New Bass Day! A semi-build... more like an assembly and finish.

[Composer of Requiems]

So this one has been in the works for ages... I figured around the end of last year that I'll probably need a 5 string for the style of music I'm playing sooner or later, to hit the low notes and to avoid drop tuning, but actually getting the bass took longer than I expected.

Around October/November or so I started working on designs for the body and around February or so I finally settled on this:

Over Christmas there was a Warmoth sale, so I ordered a fretless 5 neck. I also ordered a set of Nordstrand Fat Stacks, and picked up an Audere preamp second hand locally.

There isn't any source of lumber locally, the only wood I could get was furniture pine from Ikea... which some of the guys from TB said wasn't good for building, and indeed it wasn't. I brought it to the workshop, spent two weeks cutting and stuff... it splintered a lot and had to be sanded all the time... well, everything was fine until I realized how soft wood could be, it just snapped under pressure.

 

[Composer of Requiems]

So I figured I would have to import from overseas... while looking for lumber suppliers in the region, I came across a builder from Indonesia who could cut out my body shape to spec for about the same cost that I would need to import wood. It was done with mahogany wings and maple core. If you want his contact do let me know, I'll give you his details.

This is a shot he took halfway through production:

Subsequently, he cut out the cavities as I indicated on the diagram above.

The body arrived at the start of this month. I felt pretty silly since for the measurements of the cavity, I gave him the measurements of the pickups... not realizing that the cavity would have to be slightly larger than the pickups themselves. The neck pocket was also slightly too small, but considering that I just emailed him a scan of a tracing I made of the neck, it was almost perfect. I applied a veneer, then cut the cavities slightly larger to fit the pickups and neck.

This is a mockup of what I had at this point of time after the veneer but before the cutting:

I got the tree bark texture by cutting "slits" in the veneer and soaking it for a while so it softens, dye-ing it dark brown, glued it, then sanded down so parts of the un-dyed veneer and parts of the wood underneath were exposed, then dye-ing it all red. This was actually a mistake I made on a previous veneer application when it accidentally got soaked, but the result was pretty interesting. On that one, the veneer was vertical so it didn't look good, but I angled it diagonally on this to make good use of the effect.

After cutting the slots:

I started to varnish the wood:

 

[Composer of Requiems]

After several layers of varnish:

I realized that since the surface was so irregular, I couldn't really sand it down unless I put something like 3mm of lacquer over it... which I didn't want to do. So I left it as it is and just sanded down the sides. In any case, I like the way the uneven surface reflects light in diagonal lines and accents the texture.

Installing pickups:

 

[Composer of Requiems]

Installing the (very complicated) Audere:

Knobs from left to right: Volume/balance stack, Treble/bass stack, Mids, Passive tone control
Switches from left to right: Z-mode (impedence, 3 settings which are essentially preset EQ shapes), Coil tap, Mids frequency selection (3 choices), Passive/Active bypass switch

It actually all fitted into the small cavity:

Installed the neck and strings!

 

[Composer of Requiems]

I had to shim the neck a little to get a lower action... and the TI Jazz Flats B string was too thick to pass through the bridge so I had to drill the hole a little.

I'm pleasantly surprised by the sound. It's very growly and aggressive, even though I'm using flatwounds. I don't really know how to describe it... I've a solid, dead thump sound, but before it decays out it growls? Maybe I'll post soundclips when I'm free to record. This is good, since I was thinking of epoxy-ing my fretless jazz and using roundwounds with it to get a more aggressive tone, but I don't need to now. I'm attributing this to the pickups and very low neck action. When I coil-tap the pickups, I get a smoother sound, closer to my fretless 4 jazz, but still aggressive... it's not the preamp, since when I go passive it still has the same kind of sound. That said, I've got to give another +1 for the Audere; using Audere preamps with both my basses and I've only good experiences with the on-board settings. This one gives me even more choices than the simple Vol/Blend + 3 band EQ preamp on my jazz. Makes this a very versatile bass.

In the last photo you can see a small white thing on the left of the neck pickup. I have a habit of resting my thumb on the pickup when playing the lowest string, but the pickup was too low, so I stuck a bit of card there as a temporary thumb rest.

