Any Warmoth P5 owners?

[HeavyDuty]

I'm in the process of creating a fretless P5 using an AmStd donor bass I found. I want to swap out the Fender body with one that is natural finished swamp ash. My plan is to transplant the neck after defretting and all the other hardware (including pickguard) over to a new Warmoth body. This will be in standard P configuration - no other pickups.

Warmoth only offers their P5 body as rear routed, and they don't offer pickguards. Emailed correspondence with them brought up the question of pickup placement - they aren't sure if their pickup rout will match the Fender P5 position. They also do not offer pickguards for their P5 body. I'm not worried about the rear rout - I can work with that - but I am concerned about placement of their pickup.

Does anyone here have a Warmoth P5 body that can comment on where exactly the pickup is placed?

 

[HeavyDuty]

Anyone?

 

[topcat2069]

I built a P5 with a Warmoth Body. I believe the pickup is in the correct place.... that said, you should know that the route that Warmoth does is for a [regular] P 4 (2+2) pickup, so a Fender (3+2 size pickup wont work.... I would take the body without a pickup route to a good luthier and have him route for the Fender pickup if that's the one you're using.

Since I Wasn't as smart as I am now ...I just had my luthier route for the Am. Dlx. P Bass bridge pickup and used a Bill Lawrence / Wilde P 46...... the sound was GREAT !!!

Also... I got my bridge pickup with the 3+2 pickup and a pickguard (Complete Am. Dlx P Bass set with wiring from the Stratosphere on Ebay).... the pickguard didn't line up at all.... I believe the body is a bit smaller than a Fender... the string spacing with the
Takeuchi 5 string bridge was 17.5mm and I believe Fender is 19mm.... using a Warmoth neck gave me a G&L like spacing of the strings.

 

[HeavyDuty]

Thanks for that - I didn't realize they were using the standard P bass pickup rout. I've asked Warmoth to get me the neck heel to pickup dimension they use, since it will be under the pickguard opening up their rout might be doable. If not, I'm looking at having it routed from scratch.

When you say the pickguard didn't line up, what do you mean? The outer edges didn't work?

 

[topcat2069]

The body was a little different shaped....like a standard 4 string P but a tiny bit smaller...... The Bass with the pickups and the body with the Fender Pickguard.

 

[iriegnome]

I have the original prototype G5 body. Still used on their site as the main picture for it. I had mine routed for SD soapbar. However, in recent years, I have noticed that Warmoth is stopping doing a lot of their previous custom work for standard off the shelf kinds of things and are extremely reluctant to do anything different. Try asking the guys in the Warmouth Fan club the same question. I am sure there are a few more with the P5 body that could help. The pic above looks like the route is in the sweetspot mostly where it should be.

 

[HeavyDuty]

Thanks, guys - that size thing has me worried. Maybe I should go with plan B, stripping the stock alder body and refinishing it in trans butterscotch.

 

[comet9]

the warmoth p5 is a deluxe style body. the lower horn is pushed back an inch and a half and it requires a 22 fret neck.it is a direct replacement for the p5's that have the humbucker bridge pick up... not the current am standard p5 or the squire p5's.as far as I know no warmoth 5 string body will work with the 20 fret neck with the exception of the jazz bass bodies listed as made specifically to the mim jazz 5 specs.

 

[comet9]

 

[comet9]

that's my p5 jazz tele warmoth, the body they make is like this;

 

[lowfreqgeek]

As comet9 mentioned, the Fender AmStd V neck will not work with the Warmoth P5 body. They are completely incompatible with each other.

You'll either have to refinish the Fender body or buy a Warmoth neck to go with the new Warmoth P5 body.

 

[HeavyDuty]

I corresponded with Warmoth, and they specifically said their Standard P5 body was designed for the 20 fret AmStd style neck, not the 22 fret one - that's their Deluxe 5 body. Two different products.

I'm still thinking a refin may make the most sense.

 

[lowfreqgeek]

I corresponded with Warmoth, and they specifically said their Standard P5 body was designed for the 20 fret AmStd style neck, not the 22 fret one - that's their Deluxe 5 body. Two different products.

I'm still thinking a refin may make the most sense.

That must be brand new. They've never offered a standard P5 on their website before, and there is no mention of it yet. They have offered a standard Jazz 5 for a few years.

Let us know how it turns out.

 

[HeavyDuty]

Dammit, I think you guys are right - looking back over the emails the Warmoth rep glossed right over my questions about the body style. He talks about the neck fitting their "Standard 5" bodies, but none of those are on the website. Scratch that idea, full steam ahead on refinishing the Fender body.

 

[HeavyDuty]

... and I confirmed with the rep that there is no "Standard 5" P body, he missed that part of my question. Dead project, full steam ahead with refinishing the stock body.

 

[HeavyDuty]

Now that a Warmoth body is off the table, I'm moving ahead with plans to refin the Fender alder body: http://www.talkbass.com/threads/refinishing-a-fender-alder-body-in-tru-oil.1122548/