First Bass That I Built Myself

I have been modding a lot of the bass guitars that I buy. Well I decided that I would build a bass with a body that I would make myself. I had some leftover pieces of 2x4 lumber, from a workshop I built to work on my guitar equipment. So I glued 5 pieces together for the middle section of the body. I left a 2x4 running up the center to mount the neck, drew a body shape and cut away the middle of the side sections to leave 1 1/4" frame on the outside upper and lower bouts. So I guess you could call it a semi-hollow body. I had a few pieces of cabinet refacing plywood,that somebody was giving away, to use for the top and the back. I chose the side of the plywood with no finish, so I could finish it how I wanted. The finished side was cherry, and looked good, but not what I wanted this time. Cut the neck pocket, and pickup cutouts. Made my own knobs. Stained all wood with a walnut stain, and finished with boiled linseed oil. The other parts were all purchased from ebay, to save costs. $173 total. Fender MIM tuners, high mass bridge, Guitarmadness ceramic lipstick humbucker pickups, alpha controls, and D'Addario EXL190 strings. I wanted to build this as inexpensively as I could. It was a good learning experience. I will do the next one a little differently, as it is neck heavy. Also a different body shape. I wasn't sure how I would like it. Not the nicest looking bass, but it sounds amazing !!!

 

Hello Matt, I made the knobs from a piece of oak, that just happened to be by the drill press. I used a hole saw, and removed the drill bit from the center of the hole saw. Then clamped the piece of oak in a vice and made four cutouts. Carefully marked centers, and drilled them deep enough to fit on the pots. Sanded them on a belt sander, and then stained them with the same walnut stain as the body. No other finish , as they already had a matt sheen ??? Not sure how that happened, but was glad I didn't have another step to finish. I have licensed Hipshot tuners for the next project. This bass was to see if I could even build a decent bass guitar. Don't like how some things turned out, but I'll know better for the next bass. It does sound really good. One of my favorite sounding basses at this time. Next bass idea is a Ric bass shape, semi-hollow. But I will use maple boards glued together for the center of the body, as I just picked up a 1 3/4" solid maple table that somebody was giving away. I'll use pieces from the table base for the semi-hollow, and use the table top for some solid body bass guitar ideas that I have. I own a Gibson Ripper bass, and a Grabber G3 bass, but don't have a Grabber. The bodies are all the same [ maple ], with same pickguard , so I thought that I'll make my own Grabber bass. I'll try and remember in process pics the next time. It's just that when I got going, I didn't feel like stopping to go grab a camera. The work went by pretty fast. Waiting for the finish to dry, took up the most time. As I enjoy working on bass guitars, time goes by fast. If you enjoy your work, it's not really work, it's pleasure. Thank you everybody for the kind words ! It makes me want to continue building more basses.

 

Hello mogo2, Thank you. I will definately be buying some more of the dual lipstick pickups, as they sound so good in this bass. I wired each pickup to a three way toggle switch for series/split/parallel. Wow, nice to have different voicing with just a switch. I think the pickup would sound amazing in your Hofner Ignition Club bass.

 

I just weighed the bass, 6.5 pounds on my bathroom scale. I was just now thinking, maybe I could drill a hole in the lower bout and add some metal type of slug to add a little weight to the body. Might eliminate the neck dive some ??? What does anybody think about this idea ? Or, just leave it alone ?