5 string bass build (it's gonna be HUGE in Japan!)

[a2k]

Thanks for your insights Prostheta.

No binding. My side markers are 3mm so it's definitely going to be tight as things are currently spec'd out. 

I'd be happy to try for a compound radius, though it sounded like it might be more trouble than it's worth (for one fingerboard anyway).

I'm also fine switching to a larger radius - just need to decide before I outline the neck (which is my plan for tomorrow). I'm guessing that the larger the radius is at the nut, the less important a compound radius is. Actually, thinking about this more, a larger radius seems like the way to go. Also, I double-checked my frets and they are .043" inches high so I updated the measurements to account for that extra .003". Here's a drawing showing a 16" radius - the drop is much less at the larger radius, leaving .18" of fingerboard (4.57mm). What do you think?

Edited September 29, 2015 by a2k
removing extra image

[Prostheta]

If the sidemarkers are going to be a little close then the options of placing them over the fingerboard/neck seam are an option. This is reasonably common, but again a spec alteration. I hate to say it, but another mm on that board would have been golden! The other option I guess would be to offset the radius to one side of the neck. This is less common and more in the realms of asymmetrical neck building. Usually the profile is assymmetrical and not the board though. Not sure how that would work in terms of the marginally-altered ergonomics. I wish @Strandberg Guitarworks were active to weigh in on this subject.

Rather than seeing problems where none likely exist (hey, I'm a hairsplitter) it's good to at least know that these hiccups might affect things, and knowing about them ahead of time means you can creep up on those measurements mindfully.

Good seeing another person using CAD out there to work these things out. I'm kicking myself that I can't remember my chord-of-a-circle trig now. At least I don't have a teacher telling me, "I told you so!" after telling them we'll never use that in the real world. I'm just old and forgetful, perhaps out of practice with that bit of trig....hahaha....

[a2k]

Working out my plans on computer before I walk into the shop is a must for me. I know there are many here with enough skill and experience to design/build at the same time. I don't have much experience in wood shops and need to put 99% of my attention on not cutting a finger off, leaving 1% to figuring out the task at hand. I walk into the shop with a print out of my drawing and as detailed a checklist (with measurements)  as possible. Even then, I move super slow. Forget "measure twice, cut once". I measure 50x, do several test cuts, measure again, and then finally cut once. 

Anyway... I made some decisions and a (tiny) bit of progress last week. First, I'm bumping up my planned fingerboard radius to 16". Second, I'm also bumping up the fret size to .047x.104" nickel frets. Not sure what I was thinking when I ordered tiny stainless steel frets. Thanks Prostheta for thinking this through with me.

And third, I went back and forth for a few days about whether I should order a new 16" sanding block and fret saw or just buy a pre-made fret board (at the same or slightly lower cost). I decided to get the tools - my plan is to build a bass after all. I know it's a murky line at best, but my previous "builds" have been with Warmoth necks and I've never really felt like I truly built them. 

In the shop on Wednesday, I spent 4 hours and made two cuts (see above comment about measuring 50x). First up, I cut off the headstock. I'd planned for a 13° angle but couldn't figure out a way to reliably get the cut without building a jig. Instead I used a 60° fence and 15° angle, mounted at 90° to get a 15° cut. I think I'll live with the extra 2°. Here's an action shot just before making the cut.

Next I routed the truss rod channel. I followed the specs that came with the truss rod. I'm pretty happy with how it came out, though it is very snug. I have to push pretty hard to get the rod in and then removing it requires prying a little bit. I need to put it in and test to make sure it's not too tight to adjust. After shot:

On Thursday I glued the headstock onto the neck. Full disclosure here: things got a lot more slippery once glue was in place. I had a hard time, even with angle blocks, getting the headstock clamped in place without moving so I ended up not using as much pressure as I'd like. Fortunately (I hope), the tuners will all be placed before the seam making the risks of a catastrophic ungluing low. Still, I'll give it a few good taps when I get back to the shop this week to make sure things are solid. Action shot:

On Friday I went and got sushi before my Japanese class. I am in Japan, after all. Action shot:

This afternoon I'm hoping to swing by a hardware store and see what kinds of saw options they have. Before ordering a fret saw from the states, I'm going to see if I can uncover a Japanese saw of the correct thickness. Tomorrow I'll be back in the shop for more fun.

