vary with note decay. That's why we can't use fixed filters to make a bass guitar sound just like a trumpet, the envelope characteristics are totally different. And this is where strings, their fixings (nut, frets, bridge) and the wood employed must all have an impact.

My subjective impression playing (and having done a lot of messing around on synthesisers in the past), is that the decay characteristics of a maple fretboard tend to be a bit different to rosewood, with an extended early sustain in the upper-mids. I'd guess that we perceive them as brighter because that period lasts longer, rather than being louder per se.

Edited May 15, 2011 by LawrenceH

[3below]

Maple necks - love them, Rosewood necks - love them. Good basses sound good, bad basses sound XXTTY. Both have a different feel, the tone controls on the amp have a significant effect, the speaker cab even more. For some reason I sound like 'me' whatever neck / bass / guitar I use. I no longer worry about it, my current bit of fun is getting good tone out of real cheap kit - £30 peavey milestone III bass, weak pickups but nice otherwise. It's only the cost of a few drinks

[Musicman20]

I usually go for rosewood, but a good maple board is a good board! I have a new 3EQ Ray and the board/neck is lovely...maple with hints of birdseye and flame figuring.

[thisnameistaken]

I did my first ever gig on a bass with a maple fingerboard tonight. I've done about 500 gigs and this was my first one with a maple fingerboard. Weird.

I thought with that and the glossy neck I would be slipping all over the place but fortunately I'd strung it with rotos so they anchored my fingers quite nicely.

Still think I prefer rosewood (or Wenge) but I'm not about to get fanatical about it, it seems a nice enough bass and more importantly it looks cool.

[dave_bass5]

When i went through 3 MIA jazz basses last year, looking for one that was made properly, 1 had a maple FB, the other two had RW. All three were identical other than colour and to my ears the Maple one did have a bit more top and wasn't quite as warm sounding as the two RW basses.