Wademeister

YEP!! You were right chrisb0109, but I had to learn that the hard way. It's looking MUCH better now since I sanded off every bit of the finish and restained it. The clear will be complete this week and most likely the whole thing will be complete. new pics coming soon

It may well be backward, I don't know! I probably do have a different approach than most because of the tools I have at hand. My concern about completing the woodwork before finishing was that the dye would not be consistent at the edges of the routed areas. I may have been able to get a nice even dye job after cutting, but I definately got an even job the way I did it, and going back to cut after was no problem.

Made some more progress! I did the routing on the front of the body and inlaid the pearl eye. While I was levelling the eye, I decided to sand the entire finish to get it ready for the next coat of clear. As soon as I get the back cut out and contoured, finish and assembly will be all that's left!

Finally! I got that fingerboard on securely and got the bass stained and the first coat of clear shot. Starting to get impatient to play it now!!

THANK YOU CAPTAIN OBVIOUS!! ahem...actually you know, I never thought about that. Would be a wise thing to do. I think I do have a couple scraps left too... Thanks again soapbarstrat.

That's cool soapbarstrat, The flat surface of the neck was sanded to 180 grit, which I though was just fine, but raising the grain with water sounds like a good idea. The fingerboard is so waxy water beads on it. The grain will never raise on this stuff. I never took any care to finish the back of the board, just milled it flat on the router and then used a surform file to make some gouges to help the glue hold on. I should have washed the back of the board with acetone but figured I had the texture grippy enough so went on with it. Maybe if I get everything flat and clean again I can do a more thorough prep job and give my finished board another shot. I'll also want to use a different glue. The two hour curing epoxy I used seemed just too viscous to penetrate into the surface of the wood at all. The stuff got good and hard but some came off with the board and some stayed on the neck.

Thanks Doc, the silicone sounds like just the thing. You mean put some small dabs of silicone in the channel, let them dry completely and then use the rod to compress them when it's installed right? I had put set screws in from the back of the neck because I had an unlined fretless board and really needed to go through the back. The setscrews worked great since I was able to drill the right size hole and screw them down just until the rod wouldn't rattle. When I was happy with it all I made some tiny plugs from the neck wood and covered the setscrew holes. One would probably have been enough if it were in just the right place, but the first one didn't get the job done. I think I put the first screw in at about the 10th fret location. Second one at around the fifth fret. The channel isn't really huge, I have to force the rod to go in it. But the part of the rod that turns is a bit smaller than the part that ties the two ends together. It also has some shrink wrap tubing on the screw shaft so I figured it was all set to drop in and go. Oops, not so. Looks like at least on the LMII double action rods the channel needs to be cut for the round part of the rod, then opened up on the top and ends to allow the flat part in. Live and learn eh?

Ok maybe the lignum vitae was a bad choice for a fingerboard. It's really nice and hard with tight closed grain so should be great for a fretless bass. But NNNNNOoooooo!!! It's also very waxy/oily and the epoxy apparantly didn't stick too well since the nut end of my fingerboard lifted from the neck. It was a mixed blessing I guess, since I was able to use a putty knife and remove the board cleanly. I also had a bit of rattle in the truss rod that I can take care of now. But still, what a pain in the rear!! At least it didn't wait until after it was finished to do that. What fingerboard material has worked well for you fretless bass builders? I'd like the thing to last a long time, which is why I went for the lignum vitae. That stuff would be ok even with roundwounds. It will last forever sitting in a drawer I suppose... Now what to do?? Maybe dymondwood? What will help bring out the mwah? What's a good way to fix that rattling truss rod now that I can get it out again? I had installed setscrews through the back of the neck and covered them with wood plugs, but I'll fix it right since I have the chance to do it now.

It's very soft, seems to have a bad tendancy to check and warp. That would concern me much more if I hadn't used it as a cap on top of the mahogany body. The grain also chips out very easily. The sanding dust is a mild irritant and made my eyes water and my nose run a bit, but not bad enough to stop the project. The piece I have also has a lot of grey in it and always looks dirty. It does have nice figure though and sands like a dream. All in all I would choose something else if I were starting another project.

I got to do some more over the holiday weekend and things are really shaping up. The back is still rough and I'll be shaping it after I have the top stained and maybe one finish coat applied. I want to get the finish going on before the pickup and bridge sockets are routed, and I want to rout those before cutting the electronics cavity in the back. After the electronics cavity is done I'll shape the back. The rest of the bass is sanded to 600 grit and ready for stain. I have used the CNC router to cut the peghead and body outlines, fingerboard radius and position markers. I'll use it to cut the body cavities and that will be it. I think I've done a lot more of this by hand than by machine just because it's been easier for me to get after it and go as I feel rather than to plan it all out on the computer. Here's the best pic I could get to show the body contours. I'm pretty happy with the shape now after doing a little reshaping yesterday. the edge of the fingerboard is marked completely for fret positions and marker dots. The dots are mother of pearl and the frets are inlay made from the maple I used in the neck. Here's the whole thing in one pic Fingerboard grain neck to body transition the neck Peghead back Next step will be adding some color and making that grain pop!

Still working on it! I have the fingerboard with complete fret location marks and dots inlaid into the edge and glued onto the neck. The neck is carved and needs to be refined a bit at the head and heel. I let it sit for a while as I was working a lot and concentrating on learning some songs and practicing with the band. Work is letting up a bit so I'm getting back into the bass project. I'll be making my own bridge as individual saddles and am still working out the details of those pieces in my head. Once that's all solved I think the hardest thing left will be deciding on how to wire the pickups. I'm thinking of putting a microswitch or two inside the control cavity so I can experiment with different configurations without desoldering. Has anyone tried anything like that? Had any noise problems or anything because of it?

Cocobolo inc I think it's close to pau ferro, but not quite the same thing. Pretty sure pau ferro is quite a bit less oily/waxy. Also this stuff has a great looking interlocking grain that I love and haven't seen on pau ferro. It also has a gren tint that works well with the fish theme. Seems like it's ok and I'm going to go ahead and use it.

Wonderful guitar, I love it! Great job Mushy.

To tell you the truth, I'm having second thoughts about using that fingerboard. It's sanded to 1000 grit and rubbed with a clean paper towel, and that's it. The lignum vitae is very dense and I love the grain, but it's like working with the world's hardest candle! I'm not really concerned about the waxiness as far as attaching it to the guitar, but as it made my fingers feel waxy while working it, I'm concerned that it will feel sticky when I play the finished bass. I'll have to fondle it for a few days to decide before I glue it on. It may just be that the dust from sanding the board made my fingers feel waxy and that it will feel clean in use. If I replace it I'll probably go for ebonol or some stabilized wood to retain the extreme hardness.

Setch makin me blush over here I really don't know if would be turning out as cool as it is if I hadn't seen the progress of the bouncing Paul. That is truly an awe inspiring piece and I hope the bass will turn out even half as nice. Since the last pic I drilled a 1/16" hole about 3/32" deep near each end of the fingerboard. I pressed a pin in each hole and cut them with the wire cutters to leave sharp points. Set the fingerboard where it needs to go and pushed firmly where the pins are to mark the neck, then drilled on the marks. I don't know if that's a standard method for locating fingerboards or what, but I can now lay this one on exact location and it won't slide at all. On the way home tonight I picked up some epoxy (yep, Setch said use epoxy), Yeehaw!

hey castneter, Welcome to the forum! I've heard of bass guitar scales ranging from 30" up to I think 39". The most common scale I have seen is 34" and next after that would be 35" which is fairly common especially on 5 string basses. If you're wanting to go over 34" be aware that some of the strings you buy may be too short. If you go over 35" you will have to shop around a bit for your strings. How do I know? LaBella Deep Talking Tapewounds (almost $50!). Sounded like the greatest thing so I picked up a set for my 5 string fretless 35" scale bass project. THEY NO FIT! I decided to just make it a 34" instead to avoid future surprises with other brands I may want to try.

I'm not sure! That's what slows me up so much, deciding what I should do at each stage. I'm thinking at the moment that I should put the side markers in the fingerboard and attach it. The way the contours are going now I need to work up to the fingerboard and I don't want to take a chance on undercutting it somewhere. After it's on I can tape up the edge of it and run a sanding block right up against the tape if I want. Oh yeah! After it's on I'll be able to get my pickup and bridge height worked out so I can rout those too. Fingerboard next I'm sure!

I'm still working on it! I set out to carve the top today and am just about there. I started off with a surform file but the myrtle grain loves to tear out so I stopped that. I broke out the angle die grinder with some 60 grit 2 inch disks and tore into it! The wood is pretty soft and came off fast. After getting the contour as good as I figured I was going to get with the grinder, I went to 80 grit sandpaper on a rubber block. I'm pretty happy with it so far although when I set it up to look at the shadows I found a few spots still needing some work. It's finally starting to look like what I had in mind! I think I need a tripod to get a decent pic of it since the shutter stays open so long in the low light. That's the best pic I could get. What looks like a gap where the lower jaw topwood meets then neck is just a dark grain. I was very happy to see how tight the joints all are since sanding off the raw outsides.

Add me to the official list of awestruck admirers please, Setch. Very very fine and inspiring workmanship sir!

I realize you're probably joking Bill, but I didn't know classical guitar is actually played with the nails until I took some lessons. It's really handy to have 5 picks literally right at your fingertips!

Hey aeli, picked up a pretty old thread here! I haven't been around too much lately, partly because of slow progress on myt project and partly because I'm bummed about the new pic rules. Not that there's anything wrong with them, and I understand it helps everyone with slower connections, but it's still a bummer! I actually did get moving again tonight and cut the fingerboard. The lignum smells nice the way rosewood does, and it cut to a polished finish. I used a nice sharp cutter and the vertical cuts came out glassy smooth. I think this is going to make not only a very durable and bright sounding fingerboard, but also a beautiful one! The grain on this stuff is unique. You can see the normal layers from growth rings as in most flatsawn hardwoods, but up close it looks as though the grain is all woven together. I'll get a pic tomorrow, didn't have my camera at the shop this evening. I would say the lignum vitae is pretty waxy or oily, but no worse than a lot of rosewood or cocobolo that is commonly used. Well maybe it is, I have no way to measure that! I had it stuck to the router table with double sided tape though, and it stuck bigtime so that seemed pretty encouraging to me. I'll scuff up the back of the fingerboard with a rasp and wash it down with acetone before I epoxy it on and I'm sure it will be fine. Thanks for the tip on using epoxy Setch! Edit to add pic-

I'll have to be sure to have a burger and fries before I play, lol. I honestly don't know much at all about those strings, or fretless bass in general. Best way to find out though is to investigate! I'm hoping to make some more headway this weekend. I have the preamp, pickups, knobs, tuners...everything but the bridge and I'm making that too so there's nothing holding me back at this point! Well, nothing but time and energy. Had a nasty cold this week and haven't felt like doing anything but napping =P. Yes, I will be the bass (B+ass) player for my band. No, don't tell me how to say it, just look at the instrument.

I really like this one! I understand about making it fit the case and think you did a beautiful job recutting the shape. I like the smaller body even better then the original. Looks well balanced now. I don't know if I'm going to build case for my bass or what, so far I haven't seen a case long enough to store my project guitar Great guitar Duff Beer Man!

Haha! It's not that bad really. It's 1.84" thick at the moment, or a hair under 1-7/8. I don't have a fish scale handy but it looks like about 7.5 on my bathroom scales. Hopefully it will end up under 10 when complete. I have quite a bit of wood to take off still, but have to add the fingerboard, tuners, bridge, pickups(heavy ones!) electronics, knobs and some pretty substantial strings. It may be pretty close! Better go weigh the stuff I have that isn't on yet I guess... As a point of reference, the Ibanez comes in at 10.5 on my bath scale.

I'm with ya Ford, I'll probably sell the Ibanez once the fish is all done. I might look for a Rick or something like that for growly sounding stuff. I don't think the one I'm building will have a very edgy sound being fretless and using flatwounds and all. We shall see! While on Vacation, I picked up some strings from a big music store. LaBella Deep Talkin' bass strings. Black nylon tape wound... I heard they are great from the TalkBass forums, but as I checked them out I found they are too short for a 35" scale! I'm not sure at this point if I'm going to change the plan over to 34" or if I'm going to buy the extra long set. I may not like these strings when everything is put together, and it seems that having a 35" scale limits string choices about as much as having 5 strings instead of 4. 35" 5 string flatwound sets seem to be sort of uncommon from what I've been able to find so far. Then again I may go with roundwounds...decisions decisions. Here's where the project stands right now. Body and head are cut out, waiting on my preamp and electroncsso I can rout the pockets for everything and carve the body countours. I really like the way the grain came out in that the fish body lines work with the wood grain and the figure works well for the fish scale effect. The peghead veneer came out right for the tail I think too. I really hate that I got one of the neck lams out of position but I'm tempted to use a clear finish on the back of the neck anyway. I'll have to see how it all looks when the coutours are done. So far overall I'm very happy with the way the project is going and especially relieved that it will be comfortable to play while sitting. My knee fits right between the lower fins just like I hoped! Even with the square cut edges, it doesn't dig into my ribs, so it should really feel great when all the body contours are done. The pics! The back will be hollow contoured down to the neck. Love the way the grain and flame lined up! Is it the head or the tail?! Good grain again. Close but no cigar. Already looks like a fish! More wood grain. I never get enough of this stuff! Even looks the right size for a bass! Guitar that is... I come from Alabama with a bass-o on my knee....*groan*