[Prostheta]

Depending on your targets, buying pre-made fretboards is not always the whole solution. I prefer to look at them like you have "most of the work done" rather than "all of it". The thicknesses are right, the radius is great and the slots are good. The problem is, once you glue them up to the neck, best practice to me always says, "don't trust it to be the same any more". You'll still need that radiusing beam to dial in adjustments if it's no longer true. Most of the time adjustments'll never need anything less than 240-320 grit to bring back into line.

I'm super picky about having a perfect lightfast fingerboard before I put it into fret pressing. The big test is after shaping the neck profile; removing that much wood from the neck is ripe for inviting movement from any clocksprings hidden in the wood, which will happily take the fingerboard with them when they move into their new equilibrium.

My last 5-string bass only had one incidence of fret buzz at the 13th fret on one string only. Everything else was perfect out of the gate. I'm notorious for overthinking things to the exclusion of other simpler problems (or solutions, sometimes) though, so I'd interpret how I look at them as just grist for the mill.

Pre-made boards are great for replacement/repairs though. Like @ScottR, I am convinced that wood wants to trip us up at every opportunity so every operation I do on it has me tense like Shatner, seeing gremlins on the wing.

[a2k]

Depending on your targets, buying pre-made fretboards is not always the whole solution. I prefer to look at them like you have "most of the work done" rather than "all of it".

Thanks for that comment. With a pre-cut fretboard, we're still responsible for making sure the final product is right. My wife got very zen on me last night while talking about this project and reminded me that "it's not done until I say it's done" so if something isn't right, just don't call it done. 

In other fret related news, I came across this luthiers' round-table with a bunch of celebrity bass luthiers discussing frets, fretboard radius, and neck woods. I think the most interesting thing is that there is no "right" answer.

http://epublish.panaprint.com/article/Luthiers’+Round+Table/1397818/158781/article.html

[curtisa]

Interesting read.  Very much a case of no right answer.  Probably a case of they're all right answers too.  All the more reason to assume if you've built an instrument that sounds, looks and plays well, it won't matter how it's made.

[a2k]

Moving along slowly. But I'm moving. The metric vs english units thing is turning out to be a bit of a pain in the rear. This is what I get for buying parts from the U.S. and tools from Japan. And I've made - and (hopefully) recovered from the first (and again, hopefully) only major mistake of the project.  More below...

First update - the truss rod is tight but still easily adjustable, so I'm going to call the snug fit good. Second update - despite not being happy with the clamping on my scarf joint at the headstock, it seems solid and is past the tuner pegs anyway. Third update - in Japan, every saw is a Japanese saw. I'm talking rows and rows of them. Here's a photo:

That said, I'm not sure I was able to get the right kerfed Japanese saw. My frets have a .508mm tang and .914mm stud width (that's .020" and .036" for those of us that come from stubborn countries). At the store pictured above, they had saws with .6mm kerf. Figuring this out with the salespeople, by the way, was both a challenge for my Japanese and pictionary skills. That might be too much wiggle room. The frets arrived today, so I'll test it tomorrow. If it's too big, there's another store I found while searching for router bits that had a .5mm kerf saw. 

On to the hands-on progress...

First up, once I tested the headstock strength, I got excited and added the headstock ears and laminate. Action shot:

 I may have made life hard for myself in the future when I cut the neck profile out. Oh well...

Then I headed over to the band saw and roughed out the body shape. This was fun - it's starting to look like a bass. It's also when I discovered a possible mistake. I knew my mahogany width was going to be tight, and in straightening out the edge I may have made things a little too tight. When I cut out the top wing, I found this:

Oops! It's actually not as bad as it looks because I was pretty conservative with the band saw. Overall, there's just a little bit missing - probably 2-3 mm. I could tweaked the shape to adjust, but figured I'd play it safe and glue in a patch. Action shot:

And here it is, after the glue dried and I trimmed off the extra:

Up next, I drilled the truss rod access:

And checked for fit. Pretty good.

Finally, I put it all together because, well, I'm eager to see what this thing looks like all together. Starting to resemble a bass!

I've hit a bit of a delay because I don't have any template router bits and the only ones I can find in Japan are made by unicorns and cost about $150 each. So Amazon is shipping some over the pacific to me. In the mean time, I gave my template some love and got it smoothed out.

