Maple bass = big mistake?

[shai-ga]

I wonder if a bass constructed entirely from maple will have a nice tone, can you help me with this?
I'm talking about a neck through:
maple neck, maple wings, curly top, birdseye board.

[kingnimrod]

it'll be heavy as hell

[bbocaner]

with the exception of the fingerboard, sounds like a rickenbacker.

[JustOpenYourMind]

For rickenbacker it seems to work...

[drnknmstr]

I had a Pedulla Rapture J5 with that setup. It was actually very light, probably due to the heavy routing under the pickguard. It sounded really good to me. Mine was a bolt-on, though.

[73jbass]

My BC Rich Eagle is all maple except for the stringers between the wings and centerpiece.About 9 1/2 lbs,but man what a tone monster! The Ric 4003's are all maple if I remember correctly.

[king_xanadu]

Originally Posted by kingnimrod

it'll be heavy as hell

hell's heavy?
how do you know this?

[Mike Shevlin]

Originally Posted by king_xanadu

hell's heavy?
how do you know this?

The problem of an all maple bass is worse than you think in terms of both weight and theological significance.
An all maple bass will be heavier than hell.

[logicman69]

wasn't that $100,000 Ritter carved out of one piece of maple?

Of course the 10,000 year old mammoth bone nut is what REALLY makes the tone!

[wilser]

soft maple is not that heavy ...I don't see the problem with this at all. Several manufacturers use woods that are much heavier than maple.

[Fine Cut]

i believe the Squier VM jazz is all maple; soft maple body, rock maple neck. i know mine's heavier than the Fender P i'm buying. great tone tho

[Barkless Dog]

Gibson - Rippers, RD's, Victories were all maple. They weigh a lot, but have great tone , harmonics & sustain.

Hard maple is a dense & Heavy wood, close to walnut & mahogany. But much brighter in sound.

[PasdaBeer]

Mahog is decently open grain : /


its been said, a lot of people use maple. Tends to be a little bright IMO, but very clean, which i like


and its great to work with : )

[RLK]

My beloved (neck-through) Pedullas (MVP 6, BUZZ 4) are head-to-toe maple
The MVP 6 is ~ 10 lbs.
Very strong fundamental, a sweet upper-mid, and an (almost) painful brightness, especially in the upper registers.

[Brad Johnson]

I have a couple of all Maple basses and they're not heavy by most standards and the ones I have have a nice combination of a full and aggressive sound. If the weight of the pieces you use is an issue you can remove some wood via chambering. YMMV

[Lorenzini]

I've owned a Yamaha TRB6p which was ALL maple other than an ebony FB and it was maybe 11 lbs. But for a 6 string that's still not THAT bad. Best tone of any bass I have ever owned.

Then I owned a Pedulla Thunderbass 4 string that probably weighed 8 lbs. Super light. GREAT tone, a producer I did a session for told me it was his favorite bass tone ever and to never sell the bass. Of course, I sold it.

I also currently own a Squier VM which has a maple body and this weighs probably 9 or 9.5 lbs. The tone is really really good, of course, it's just a "Squier"

[LowBSix]

I'd play it in my stable....

[agreatheight]

I had a Hamer Chaparral 8 string that was all maple (except for the rosewood board), which sounded great. It was awesome for the octave strings, but it also sounded excellent for the regular strings as well. Great sustain, too (some of which may have come from the set neck construction). It WAS a heavy bass, somewhere around 12lbs, but a lot of the weight had to be from all the hardware due to the extra 4 strings.

[Mushroo]

My Pedulla is all maple and is comfortably light. Sounds pretty good, too!

Musical instruments have been constructed out of maple for a long time (Stradavarius, anyone?).

[pbagley]

My Carvin LB-75 is maple neck through with maple body wings and ebony fretboard, ordered that way by KraigO. It has a comforting weight - no chance of me lifting off the ground and hitting my head on low ceilings no matter how much I jump about. Sound is impressively clear and clean.