"FiberD" carbon fiber 5 string build

[Rôckhewer]

I ordered the tuners for this bass along with some parts I needed for my P-basses and they arrived today from Japan. Took one out to confirm the weight. Manufacturer says 40 grams, which is exactly what I got (to the nearest gram):
View attachment 3585699

... or 1.4 oz.

I have never used the Res-O-Lites before, or any other lightweight tuners for that matter, and I must say they do feel kinda strange to hold. My mind says something that size made of solid metal should weigh more!

Nice Choice
I dig Gotoh way more than Hipshot.
I almost..... (almost?)...well...
...wanted to, really bad... have them do a custom branded batch for me, ( my logo on the gearbox)... like they do for Alembic...etc.
I went so far as to submit my logo for a batch-run quote.
So, the minimum order initially ....was about ¥300,000
... just over $2K usd... for about 50 machines.
If I remember correctly.
But subsequent batches were totally affordable... once they had your logo setup done.
If I was building full time right now, I would have already done it.
Just...because they completely blow away Hipshot for stability...
The extra weight loss, and branded logo would only be a bonus.
Just saying.... dig me some Gotoh.

 

[Jeff Siddall]

Res-o-lite have a goodly amount of resin in them (hence the name). The moving bits are metal (probably aluminum), but other bits are plastic.

Yeah, I think you are right. I believe the handle part is plastic, though the machine part is supposedly "duralumin". I think that's mainly just an alloy of aluminum and copper. Despite knowing that, in my mind, tuners are still big heavy hunks of metal!

EDIT: I found a Gotoh catalog that indicates the GB350 "button" is plated plastic while the rest is an aluminum alloy.

Nice Choice
I dig Gotoh way more than Hipshot.

Thanks! I found that the regular (non Res-O-Lite) Gotohs are smooth and tight so I figured these would be too. Not disappointed.

$2K startup cost is a significant entrance fee unless you are churning out a lot of instruments. It would be cool to have branded tuners like the big guys though!

 

[Jisch]

Keisel uses Gotoh branded tuners, I find Keisel to be the cheapest place to get them, but they do have their logo on the back.

 

[Jeff Siddall]

Keisel uses Gotoh branded tuners, I find Keisel to be the cheapest place to get them, but they do have their logo on the back.

Interesting. I built a Kiesel bass a couple of years ago (my current avatar pic) and while the tuners felt nice and tight I didn't immediately think of Gotoh. Mine are branded Carvin, and the post is contoured rather than straight like the current Gotohs, and they don't have the silver/gold rings where the handle joins. Maybe they are based on an older design.

 

[Reedt2000]

Really cool project, I'm in

Sub'd

 

[HaMMerHeD]

Philadelphia Luthier Supply has good price and abailability on Gotoh bass tuners of the GB707 variety.

 

[Jisch]

Interesting. I built a Kiesel bass a couple of years ago (my current avatar pic) and while the tuners felt nice and tight I didn't immediately think of Gotoh. Mine are branded Carvin, and the post is contoured rather than straight like the current Gotohs, and they don't have the silver/gold rings where the handle joins. Maybe they are based on an older design.

You are probably correct. I'll take a closer look when I get home, perhaps they changed suppliers. They work well, regardless.

 

[Jeff Siddall]

Philadelphia Luthier Supply has good price and abailability on Gotoh bass tuners of the GB707 variety.

That's probably true if you are in the US and when shipping is free. I will also add, at least for anyone reading this from Canada, that JAPARTS usually has even lower list prices, but shipping may eat up all the savings. Just ask for a quote to find out. Also be aware that Gotoh parts from them ship direct from Japan and will take about a month to arrive.

 

[HaMMerHeD]

I believe Kiesel tuners are made by Ping. They are fine and i have used them on several projects, but they are definitely not as smooth as Gotoh.

 

[Jisch]

I believe Kiesel tuners are made by Ping. They are fine and i have used them on several projects, but they are definitely not as smooth as Gotoh.

Cool. I learned something today.

 

[rogerbmiller]

Sub’ed for carbon fiber!

 

[Jeff Siddall]

No real progress to report, but the local wood store had exotic hardwoods on sale this month and I couldn't pass up this quarter-sawn beauty:

At more than 10 bf this 8' long plank is about 4 times as much wood as I needed for this project, but the grain is so tight and straight on this piece that I couldn't resist. I tried not to look at the price when it came time to pay!

 

[Jeff Siddall]

So... I just placed an order for 3 weaves of carbon fiber, 2 epoxies, bleeder, peel ply, vacuum bag film, sealer tape etc... to carbon the neck.

