SEI24bass:
Wow, I thought us United State-ians were supposed to be the guilty masters of excess!!
Sounds like the best kind of intense. Loved the fretless 8.
My unsolicited vote: Bloodwood stringers. IMO it would better match the Amboyna.
Question; how many truss rods are in your 8er?
I just recently agreed to switch from 2 rods to 1 on my Ramirez 7, and it looks like
SEI is one of the only other builders to use only one t-rod on some of their ERBs.
I spent 3 weeks in California on vacation last year and fitted right in over there! America is like a second home to me...
Thanks for your kind comments and my preference is also for the bloodwood. The SEI 8 has two truss rods, which was a first for Martin (you rightly identified all SEI 7 stringers have one truss rod). Both Martin and I liked the stiffness this and the purpleheart / maple combination provided in the neck and will be doing the same for the 9 string.
I am rather fussy about the action on fretless basses, so I really value the extra flexibility dual truss rods seem to provide when setting the playing action (different neck relief for the bass and treble strings). However, they are a little trickier to set up, so a single truss rod might be better if you particularly value ease of set up. Hope this makes sense and will happily try to answer any questions.
