I wasn't sure if this belonged in Douglass thread or the Essex thread for more participation. I'll go ahead and leave it here in case someone else does a search for one of these instruments.
Apologies in advance if this is too verbose.
About a month ago I ordered one of the Douglas Sculptor 5 NA from Rondo Music. Great service and shipping from Rondo. It arrived quickly and wasn't damaged. My signing bonus at work almost covered the full amount so I decided to throw it at my first 5 string. I hadn't thought much about using 5 string and I knew none of the the typical 4+1 headstock styles were for me but I still wanted to taste the Essex kool aid.
My bass looks much better than the one on the website which has poorly matched wood. Mine is a 3 piece body and very well grain matched with a well applied glossy finish. The fit and finish of the body and neck is good. The neck joint is tight and everything seems to be lined up and bolted together accurately. The scarf joint at the headstock looks secure but it is not made from the same piece of wood as the neck. The neck is 1.75" wide at the nut and very chunky. Not a good thing for me but I'd heard rumors to the effect so I am not marking it down for that. Be warned.
The bass was tuned up and checked for function with the stock strings and then immediately replaced with a set of D'Addario XL 50-135 from the local guitar store.
The pots are stiff and squeaky. The active electronics are quiet and the humbucker seems decent but the jazz pickup in the neck position is the weakest pickup I've ever heard. It is useless. I have added springs to the pickups but raising the jazz pickup doesn't do anything. It's lifeless and extremely quiet.
The setup on this particular bass wasn't very good. The strings were VERY high, the nut slots were too high, and even with the bridge saddles bottomed out the strings were 5-6mm off the fretboard at the 24th fret. I knew immediately that this would be problem.
It wasn't hard to dial in the neck relief (I like a very nearly straight neck) but there was a problem with how high the strings sat over the neck. I tried a few rounds of shimming with business cards and plastic material to fill the neck pocket but none of it raised the neck enough. I decided to make a full pocket width shim from scrap aluminum to raise the neck 3mm in the pocket. Even after raising the neck 3mm the strings were too high (for me) over the 24th fret with the saddles bottomed out. I like the strings low, but I've never run out of adjustment before they get into the medium action range.
I didn't want to add another full size shim so I removed the saddles and cut them from the bottom so they could sit lower in the bridge. There are two things to note about this bridge. The saddles have different sized slots for the strings so they must go back in the right order, and also that the threads for the set screw do not run the full length of the saddle.
All the above helped me gain another millimeter of adjustment at the bridge, and that combined with a .75" shim at the body end of the neck pocket to tilt the neck brought everything closer to my comfort range. I tried coming to ease with a setup without tilting the neck but the strings seemed to pop off the fretboard on the high end without one.
The nut slots were lowered so the strings rest at .65mm (.026") over the 1st fret. Also worth noting, a .135 B string does NOT fit the nut as sold. It had to be widened for the string to rest properly. My other basses are cut lower than this but I'm leaving it alone for now.
I was getting a lot of buzzing on the D and G strings in the 10th-14th fret range. This was not obvious with the factory setup but was readily observable with a Fender spec medium action. It didn't go away without a lot of relief and very high strings until I used a fret rocker to identify the offenders, knocked them down with a fret level, and re crowned the frets. I already have most of the tools to do the basic setup work but the luthier specific tools were new and this Douglass bass was a good way to begin practicing with them. I have no aspirations, I just like to tinker.
All in all.... it's been a bit of a pain. After reading so many positive things on these basses I'm wondering if mine was a poor example, or maybe my idea of a good setup is on the extreme side? My other basses, cheap and expensive (if you can call USA peavys that) have taken a better setup with less effort.
It really isn't a bad looking or poorly finished in the body and neck department. The bridge is nice and so are the tuners. However, the screws are very soft which most people wouldn't know if they weren't fussing with it as much as I have. The truss rod did the job too. The super chunky neck is very hard for me to play and the jazz pickup is terrible but I don't know if it's worth replacing. It seems to be and odd size for a 5 string jazz pup.
I'll update with some photos soon.