I've to admit that this shape that I designed has some neck dive. It's annoying but I can live with it. It isn't too bad, before I installed the electronics it dived quite a lot, but seems like the electronics and bridge are heavy enough to compensate a little. Now it still dives a little... but since I rest my arm on the body while playing, it's quite controllable.

Still in the process of setup and intonation... a fretless unlined is annoying as hell to intonate, since I'm not always too sure where to put my finger to intonate it. I'll probably intonate it over a week or two, get the feel of the positions and see what's best for it.

Although it's a 35" scale, it's actually shorter overall than my 34" Jazz. Can't wait to take this one out on gigs!

 

[b33r]

looks very Les Claypool-ish. very cool, although not as much as those people who make the neck and body from scratch haha.

also, sound clip plzzz

 

[Composer of Requiems]

I wanted to make it from scratch... but it made more sense to order a body for about the same cost as ordering wood, then taking leave from work to go to a workshop and cut it.

I'm itching to get home and play it!

 

[nomaden]

Hmm...nice finish...

 

[cool-beans]

So many switches!

Nice though! How much did it cost you in total?

 

[Composer of Requiems]

Hehehe switches are fun.

Hmmm.... neck was bought during the Warmoth sale over Christmas, can't remember that one; including shipping it was around US$300 I think. Body, around S$300+ I think. I got the preamp 2nd hand on this forum (ah I miss the buy/sell section =/), can't remember exact cost but it should be around 200? Pickups were S$300+. Misc. hardware totalled up to around 100+. So should be around 1.5k or so.

Man, I wanted to record this, but it seems like my intonation on an unlined is even worse than I thought! Looks like I'm not gonna record anything with it until I get better at it, heh.

 

[nomaden]

Body..$300+bonus....hahaha...right bro?

I'm waiting for your next project...(lp bass...)

 

[rottenramone]

amazing. simply amazing. did u varnish the body at home/

 

[fretless6]

Is that a gloss finish on the textured body? Looks kinda reflective. IMO a satin finish would have been more "bark" like. The neck and body laminates not aligning is throwing me off lol.

 

[FourSling]

Seriously beautiful bass! Congratulations!

 

[Composer of Requiems]

Is that a gloss finish on the textured body? Looks kinda reflective. IMO a satin finish would have been more "bark" like. The neck and body laminates not aligning is throwing me off lol.

Hmm but the gloss will show the diagonal lines when the light shines on it. From stage, instead of a flat uniform "whiteout" when it reflects light, it can reflect a series of diagonal lines...

Hahahaha yeah... different company >_< doesn't really matter to me though.

amazing. simply amazing. did u varnish the body at home/

Yeah I did. It's smelly.

 

[AlNino10]

Looks awesome buddy! very interesting design and i like th versatility of th bass. nice work! might come to you fer help if i ever decide to go th same road as you

 

[XenoJin]

That was awesome. I think I saw that bass during Cosfest, do you by any chance performed as the first team during Cosfest? xD

 

[Composer of Requiems]

XenoJin- Yes, that was me! That was so embarassing, they turned off the bass monitor on stage and I was flying blind on an unlined fretless >_<

Eh, were you the guy with a Mustang?



Anyway, I dug up a recording that I made a while back, so for those who're curious to hear what this bass sounds like- https://www.yousendit.com/download/T1Vrck96VEhCTWxjR0E9PQ
On this record, I'm running it through very low gain on my ZVex Distortron and through my Electronix Submarine. I think at the start I used a bit of chorus, but decided to turn off the chorus after the intro. I'm still not completely used to this bass yet, so there's some error here and there.

I think I solo-ed bridge pickup, and as usual I set it to low-Z, cut highs, boost mids, set mid frequency low. It's running through ZVex Distortron on low gain and Electronix Submarine, I had the chorus on in the beginning but turned it off after the intro. Used Tapewounds on the bass.

 

[XenoJin]

Yeah, I'm the guitarist of my "chui" band xD
How'd you know?

 

[alanchia]

unlined fretless? may be you can put some dot markers on the side of the fingerboard to guide you. i used that on my electric db. lol.