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Fretless five competition: Mad scientist edition

#281
Lab Journal #27: Got a little free time this morning to make some more expensive sawdust. Spent some time with the headstock and got rid of all the square edges. Hard edges dont look nearly as nice with the laminations as curves do. My goal now is to get the entire bass carved to the point that I can start hand-sanding (and preferably as little as possible)

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And pictures from the front:

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#288
Lab Journal #28: Back at it again today. Temps in the mid 70's most of the day. Doesn't exactly scream Mad Scientist but I can live with that for today.;)

Time to radius the fingerboard. I started out by taking a 20' radius block and working the fingerboard down to rough out the radius.

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I dont care for the feel of a straight radius so from the rough 20' radius I started working towards a compound radius. I started by measuring off the fingerboard into five sections at each end and connecting the two marks.

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Once the lines were marked I marked in between them with a pencil to show my sanding progress. Using the lines as a guide I took a small, straight sanding block and sanded a flat plane between each line using the filled in pencil as a guide to gauge my sanding. Once the five straight planes are established I came back with the 20' radius block and lightly sanded the peaks together to make one smooth radius. Sorry for the lack of pics but I dont like to give away everything I do in detail. ;)

Here is a somewhat fuzzy pic of the final product.

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While I was in the lab today I spent a little more time sanding on the neck heel. The smoother the heel gets the happier I get, I just have to find a happy stopping point while there is some bass left to sand on. :D

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And my personal favorite:

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Once I have tuners and they are drilled it will be time for a final setup. I will string it up and check the board for any buzzes or uneven spots. Once everything is good to go it will be finish time. I still havent decided what finish I will use but I have decided to do a cyanoacrylate finish on the fingerboard.

Before I go here is a full frontal :eyebrow: pic to leave you with:

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#291
I wouldn't say the body is small but it is a little smaller and more carved than I would usually do a five because the thick ziricote top and laminate body are pretty heavy. I also like reasonably wide spacing for a five. 18.5mm or 19mm.

Also I think since the body is dark and the fingerboard is light the eyes tend to see the board as being bigger than it really is.

Knucklehead: dont know the exact weight at the moment but I would characterize it as average. Not terribly heavy but certainly substantial at the same time. Is that vague enough for you? :smug: The balance of the bass is very good, not even slight neck dive while the bass is strapped on.
 
#294
colcifer said:
That's a lot of neck! Or was that taken at an odd angle?
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The slightly distorted neck suggests that the picture has been taken with a wide lens - that's also the default setting of pocket cameras. A wide lens would indeed make the neck look longer than usual when shot at such an angle. I think... ;)
 
#300
kcandme said:
I'm curious on the the fit of the tuning keys with the contours you put into the back of the headstock. I really like the look of everything you're doing. Just wondering how the keys will fit as I thought they pretty much need a flat surface to mount to...???
(I'm not a builder)
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my thought too. He can always recess the ferules on the front side, and on the back some increible careful dremme / chisel work to make flat spots underneath the tuners. Or something even more insane that we havent thought of haha.

edit: but at second glance, it looks like there may be enough flat area where it will all just work out....
 

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