Laguna burger build

[RichterScale]

I will also follow up with some of the more crucial details:
How much it weighs
String spacing
Will it Geddy with a Duracell, or will I need to go back to Energizer..
There's a few more important ones that I can't think of at the moment.

Finally finished it up (enough to make it playable). I made a little cord with an adapter so I could use the aux input on the little Bose mini and when I plugged it in, I was getting no volume until it was turned all the way up. And it was buzzing loud when I touched the strings or ground. I thought, great, I effed up the wiring. Turned out the bass is fine and the cord is fine. Something screwy with the aux input. Plugged it in a little karaoke amp I garbage picked and set up the intonation. I ended up pulling the whole nut shim out and replacing it with a little strip of .010" alum. It got the strings roughly .020" above the 1st fret. Setup isn't perfect, but the action is playable and there's no buzzing.
String spacing is right around 16mm OC at the bridge and around 9+mm at the nut. And I'm pretty sure it will Geddy with a Duracell, especially if I had some effects. But I can't. I'm definitely out of shape. