PsP

Thank you everyone so much for replies! I've been busy because of midterms, but with all of your help I feel like I can get the project out of just the concept phase and get to slowly working on it! I'll make sure to follow up on this thread when I get to working on my unbelievably useless bass (and yes, that sub octave bass was partially my inspiration, I've been thinking about making a longer scale bass anyway) Cheers

Yes exactly, and this is my problem. Sure I could use construction rebar thickness strings but that's unplayable. And I understand that it's a balance of scale length, string tension and string thickness, and I want to make it have reasonably thick strings, so it actually can be somewhat played. I understand that a standard scale of 34'' wouldn't work at E0, not without extremely thick strings, because that would be unplayable, and this is what I want to avoid. I want to get to E0, with the ability to actually pull the strings. And what I understand about scales that yes, the 12th fret is the halfway point, and the lower you go, the lower the tension is, so you make up for it with longer and thicker strings, and this is what I basically got stuck on. I understand the neck and the whole scale actually would probably have to be much longer, but how long? What strings to use? You have mentioned that there are tables available for any scale length, is there even one for something so stupid as an electric bass tuned to E0?

So from talking with my friends, and my own experience, what I've realised and know is that - my bass downtuned to B standard and having a standard fender scale length of 34'' makes standard strings pretty floppy, so I use a set of .135 (I don't really remember, but I think these are what is on my bass) to compensate for the slack with string thickness. Maybe I haven't worded my question well enough, but I do get that part. The lower you go, the less tension there is, so you have to use thicker strings, but at a certain point it becomes unplayable. I don't want to use a ridiculous set of strings that are .3000 thick for it to somewhat work, and so to barely achieve playability i have to make the neck longer so it kind of balances out. At least that's how I understand this has to go. And this is where I get lost really. If I were to use a 5 string bass scale length it would come out to be just 35'', and I don't think that will work for E0 (I'm not actually sure, at least not with reasonably thick strings, might be wrong about it), so I think it would need to be longer, but how long actually. Is there a way to get the needed scale length in relation to string tension needed to play it, and what kind of strings would work the best? I'm lost on this part. I want it somewhat playable, but just enough. I don't think there would even be an amp, or a speaker that could produce such low notes but, I believe its still a fun and silly project to do. Also my friend that I've mentioned earlier suggested that it possibly would have to have a scale length of over 40'' for it to be feasible, don't actually quote me on that.

Hello everyone, I hope I got my way around the forum correctly and I'm in the right place. So a brief background - I'm a design student and I've been thinking of a project to do for a while now, and I think I've got a nice, dumb and unnecessary idea that can push my knowledge etc. So I have seen someone make a sub octave bass, and I think I want to make one. Problem is, with what I've come with, everything is pretty much set when it comes to form of the guitar, electronics, and all that jazz, but I just cant wrap my head around how actually scales and fret distances works. I mostly play stoner/doom metal so we downtune to B standard, but I never really gave the thought to how this works and affects everything. All the setup for me has been done by my friend who's a luthier. The question I have, and it's not a question of why would I do it, it's a question of how to get there. How to calculate fret spacing, how to get the neck length for what I want. How do I calculate it. It would be a tremendously helpful if you could guide me in the direction of making this dumb dream a reality. Would a standard scale length and fret spacing work, does it even require reworking? If so what scale length should it be? etc. What would happen to string tension, what strings to have in mind while making this for it to be somewhat playable? I need all the help in the world to wrap my head around this. This a dumb experiment project, I want it to work just about, so I do not care that it's barely audible etc. It's just something I want to make for fun