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Double Bass American Standard...Neck falling

#21
Nice work CT. What wood did you end up using for the block?

With the neck, I would be tempted to cut off the bad part of the heel and add some fresh wood, make a 'stacked heel'.

That would leave it with most of the original neck and allow for shaping the tenon to reset the neck angle and the overstand too.
 
#22
ctregan said:
Double Basses are the hardest things on earth to figure out how to clamp ....
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Keep After That AS CT ..... It's great that you are reviving an old American PlyWood POS .... I own several American Plywood POS's myself (2 Kays / 1 Epiphone). You are doing some Good Work there. I love that photo with the big ol' silo in the background .... Reminds me of Transplanted Dutch Spud Farmer Country just a little west of where I live :D .... I like it a lot.
 

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#23
Jake deVilliers said:
Nice work CT. What wood did you end up using for the block?

With the neck, I would be tempted to cut off the bad part of the heel and add some fresh wood, make a 'stacked heel'.
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Poplar on the block, the original was made of nice tight grain spruce, but was all splits.

Stacked heel? Is that just cutting off the heel and gluing a new one on?
Do you use epoxy, bolts, or dowels? It would be easier to do with the fingerboard removed.

It looks like someone did the same kind of repair years ago.
 
#25
Google 'stacked heel' maybe. Its how they build up classical guitar necks, rather than cutting them out of giant timbers with the concomitant waste.

Taylor has started to do it with their guitar necks too. Its much less wasteful that way.

Epoxy works very well to glue broken necks and would be excellent for the new heel wood too.

You could let in some blind dowels too. With the epoxy you don't have to be super accurate because the glue fills the gaps around the dowels. :)
 
#28
From looking at the phots you made I think that is the original neck for that bass,I have only seen like 3 A/S ,King basses that have not had a heel crack, that one looks like it could be repaired like Jake was saying,I have had to have a neck repaird just like that once and thats what they did.
Has anyone ever used a epoxy called PC7???,,you can get in most hardware stores. I have used it to do repair on of all things tombstones ,some of which I reparied over 10 years ago, and their still holding up fine,,that might be a good bet to use on neck repairs also,,just a thought,,Kent
 
#29
You're having some fun now!

While the board is off you should put a carbon fibre stiffener in there - its cheap and easy to do.

It looks to me as though that neck had a built-up heel in the first place. That looks way too clean and square a joint to be a break.

Can you post a photo of your heel Kent? There's only one AS in BC as far as I know, up in Prince George. I played it at a picking party once, late at night with maybe some drinking involved, and all I remember is the great sound and the looong string length! :)

I think you'll probably just want to clean up the mating surfaces and use something like a West System Epoxy to re-assemble it. I like to use some dowel so as to resist the constant forward pull with something other than just the adhesive in the joint.
 
#30
superman said:
From looking at the photos you made I think that is the original neck for that bass,I have only seen like 3 A/S ,King basses that have not had a heel crack,
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CT…awesome project! :cool: Just dig in and do it, I like that attitude. I agree with superman it looks to be the original AS neck. Every AS and King neck I have seen has this two piece heel…no idea why H.N. White designed it that way, but it looks original to me. The neck is work saving with its factory carved scroll especially if it has the original tuners. It keeps the bass close to original as possible.

I like the selection of hand tools…butter knife and vinegar…DIY’s are very resourceful people. I also noticed the “green bottle” in the hand tools portrait…a sometimes necessary hand tool to help us think more creativity…outside of the box type stuff. :D

Keep up the good work and I appreciate the great step by step pictures. We haven’t dug into a neck block replacement yet…but one is coming up soon. This is good stuff to share and learn. Be sure to share the next stages and final out come…especially how it sounds. With good contact in the neck block it may improve the sound…if that is even possible on a vintage AS bass…they are already great sounding basses and worth putting your effort and skill into it. You are repairing a faithful friend that will repay you with the pleasure of making great music together again.
 
#31
I hope I did'nt confuse anyone ,about the A/S heels, they were made out of one piece of wood originaly,,but just about all of them have broken ,at least once,I have one right now that has at least 3 heel cracks,, this is for sure the weakest point of these basses. Billy Linneman who was the staff bassist at the opry for 40+ years played a old A/S that had a bad heel crack that was open enough that you could see light through it,, but he said it had been that way for 30+ years.
I do have pics of A/S #66 which had not ever had a heel crack
but then it had been in a cover sitting in a corner,,never played,,it was a mint,I'll try to find em, and post,,Kent
 
#32
superman said:
I hope I did'nt confuse anyone ,about the A/S heels, they were made out of one piece of wood originaly,,but just about all of them have broken ,at least once,I have one right now that has at least 3 heel cracks,, this is for sure the weakest point of these basses.
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Hey Superman...I wasn't confuse:)...I really think the two piece neck was the design. My King neck has never been broken and it has the two piece neck as well as my two AS basses have this same design. This is also what Upton has stated here...

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I could be wrong...:D

Maybe Arnold would know best since he has improved this neck flaw with the NS bass design...please...someone chime in who knows waaaaaay more then I do!
 
#33
I did find an old screw under the fingerboard which would suggest the heel was attached as a separate piece of wood.

The screw appears to be original and since it was under the fingerboard, it does not look like a repair job.

It was probably easier to mill the dovetail as a separate piece of wood? Then attach it later with a screw. Remember, it was a factory.
 
#34
I went and looked close at both of my A/S basses and neither
of them are a two piece neck, both are made from the same piece of curly maple from heel to scroll,,thats not to say that some might have been made that way, but I have yet to see that. It looks like to me from those pics of the neck rebuild
that that was a old repair not a factory joint.
Like I said I've owned a dozen or more A/S/ King basses and most had a heel repair of some sort,, some were very sloppy and some were very nice almost could'nt see the repair,Kent
 
#38
does 744 have a paper label? and does it have binding strips on the ribs against the top and back??
I have owned 3 that did'nt have the full paper labels, they had a cut label with just the serial # inside, and did'nt have the extra rib moulding or the brand on the back or inside,,I refer to them as unmarked Standards,,they must have made them for another company, and just left the name out.My old road bass is #467 and it has a type written label from a school that reads puchased new Sept 41, I.W.U.,,so that blows the current serial # reserch around if they made all these in consecutive numbers,Roy Huskeys old standard is also one of these unmarked basses, I think his is like 411,I've owned #301 and#660 which are also unmarked,,bit of a mystery,, we'll prob never figure out,,Kent
 

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