First Scratch Build...

[HaMMerHeD]

Greetings LC.

So my pointy V bass project is on hold, partly because of availability of certain components, and partly because during the design process, I began to understand that many of the skills required to successfully execute my vision for the project were out of my grasp. So I have put it off for a future date, hopefully this summer.

In the meantime, I am building something else.

I am calling it "Epoch", and it is a 4-string fretless bass. Specs follow:

4 strings
Fretless
35" scale
Madagascar Ebony Fingerboard
1-piece Wenge neck
2-piece Eastern Soft Maple (Acer rubrum) body "core"
2-piece bookmatched Flamed Maple body top
Hipshot Ultralite Tuners
Hipshot A bridge
Bartolini X44CBJD pickups
Passive electronics: blend, volume, tone
Tru-Oil Finish

The Design:
The Body:


The Neck:


Mockup:


The Wood:




And some parts:


The headstock will be covered in a 3-piece veneer sandwich of maple, ebonized maple, and flamed maple. This will provide a nice contrasting color scheme against the dark chocolate wenge neck, and match the body.

The body will be 1-5/8" thick. I had the supplier machine the maple body blank to 1-3/8" thick. and the flamed maple top is 1/4" thick. The body will have a 3/4" roundover profile shaping, which will be smoothed with the random orbital sander. I know the body isn't the most creative or original design, but I like it a lot. I'm hoping this slightly more pedestrian build will give me the necessary experience to be able to execute my V bass this summer.

The neck will have stainless steel inserts and the bolts are #10-24 303 stainless machine screws. The neck blank is 1" thick currently, and I am going to have it milled down to 7/8" thick as soon as I can find someone local that is willing to do it. The nut is 1-5/8" wide, and string spacing will be 0.75"/19mm at the bridge.

Thanks for watching, and I can't wait to get started!

[ctmullins]

Looks really nice! Elegant and understated. I'm looking forward to watching this one!

[HaMMerHeD]

In other news, I just secured a side-work project involving designing and deploying a web site for a local pizza company. The job will pay enough to buy a bandsaw, an oscillating spindle sander, a jointer, and a nice router+table.

[ctmullins]

Where's "local"? I love pizza....

[HaMMerHeD]

Originally Posted by ctmullins

Where's "local"? I love pizza....

Norman, OK....Pizza Shuttle is the company. Their 'broccoli shuttle' specialty pizza is (in my opinion) the finest pizza-like device ever created....butter garlic sauce, onions, broccoli, cheddar and mozzarella.

[HaMMerHeD]

Well, I glued the flamed maple top down tonight. Forgot to get pictures, though.

[HaMMerHeD]

Here's the body in clamps:



Should be able to unclamp it in a few hours and see how badly I messed it up.

[ctmullins]

"messed it up"?? I doubt it!

So I'm assuming the plain maple body core was already glued? And you just glued on the bookmatched cap? Did you joint the edges nice and square beforehand? If so, you should be just fine!

[HaMMerHeD]

Originally Posted by ctmullins

"messed it up"?? I doubt it!

So I'm assuming the plain maple body core was already glued? And you just glued on the bookmatched cap? Did you joint the edges nice and square beforehand? If so, you should be just fine!

Yeah, I made sure it fit together nicely before I glued it. Yes, the maple core was glued together when I got it, so I just glued the top on. I used a staple gun to position the top piece so that it wouldnt slip when clamped. I drove a staple about halfway in, close to the edge of both ends of the blank and. Then I snipped them off on a bias so they were pointy and sharp. Then I lined the top plate up and pressed it in to make a snug little hole. Then I applied the glue (all spread out of course), put the top pieces on, and clamped it up. As near as I can tell, there was no slippage. And when the body is cut out of the blank, the staples will no longer be part of the guitar body.

Also, there were more clamps on it earlier (before I took the picture). I borrowed some from a friend yesterday afternoon, and he came a little while ago and got them back. The whole thing had about 10 hours of clamping time with all the clamps, so I am confident it will be ok.

[devo_stevo]

Should be just fine. Nice looking lumber you got there. Good luck.

[HaMMerHeD]

Clamps are off and it looks fine. It's not perfect, but it is acceptable to me for a first effort.

After I got the clamps off the body, I went ahead and glued and clamped the veneer sandwich for the headstock:



It is squished between the pine planks, wrapped in parchment paper (which is like wax paper, but better).