I thought I'd drill the tuner holes and this is where I hit on the metric issue. The tuning machines I purchased are hipshot and call for a 9/16" hole. Being a logical country, Japan has adopted the metric system and does not bother with 9/16" drill bits. They would be happy to provide a 14mm or 15mm bit, but that leaves me with a Goldilocks problem. Should have gotten Gotoh machines... That said, I have managed to locate the right bit in a box at the auto shop. All I have to do now is sit through their 30 minute shop safety class and then I can use the drill bit for a few minutes to drill 5 holes. 

And finally, in my travels I came across a shop that specializes in selling fake food for restaurant windows. So here's a shot of a bunch of fake beer:

Up next... detour to autoshop safety class, drill holes for tuners, test fret slot size, and hopefully get a care package full of router bits from Amazon. 

 

 

 

Edited October 20, 2015 by a2k

[Prostheta]

I'd say 14mm if you have a reamer on hand or 15mm otherwise. That's not really too much of a gap. If you're clearing the neck then any finish in the tuner holes will snug them up anyway. I usually clean them out with a reamer as a matter of course.

[a2k]

Time for another progress report. This one ends with a big OOOPS!!! but I think I've found a way to turn lemons into delicious lemonade. More on that in a bit. 

I left off last time with the Goldilocks search for the perfect sized drill bit. I really didn't want to go take the auto shop "safety class" just to use a drill press for a few minutes, so instead I distracted myself by cutting fret slots. The 0.6mm kerfed saw ended up being too big but it just so happened that the shop had a perfectly sized blade hiding in the closet. I used a miter box to help ensure the saw stayed straight, pulled out a metric ruler with .05mm marks on it, got out some magnifying glasses (cuz those marks are tiny!), and went to work. It was a slow process, and I'm still going to have to go get the depth right, but the fret board is slotted.

At the time, I was still trying to decide if I wanted to do a zero fret, so I didn't trim off the top of the board. 

Action shot and final product:

The next day, I dragged myself over to the auto shop to begrudgingly do the class. I lucked out - the DVD player was broken, so they gave me a 5 minute shop tour and set me free. It's a lot greasier there than the wood shop, but the drill press works the same. Plus the auto guys were very curious about what I was up to so it was cool to share some stoke. 9/16" drill bit = perfect fit.

Fast forward a week... I headed back in to trim down the headstock. I used the band saw and resawing fence to make the cut, but made the cut too short (don't ask) and ended up finishing it by hand. 

Finally, I did another pass with the band saw to trim the body edges down closer before routing to the template. I was worried that I had too much to take off and I'd get tear out (I was right, I'll get to that next). Here's what I cut off - it ended up as a cool outline of the bass-to-be:

The template bits arrived on Thursday afternoon (I never knew I could be so excited about getting router bits in the mail) so on Friday afternoon I headed into the shop to trim down the body.

This is where things went downhill. Tear out. Big time. I wish I could blame it on the bit not being sharp or the wood being bad (well, it is mahogany), or even that I was trying to take off too much at once, but I'm afraid this is a case of my lack of skill and "it only bites if it senses fear".  I was worried about the bit grabbing the wood and yanking it, so I probably wasn't holding the body securely enough... which I think is what caused the bit to grab, yank, and make that horrible sound. Here's an after-shot:

Yuck. It actually happened twice - the one pictured above, and once on the upper horn. I cleaned up what I could, and then finished the troubled spots with a rasp. I was DONE with that router for the day.

I went home Friday bummed and debating two choices: do I patch it as best I can, chalk it up to "learning", and move on with a less-than-perfect project? Or do I throw these pieces away and start over. It'll set me back, but probably not too much. I'm sure my friends in Shinkiba would be happy to send me more wood and I already have extra maple. I could be back on track in just a few days.

I spent the weekend debating this and slowly a third option came forward. This bass is for me to play. It's going to evolve, get scratches, get worn, and change over time. It's not a collector's bass, it's not going to be sold, and it isn't intended to be babied. I think of my life as the slow process of destroying my body. Not in a self-destructive way, but in a "live my life" way. My scars are part of who I am and while getting them may have been painful, they are part of my story. So with that mindset, how do I turn this tear out around, and rather than try to cover it up, work it into the bass and its story?  

The answer came to me while I was running yesterday. I'm excited. Once it hit me, I rushed back to my computer to mock it up. It was all I could think about for the rest of the day. It's still going to set me back. It's going to challenge me. But if I can pull it off, it'll end up making the bass better. And it will give the bass a story.

To be continued...        

