Pimping my first bass

[Metalmoore]

Ok, So i will give a little history first, i bought this bass off of eBay for about 60 quid about 3 or 4 christmases ago after trying to get the same package for months (came with an amp, strap, soft case).
Its a "Spider" PJ bass which looks very much like an ibanez that is getting modded over at [url="http://www.talkbass.com/forum/showthread.php?t=616181"]talkbass [/url] but in black. It arrived with the jack inside it, so i had for fix that and solder some of the wires back onto the jack.
It was amazing, sounded great, felt great so i learned on it until the nut broke while putting on some heavy gauge strings about march '09 so i tried to replace it and failed and in the end built my custom jazz but always went back to this cheap PJ bass with a 3 string nut when i wanted a heavier sound for some metal and tried replacing it with other nuts but could never get the right one.
So lately i have been wanting to do another project, i got halfway through my fenderbird project until all i needed was the body and electronics and if you check out the thread you will see why its not complete and i have now decided that i want to breath some new life into this old cheap bass.

Here it is after i took everything out of it:
[attachment=44812:DSC00070.JPG][attachment=44813:DSC00071.JPG][attachment=44814:DSC00073.JPG]

Spec will be:

Neck: Cheap 24 fret neck
Body: Cheap Ibanez look-a-like body
Finish: Glossy black
Machineheads: Black Y shaped hipshot ultralites
Pickups: Wizard P and Wizard MM
Bridge: Black Schaller 3d-4
Strap locks: Black Schaller
Electronics: 1 vol and tone per pickup

So my plan so far is to:
1. Strip the body to bare wood
2. Fill all the small holes in it left from screws (using the toothpick method probably)
3. Fill and redrill the neck pocket screw holes (squint and all different sizes)
4. Fill and redrill the control knob holes (also squint and had some trouble changing the bottom right knob since the one above was a little too close)
5. Fill the pickup routes (also squint and all different sizes and will be using epoxy since i will be rerouting in the same way as the bassgod76 from talkbass filled his)
6. Sand the front and back so its all level
7. Make a new nut
8. Work out where the new bridge will be
9. Work out exactly where the P pickup should be and route it (think i may keep it the reverse P as it would be easier and when the P was solo'ed i liked the bassier D&G)
10. Work out where to put the MM pickup and route it (unsure where it will go at the moment)

This is as far as i can go with out spending much cash as i am still in between jobs at the moment but once this is all done its as easy as just buying all the hardware and throwing it in.

As usual ANY advice would be great. I will be painting it in nitromors tomorrow so will see what kind of wood i have and hopefully it goes well.

[Dom in Dorset]

Why not just make a new boby rather than filling and re-routing the old one? Also you may not like what you find under the laquer, starting from scratch is a bit more work , but you sound confident with a router.

[Metalmoore]

TBH i have no experience with a router and dont have one (yet!).
I'm not worried with how it will go as i was planning to make a P-MM bass and was going to buy a P body and jazz neck but realized i could just use this old bass and if something goes wrong on this cheap body i wont feel as if i have lost much money as its so old.
So if i really do muck it up i will be buying a P body and a jazz neck, use the old body as a practice with the router and would be using the exact same parts.

[Metalmoore]

Well I got the body stripped (kinda, it needs a quick sanding) and it seems like 5 pieces of (ugly) unknown wood but NOT plywood

I plan on using a chisel to make the routes rectangular to make the job easier (idea borrowed from ou7shined and his pingray build) and flatten the floor and sides of the routes (not so sure how to at the moment as its a bit of a mess) and finding some pieces of wood to plug up the routes and glue them in and do the usual sanding and filling to get a nice flat surface.
My great uncle has a router that he is willing to loan me so I can do the MM and Reverse P route (going for a true MM pup position with the EA P pup side in the normal place but the DG side closer to the neck).

This is all I will be able to do for a while until I can get some cash to do the finish.

I would like a cheap black gloss finish for it but would not like to go for the spray on nitro route as it was a right pain in the arse so is there a paint on black gloss available.

[hillbilly deluxe]

There was an excellent product that i used a few years ago called Re-paint,i painted this bike with it.3 coats then wet and dry paper,finish off with rubbing paste or solvol autosol for a high gloss finish.

[Metalmoore]

[quote name='hillbilly deluxe' post='834981' date='May 12 2010, 07:14 AM']There was an excellent product that i used a few years ago called Re-paint,i painted this bike with it.3 coats then wet and dry paper,finish off with rubbing paste or solvol autosol for a high gloss finish.[/quote]

Could you gimme a link to where i might be able to buy it?

Cheers, Andrew

[hillbilly deluxe]

I've had a quick search,but ca'nt find anything yet,because i ca'nt remember the manufacturers name.There is another product called Tekaloid that is also excellent,and should'nt be hard to find.

[hillbilly deluxe]

Found it,
[url="http://www.jenolite.com/index.htm"]http://www.jenolite.com/index.htm[/url]

[Metalmoore]

Cheers for the link hillbilly deluxe, i will have a look into it.