manquesa Posted December 16, 2005 Report Share Posted December 16, 2005 (edited) Hey, i've never posted here before, only found this site about a month ago. I'm just about finished with my first complete from scratch build of a 4 string solid body bass guitar and thought i'd post a few pics to show it off. A quick little list of specs: 4 String Solid Body Electric 36" Scale Poplar Body Poplar Neck Rosewood Fingerboard Abalone Side Dots Hot Rod 2 way adjustable truss rod A Single EMG Humbucker (EMG-35DC), replaced the tone control with a Bass Expander Individual Single String Bridges Strap Locks Gotoh Compact Bass Tuners Graphite Nut Pre Paint Pics of the Body Body Front Body Back Body Front Angle Body Back Angle Painted and Assembled Pics Whole Bass Body Front Body Back Headstock Rear Headstock Front The Electronics Cover plate currently on the bass is temporary until I can get some better material to use for it and I still need to make a truss rod cover plate. I also still need to do the final sanding on the finish with the Micro Mesh Finishing Abrasives and then Polish the Whole thing. But I just couldn't wait to get it all put together to see how it looks and play. So far I love it, it looks great and play better than any bass i've ever bought. I used Stew Mac's Color Tone Waterbased Black Stain mixed with a bit of Alcohol on the bare wood, then applied the Color Tone Grain Filler. Then I applied several clear coats of Stew mac's Color Tone Waterbased Lacquer. Wish I would have found this site before building this thing though, could have avoided many mistakes if I had. Edited December 16, 2005 by manquesa Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZoSo_Spencer Posted December 16, 2005 Report Share Posted December 16, 2005 Good work... im just a tad scared of your lower cutaway looks so0o0 thin and breakable.... although nonetheless Very nice.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drinkchoglit Posted December 16, 2005 Report Share Posted December 16, 2005 thats a pretty cool bass, i really like that shape Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mushy the shroom Posted December 16, 2005 Report Share Posted December 16, 2005 Incredible shape, very unique. I would have liked to see the paint darker or lighter (as it is now, it looks a bit spotty), but I could imagine it would shine in good light. Great build! Keep it up! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TenderSurrender Posted December 16, 2005 Report Share Posted December 16, 2005 Definitly looks nice man Personally dont like the huge gap between the neck and the pickup, but i guess thats just me being fussy Great work dude ~~ TS ~~ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lietuvis Posted December 16, 2005 Report Share Posted December 16, 2005 Wow, man, that is looking awesome! The only thing: You really need a truss-rod cover! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Primal Posted December 17, 2005 Report Share Posted December 17, 2005 Definitly looks nice man Personally dont like the huge gap between the neck and the pickup, but i guess thats just me being fussy Great work dude ~~ TS ~~ ← Looks to me like he put the pickup in the "sweet spot." My only complaint is the shaping of the neck near the neck pocket. It looks like you left it square for about a foot up next to the neck pocket. Other than that, it looks good! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erikbojerik Posted December 17, 2005 Report Share Posted December 17, 2005 Nice! <---(we need one of these with a slap bass player) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TenderSurrender Posted December 17, 2005 Report Share Posted December 17, 2005 Looks to me like he put the pickup in the "sweet spot." My only complaint is the shaping of the neck near the neck pocket. It looks like you left it square for about a foot up next to the neck pocket. Other than that, it looks good! ← I dont know much about bass, i was just basing it upon what i could see as apposed to understand Cheers for the info Primal ~~ TS ~~ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manquesa Posted December 17, 2005 Author Report Share Posted December 17, 2005 (edited) Thanks for all the compliments. And all the other comments as well. This is basically my prototype, I plan on building more and many of the comments said are issues I planning on addressing in future builds. As far as color goes, once I run out of my current supply of waterbased lacquer I don't plan on using it again, I didn't really like it. I'll probably switch to Nitro for future versions. And the color stain didn't really turn out the way I wanted it to, I would have acheived what I originally wanted better if I would have mixed the stain in lightly with the first few clear coats to acheive that trasparent black or smoke color that I really wanted. Applying directly to the wood, which wasn't thinned down enough, went on darker than I wanted. Oh, and the color in the pics is not really that accurate, it does look better in person. For some reason it looks a bit purplish when it's really not, it's just a black stain with clear coat. The pickup position was placed with no real thought other than what I thought looked good at the time. I do plan on moving it up in future versions at least an inch or so closer to the neck if not more. Only because I like to use the pickup as a thumb rest for the rare times when i'm not beating the crap out of the bass with my slap n pop playing style. After getting this assembled and playing it for a while now I realize that it's not in a comfortable spot for me to use as a thumb rest. I realize that may sound like a dumb reason for pickup placement to some but oh well. Good eye on the squareness of the neck for the bottom portion of it. It's currently not really an issue though as it's not really that sqaure in that area. It' s more of a gradual transition between the rounded part of the neck and the sqared off portion at the neck pocket. It is very comfortable to play to me right now though I do plan on improving that in the future builds as well, i'll round it off all the