Excluding the pickups (the only thing not yet ordered), the carbon materials cost more than all the wood, hardware and electronics combined.

No turning back now!

 

[Jeff Siddall]

After weeks of too many other things on the go, I finally got back to working on this.

I got full-scale printouts of the various parts of the neck and taped them together to make a mock-up of the final result:

Everything fit, but I wasn't happy with how little access there was to the higher frets so I redesigned the lower half of the neck and lower wing to allow more access. I updated the render, but it still doesn't have the fanned frets so again, use your imagination:

It is a minor change for sure, but at least 2 more frets are now accessible (about the 18th fret on the bottom string).

Then I headed to the saw and took the bulk of the neck core to the right thickness, though leaving the headstock full thickness for now, since it will be angled back:

Then I attached the new ripping blade:

...and got to work on the Wenge!

Before:

Piece cut off for wings and fretboard(s):

Two wings:

And a fretboard (bottom piece)... plus enough leftover wood to make 3 more (top piece):

I gotta say, I am really impressed with that blade. At Janka hardness 8600 N (about 2000 lbf) Wenge is significantly harder than Rock Maple, but there was no real drama re-sawing nearly 3" of the stuff. The blade packaging claimed it cuts "like a hot knife through butter" and I rolled my eyes when I read that, but having previously used combo blades for ripping, this really does cut amazingly well. Those are the cut surfaces facing up and after checking with a caliper the variation in thickness was only about +/-0.015" over the entire board.

I certainly like the face of the boards but if I look down at the thing while playing it I will mainly see the edges. This is the upward facing edge of the top wing:

Nice!

Likewise, the edge of the fretboard will be roughly like this:

Such cool wood!

It also makes some seriously dark sawdust. I churned up a bit of the balsa dust underneath for some contrast:

Now onto shaping the neck, and then... carbon. Eeek!

 

[Jeff Siddall]

Some carbon arrived! This 4x4 twill will be the presentation layer:

This plain weave:

and this biaxial weave:

will be the build layers.

Probably going to need 7 layers total.

The first project was to create a flat carbon sheet to make a zero clearance insert for the table saw, and also some stiffening rods for the fretless build.

Then onto bigger and better things.

First step was to build a vacuum connector. This rig worked pretty well:

Except the valve seems to leak under high vacuum. It worked well enough for the first vacuum bag but can't get much above about 30 cm Hg (about 12 PSI):

Update: a new ball valve arrived so I will stick that on and see how it works.

 

[Jeff Siddall]

After far too long I finally got some time off to work on basses again. Back in June I shaped the top of the neck, including the wonky multiscale headstock angle, shown with a straightedge for reference:

I also got the new ball valve and rebuilt the vacuum connector and rounded the edges of the board to go inside the vacuum bag. Last time the sharp board edges cut up the vacuum bag.

Then I got to cutting up 7 layers of 3 different weaves of fabric, plus the two peel plies, and bleeder layer, and of course a new vacuum bag. I also filled a few small nicks in the balsa so they wouldn't show through the carbon layers. That balsa is soft stuff!

The rest happens pretty quickly, as the epoxy only has about 25 minute pot life, so there are no pictures of that process. But here is the whole thing in the bag:

Even in the vacuum bag you can already you can see the waffle-pattern from the build layers so I expected I would need to do some leveling and another presentation layer. Out of the bag the next day:

Everything actually turned out great, except the texture. Thickness was 2.7 mm, exactly where I had planned, and the epoxy was even with no dry spots. After trimming the edges down (I was wearing a respirator mask but later realized it was a poor choice to wear a T-shirt!) and block sanding I spread on a coat of thick epoxy and it is already looking pretty good:

Another day and a wet sand and it is ready for the presentation layer:

...except there is a ton more work to be done before that happens, but I really couldn't proceed with shaping the back of the neck until the front was stabilized. Balsa is light but as a consequence pretty fragile. Without one side reinforced with CF I probably would have snapped the headstock while working on it. Now that one side is done I can get to the real shaping work on the back!

 

[Matt Liebenau]

Cool. I’m a sucker for CF.

 

[MPU]

Looks very familiar! Well done, looking good.

 

[dwizum]

Just read through this whole thread. Looking forward to seeing how the neck turns out, I've always wanted to try something similar to this. I may have skimmed too fast and missed these details, but are you including a truss rod? If so, from the back? And what about the fretboard? Is that what the wenge is for? And you're gonna glue it to the top CF surface of the neck you just bagged?

 

[Roxbororob]

Subbed. Very cool!