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g00eY's first bass - progress thread

G

g00eY

Sep 17, 2005
2,150
5
Chicago, IL
#1
yay! my first bass. i'll be building it at my schools woodshop with the help of the shop teacher. just a little info on why i'm doing this. our semester project for my english class is to find something you've always wanted to do. now, i haven't always wanted to build a bass. i guess i got GAS like symptoms (except for bass building) over my winter break when i kept coming to this part of the forum to see how basses are made. then, when we were prompted for project i originally wanted to learn slap, but my teacher said no. then i thought, "what do i want to do?..." one night it just clicked - i love music, i love using my hands... let's build a bass! so yea... that's about it.

i have some pics of my design and wood pieces:
design
Picture.jpg


back (laminated pine)
IMG_2617.jpg


poplar piece #1
IMG_2620.jpg


poplar piece #2
IMG_2618.jpg


yup, so like i said, i'll be building this at school (during my lunch period). today i got the two pieces of poplar glued up, tomorrow i'll run them through a planer and glue them to the pine.
 
#3
thanks!

yea i know, especially since it's laminated, but i saw Bud building a bass with pine so i figured why not. i'm not too worried since it's my first bass. so far i've gotten the pieces glued up and the template drawn on. i might get time tomorrow to take off some chunks of wood.
 
#4
FINALLY! updates!

i got the body cut with a bandsaw, i'll start with the routing hopefully on Monday.

frontcut.jpg


backcut.jpg


but i ran into some problems with gluing. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS TOO MANY CLAMPS!!!!!!!!

c3.jpg


c2.jpg


c1.jpg


how would i go about fixing those cracks? can i just shove some glue in there and reclamp at those positions?
 
#6
if you do a semi-transparent finish on the top and opaque sides/back, that wood filler will make the gap disappear.

do you have access to a thickness sander? that would be a far better choice for final levelling than a planer. with the grain of that poplar, I'll bet you will be better off hand sanding with a block sander than running it thru the planer ... the thickness sander would even everything out nicely since it doesn't use knives to reduce the thickness.

since that looks like soft pine, you're going to want to use a neck bolt plate when you attach the neck - just like on a Fender. this will help to distribute the clamping force and keep your screw heads from sinking too far into the body (and coming thru the fretboard :crying: )

all the best,

R
 
#7
Looking pretty good! I actually quite like the grain of the poplar, it's very calm and understated.
The use of laminated pine is a very good choice from an environmental and economical point of view! Hope the tone works out though.

Shame about that gap in the seam.
It does sound like a good idea do give the back and sides an opaque finish, because although the gap will fill out nicely with filler you indeed won't be able to ever get the wood closer together.
Give the opaque finish a little burstover on the top, it'll look pretty sharp to!

Is the thickness of the blank very much off the final thickness? Because you could plane it to about two millimeter off the final thickness and sand it down by hand. Especially pine sands very easily.

Good luck with the routing!
 
#8
thanks for the comments guys!

what do you guys mean by an opaque finish vs a clear finish? could you give me some examples?

and what type of wood filler would you guys suggest?

the pine is very very soft indeed. it has a couple of dents in it from the workbench (someone left a nail on the bench and i put the body on top of it!). i think i'll sand off some of the pine, rather than the poplar because i really like the grain i have right now.
 
#9
opaque = solid color you can't see through, so think of any solid color P-bass and you have it. Here's an example of opaque sides and transparent front:

d46f400d.gif


if the back and sides are a soild color and you burst that color onto the front, you'd get something that doesn't allow you to see the glue line but highlights the top wood ... like in this quilt maple over swamp ash 5-string (except that the back is also burst to show the gorgeous grain in the swamp ash)

all the best,

R
 
#11
g00eY said:
FINALLY! updates!


how would i go about fixing those cracks? can i just shove some glue in there and reclamp at those positions?
Click to expand...

As far as those cracks go, i would put some superglue in those cracks and sand the sides and get wood dust in the cracks and let it dry, and just forget about it. I think then, if you wanted to, paint the back and sides only, getting some of the black paint or whatever color to do a kind of burst finish on the front edges a little. No one could ever tell. If you go to Invalid Link Removed it tells you how to do a "poor man's" burst finish with only spray paint and a template. good luck.
 
#12
hey! thanks for that link! how many coats of paint would i need? i remember reading a thread about a guy who spent like $100 on cans. i've got a little experience using paint cans from building model cars and stuff, but it's not much.

and i would paint the top coat first, right? like if i wanted a green burst i would paint the top green, then do a burst, then some clear.
 
#13
Well, spraying the top first would be how I would do it.
You always put the lightest color on first, in this case transparent counts as a way light color.

But I'm not sure! The things I've spraypainted so for are cars, motorcycles and 3D product models, none of which involved burst-overs or transparent effects. Well, not intentionally...
 
#14
i'm actually now not sure if i want to a burst, or any type of painted finish. the reason is the pine is very soft, and any dings would be very apparent. also, i wanted to make a more of a beater bass where i wouldn't have to worry about having dings, and and oil finish tends to hide them better.

if you think i should do a paint finish, then feel free to convince me otherwise.
 
#15
g00eY said:
i'm actually now not sure if i want to a burst, or any type of painted finish. the reason is the pine is very soft, and any dings would be very apparent. also, i wanted to make a more of a beater bass where i wouldn't have to worry about having dings, and and oil finish tends to hide them better.

if you think i should do a paint finish, then feel free to convince me otherwise.
Click to expand...
Yeah spray finishing is an art in itself and I would just hide the cracks the best I could. Im sure no one will know the difference but you. I haven't had the best of luck with spray finishing with cans. Your friend who spent like 100 bucks on just spray paint probably got the real nitro lacquer from guitar Reranch online. They are expensive and i wouldn't go that route if i was gonna paint it.
 
#16
can i get by with Duplicolor from Auto Zone? i'm guessing a can of black, a can of color, and a can of clear would be enough?

i'm still very hesitant in doing a burst finish. is there such thing as a solid colored oil?

and oh! just remembered a question i had about bursting. assuming i use the method as stated above, what angle (approximately) would i hold the can at if the body was on a flat surface?
 
#17
so... no real progress to show, but i did get the grade back for the paper i wrote for my project. it was a project for my enriched English class, and it's a class where i'm not sure if i'd ever gotten an A on a paper before. i got like a 90% on my presentation, and a 93ish% on my 90 pages long paper (lol! it had an appendix that was like 75 pages long). so yea... i'm happy. i'd like to thank specifically Bud, Scott, and Frank for doing those long interviews for me :) . definately paid off (at least on my half)! so this project is basically on hold either till next school year, or till i get my hands on a router.
 

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