way down, especially since i'm thinking i'll probably do a set neck and with a much better smooth transition between the neck and body. And that lower horn is not really that thin, i've seen much thinner. I've atually broken off the upper bigger horn mid construction. I left the cut and shaped body in my dad's woodshed when I was moving, it was left sitting on a rafter in the ceiling so nobody would mess with it but it ended up falling off the rafter and hit the concrete floor and broke that upper horn completely off. But now glued back on with Titebond hopefully it's a much stronger joint anyway. I do have' a different design for the headstock by the way. But when cutting it I messed up and trying to fix it just kept messing it up more so I just went with the extremely simple design that you see in the pics there for now. I'll make templates or just better plan it out in the future builds. I'm surprised nobody said anything about the choice of Poplar for the body and neck as I know it's not exactly the most popular choice of wood for luthiers. It was cheap, I bought it at either Lowe's or Home Depot (don't remember which one). The body is actually 4 planks of wood glued together. Again, thanks for all the complements Edited December 17, 2005 by manquesa Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Primal Posted December 17, 2005 Report Share Posted December 17, 2005 I'm surprised nobody said anything about the choice of Poplar for the body and neck as I know it's not exactly the most popular choice of wood for luthiers. It was cheap, I bought it at either Lowe's or Home Depot (don't remember which one). The body is actually 4 planks of wood glued together. ← Whoa, I completely missed that part. Poplar is not a very acceptable neck wood AT ALL. But, as you said, this bass was a prototype, and if you don't mind the fact that the neck will be unplayable in a few months (unless you reenforced it with carbon fiber rods), then you should be all good. Poplar just isn't strong enough to be a neck wood. It is also EXTREMELY subject to scratches (which I'm sure you already know after having worked with it). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
guitar2005 Posted December 18, 2005 Report Share Posted December 18, 2005 The Electronics Cover plate currently on the bass is temporary until I can get some better material to use for it and I still need to make a truss rod cover plate. I also still need to do the final sanding on the finish with the Micro Mesh Finishing Abrasives and then Polish the Whole thing. But I just couldn't wait to get it all put together to see how it looks and play. So far I love it, it looks great and play better than any bass i've ever bought. ← ... I was going to comment on the finish but since its not completely done... The shape kinda reminds me of that guitar Prince uses. I personally think that the color might look really good on stage. As for the choice of poplar, kinda unusual for a bass. How does it sound? Are the low/sub lows easy to control? Do you have enough top end? Poplar should sound close to Basswood. On a guitar, I like the sound (see Ibanez, the EVH Wolfgang and Music Man) The neck looks like it could use a little more shaping towards the heel though. Is that intentional? Did you re-inforce the neck? Is this for your own personal use? Are you going to build more? Nice job! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manquesa Posted December 18, 2005 Author Report Share Posted December 18, 2005 ... I was going to comment on the finish but since its not completely done... The shape kinda reminds me of that guitar Prince uses. I personally think that the color might look really good on stage. As for the choice of poplar, kinda unusual for a bass. How does it sound? Are the low/sub lows easy to control? Do you have enough top end? Poplar should sound close to Basswood. On a guitar, I like the sound (see Ibanez, the EVH Wolfgang and Music Man) The neck looks like it could use a little more shaping towards the heel though. Is that intentional? Did you re-inforce the neck? Is this for your own personal use? Are you going to build more? Nice job! ← Oh god I hope it doesn't look like Prince's guitar! Anyway, yeah as I said this is basically a prototype, I do intend to build more. This one will be for my own personal use for now though. Poplar was chosen because it was cheap and easy to obtain at the time I started this, i've worked on this thing off an on for about 2 and a half years now (more off than on). It sounds fine to me, the active electronics are awesome, i've never used active before but I really like the sound i'm getting from it. I replaced the generic tone control with a "bass expander" control which boosts the lows and highs while cutting the midrange which is awesome for slap bass. It sounds decent enough to me when not plugged in as well though I still need to finish leveling some frets to get rid of fret buzz in a few spots and it still needs to be intonated. As for the neck, I do plan on building a new neck eventually to replace this one. I was never confident in the usage of poplar for a neck plus I messed up the headstock and truss rod (the truss rod access hole in the headstock is very horribly cut). I'll probably get some maple for the new one and maybe pau ferro for the fingerboard. It's currently reinforced only with a single hot rod truss rod. Question: Has anyone else used Stew Mac's Waterbased Lacquer? I'm not that impressed with it. It says to wet sand with 600 grit in between each coat or every 2 coats but being that it's a waterbased finish every time I did that it seemed that it would take off the entire coat that I just put on. Which is why i'm dreading doing the final wet sanding with the Micro Mesh finishing abrasives. The wet sanding also leaves some very undesireable milky whitish streaks in the finish when the water drips away. Hopefully the polishing process will take care of that though?? I don't know. Anyone have any tips for finishing this particular finish? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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