Aaron

[Prostheta]

Despite what you might think, that can be recovered. It's not an easy fix and unlikely ever to be invisible, but do-able. The only major issue is the top.

Simply, make a router slotting jig. Bear with me because I'm sure short on time but I'll try and explain. This is a saddle fabricobbled to sit over the side of the body. This is meant to cut a square slot out of the tearout which can then be replaced with some scrap dimensioned and that matches the grain orientation.

[Prostheta]

It looks like you took too big of a pass both in depth and scale of removal. African Mahoganies like Khaya and Sapele are absolute nightmares for doing that.

[ScottR]

I did a similar thing on my current build. I just adjusted the shape a hair and sliced off the offending piece with the bandsaw. It took off a little guitar shaped outline like you pictured. I finished cleaning the edges with sandpaper and elbow grease. Like Pros mentions, it was sapele.

SR

[Prostheta]

Which way around were you cutting? I guess that it wasn't a climb cut since it was such a large pass. Woods like Sapele are heavily interlocked, so you don't have a choice about avoiding grain reversal. It goes both ways. We run bodies mostly flatsawn, especially for the ribbon figuring in Sapele which exacerbates the issue.

I've found with Sapele that you really really have to bandsaw as close to the final cut line as possible. The wood gets so weak and catchy around the horns and other endgrain that even sharp cutters just grab the wood and make a run for it. If you don't trust your bandsaw, exchanging the bearings on your template cutters for ones with a negative offset (or using a guide bushing) allow you to creep up on the final sizes with far more safety. Equally, table routers make working with fractious grain structures easier.

None of this puts the wood back in though. You might recover a laminated scrap from your pile that can patch it up. That's the first thing I would try rather than going offroad with your specs. The other alternative I figured in my head was to add in a couple of stringers around a 1/4" each. Tapering a little off the wing to body mating surfaces towards the neck fingerboard end keep the horns in place, whilst moving the butt of the bass outwards. It's a little bit of a fiddle, but an option. That doesn't save the tearout on the horn though. Got photos of that?

Look at you in your repairing hat, @ScottR! That was a save and a half. I think that Aaron can get this back on track though eh?

[ScottR]

Oh sure, one way or another. He states he already has the answer and is excited about it, so we just need to grab some popcorn and sit back and watch it happen. Perhaps with those new glasses you mentioned....the full ones.

SR

[a2k]

What's a project without some surprises for those following along? Grab your popcorn... and eat it very very slowly because it's going to take a while, but I do have an idea. It's either going to be awesome or horrible. 

I do appreciate the comments on how to fix the tear out. I'm here to learn (and lurk in other threads admiring everyone else's work). And while I have an "idea", I still have to figure out the details on how to pull it off (which will require fixing at least part of the tear out). 

None of this puts the wood back in though. You might recover a laminated scrap from your pile that can patch it up. That's the first thing I would try rather than going offroad with your specs.

Are you suggesting simply cut off the section with tear out and glue in a replacement?

I hope to make it back into the shop this afternoon so I'll take some pics of the horn tear out. 

Thanks for following along!

Aaron

[Prostheta]

It truly depends on how confident you are in cutting out the problematic area. Milling out a perfectly clean square-edged section and glueing in a corresponding piece to replace it is not a simple task. Given patience and staring at it with a beer or whatever usually does the trick. I'm not sure if that is the OFFICIAL working method, but it certainly seems the most common one.

Yeah, let's have a look at that horn. They're always difficult when it comes to tearout. I'd be a liar if I said I hadn't ever gone hunting through piles of chips trying to find the bit that flew off the outside of those. The last major time that happened I immediately went out and ordered a shorter template-follower router bit so I could reduce the amount I was forced to take per pass. Those full 1" long bits can soon get way ahead of you.

[a2k]

Okay, I got back into the shop yesterday and got a picture of the horn. It's the back half that's torn up which is slightly better than the front. Still, this picture makes me wince...

I patched up the maple section of the tear out on the lower wing. Unfortunately I don't think beers are allowed in the shop, but I otherwise took it slow, stared at it for a long time, and did my best to get it to fit. 

While at the shop, I got a nice zen discussion from then old Japanese guy that runs the wood shop and periodically peeks in to check in on my progress. I think for every American kid in the 80's that watched Karate Kid and longed for the lessons of Mr. Miyagi, there's a Japanese guy who also saw the movie and dreamt of growing into a wizened old Migayi-san dropping tokens of deep insight upon a wide-eyed Daniel-san. Anyway, his lecture was about "mistakes" and had two key points:

1. You only call it a mistake because you haven't yet discovered the opportunity it creates

2. I still have 10 fingers

Good points. In the meantime, I've gotta patch up that horn!