[HaMMerHeD]

So I cut the scarf joint today. I forgot to get pictures of the cutting process, but it was pretty straightforward. A while back, I built a 10 degree scarf jig, and I used that today. Here's what the jig looks like:



The problem I had was that the neck blank is 4" wide, and the table saw will only cut about 3" high. I went back and forth with a lot of solutions before I decided to just cut as much as I could with the table saw, and finish up with a handsaw. So that's what I did.

The handsaw cutting was pretty rough, and I didn't do the best job. But I built a lot of extra material into the build, so I had room to correct my errors.

After sawing, I clamped the two pieces up and began to plane them flat/smooth. Here's what it looked like starting out.



OK, what really happened was that I asked the guy who owned the shop to show me how to use the planes. He was happy to do so. About a minute into the planing, however, he suggested that he should finish up the wenge planing, and he'll show me using some other wood. He didn't think learning to plane on such hard and stubborn wood would be the best idea. So, he finished the planing for me. Here's how it looked when he was just about done:



And done:



There is still some more work to be done which will clean the edges and surfaces up.

A few nights ago, in a fit of foggy insomnia, I had an idea for a scarf joint clamping jig. On the test neck I made of oak a couple of months ago, clamping the neck was a pain in the butt, and the pieces slipped after clamping. Late one night, I laid awake in bed thinking of a solution. A very simple idea came to me, so I dragged myself out of bed at 3am and built this:



This evening, after I got the scarf cut and planed, I tested it out. Everything fit:



As soon as I get the headstock piece planed down to 1/2" thick, I'll glue it up.

[HaMMerHeD]

So...problem with the body blank. It's about 3/8" too narrow. I can either change my design or widen the blank. I choose to widen the blank. To do so, I have sawn it in half along the glue joint, and I am going to glue in a 3/4" wide wenge strip. I've seen similar things done before, and I like the way it looks.

So I've ordered the wenge trim piece and a Wagner Safe-T-Planer to get the headstock piece down to the right thickness.

[HaMMerHeD]

So some stuff arrived today...

A Wagner Safe-T-Planer: (so I can plane the headstock piece down to 1/2")



A nice piece of maple: (fretboard for a future project)



And a piece of wenge (to make my body blank a bit wider and add some contrast)



Now I just have to build a drill-press table for the safe-t-planer and I'll be in business.

[Beauchene Implements]

Originally Posted by HaMMerHeD

So some stuff arrived today...

A Wagner Safe-T-Planer: (so I can plane the headstock piece down to 1/2")



...

Now I just have to build a drill-press table for the safe-t-planer and I'll be in business.

You'll love working with that safe-t-planer. Word of warning though- it says it can't grab, but it can-and will- grab your work if you feed it wrong. I'm sure you'll get the feel of it with scrap first. It does nicer cuts and grabs less if you run it fast, too.

[HaMMerHeD]

Originally Posted by barnaclebeau

You'll love working with that safe-t-planer. Word of warning though- it says it can't grab, but it can-and will- grab your work if you feed it wrong. I'm sure you'll get the feel of it with scrap first. It does nicer cuts and grabs less if you run it fast, too.

Thanks B-flat. Here is what I'm planning to do with the safe-t-planer for the headstock piece...

First, build a simple table for my drill press out of MDF.

Second, the piece is fairly small, so i'm going to attach it to some larger 3/4" MDF with carpet tape, so I have some room to grab it and move it under the planer without getting my fingers too close to the cutters.

Do you think the tape should be enough to keep it attached?

Last, after the trial runs with scrap, run it though.

The max speed on my little press is 3100 rpms...I hope that's enough.

[HaMMerHeD]

Well, I went ahead and did it. It worked like a charm:





Close enough!

[HaMMerHeD]

UPS and USPS showed some love today:

Hipshot HB6Y Ultralight tuners and A style bridge:


Bartolini X44CBJD Set:



Pots, Knobs, Tone cap, Output jack:


And some DR Legend Flatwound stainless strings:


~~~~~~~~~

Edit:
I have to give serious credit to Best Bass Gear. I ordered the bridge, tuners, jack, tone cap, and pickups (+screws and foam) from them on Friday the 22nd. The package arrived today (the 25th) via USPS. Quite expedient service.

[HaMMerHeD]

I've also modified the headstock a bit:


And with "tuners":


The change was necessary for n00b builder reasons.

[HaMMerHeD]

This morning I got the wenge strip cut down to the proper depth, and glued the body back together:



My spindle sander will be here tomorrow, and I should be able to get the body cut out on thursday. So it should come together nicely in the next couple of weeks.