Aaron

[Prostheta]

Hi Aaron! Sorry I didn't get around to posting about this yesterday. The software monkey threw a big spanner in the works....

The horn looks like a typical instance Sapele tearout. I and many other have been there. In fact, it's weird looking at somebody else's issue halfway across the planet and knowing EXACTLY how those occur and look. I think that the Maple is more work to patch up than the horn. Simply because you are able to put a strap button in that location (when there is wood there) to hide any repair. Thankfully it's on the back, but still.

The tearout on the horn could be cleaned up using chisels to make a V and a grain-direction matched piece patched in. The soft nature of Mahoganies mean that there is plenty of opportunity to compress the piece in to close up any gaps. Just snip a little (1/8"?) off the sharp end of the V in the patch so it doesn't bottom out in the repair. Making the patch a couple of degrees larger than the hole helps with the compression.

The Maple is the conundrum here. That's end grain, and there's no simple way of disguising those repairs. That said, this is where you need to go full ninja and show us that you can pull this one off a la @sdshirtman and @ScottR! I'd hold off for more opinions on this one for alternative options. Personally I would be likely to take a chisel to it and make a square-profile channel that "ramps down" into the missing Mahogany. That reduces the obviousness of it being an end-grain repair and increases surface adhesion when glueing a patch in.

I've not put much thought into whether it might be simpler and more effective to glue in a ready-laminated repair piece yet. I think that is more because the Maple is where the cosmetically-best part of the repair needs to be. Does that make sense?

It's still going to be visible, but there's less chance of this being as obvious as a simple butt jointed patch; end grain shows repairs like hell.

Do bear in mind that subsequent routing operations on areas that have grain disruption from tearout or catching are more likely to do the same if you re-rout it. This is a good time to withdraw to the safety of the sanding machines!

[Prostheta]

Obviously, make sure that the patch has the appropriate angle sanded/cut into it so the top and the patch have identical grain directions. The size of how I illustrated it was purely to exaggerate size rather than demonstrate it!

[ScottR]

Me? I'd only go full ninja if there is no other option. On this one I'd just shorten the horn by the depth of the chip out and blend in the curves. Nobody will know but you and it is 100% invisible.

SR

[a2k]

One concern I have about the repair here is making it look right when I round-over. I was planning on doing a 1/4" round-over with is 100% in the maple. If I bump it to 1/2"it'll leave less maple to repair and I might be able to pass it off as 'character' in the wood. But that will also really change the feel of the bass. @ScottR's suggestion is tempting - I'd only need to shorten the horn by about 1/4" and nobody except us would ever know. 

Of course, I do have that top-secret third idea, but it deals with the mahogany more than the maple. Even if I do manage a workable patch, I'll still probably pursue it. 

Back in the shop tomorrow... I'll stare at this for a bit and see what strikes me, and then probably distract myself with the neck for a while. Plenty to do there!

I'll be in the States for a quick work trip next week. Might do a little shopping spree of router bits, stains, and finishes, and then ship them all back to myself in Japan via boat. 

[Prostheta]

One of my favourite basses has a larger radius roundover on the back than it does on the front....that makes sense for comfort against the body whilst being visually "sharper" on the front. That might be of help!

Getting rid of it entirely is an option. Personally I dislike taking things out of their original specs, but a save is a save.

[ScottR]

I do tend to make up the specs as I go, so re-shaping things does not often offend my sensibilities. I have no interest in making exact replicas of anything, but if I did, I could see where making a change to the original might be troubling.

If you listen to the wood closely enough, it will tell you what it wants to do, and that piece said it wants to be a little shorter......or possibly it was more like- get that whirling router bit away from me.

You can always test out your ability to repair the damage and if you are not satisfied, use the option of trimming it back as your safety net,

SR

[Prostheta]

That sits within your style though Scott - you "work in the wood" rather than from a defined spec. Both are perfectly relevant styles though, since the only thing that is truly important on a strung fretted instrument is the underlying mathematics and geometry. The rest is there to knock beers over, to stop the unlouding bits from flopping about on loose wires and keep the shoulder hangy stuff hangy.

[Prostheta]

I'm breaking out the really technical stuff here.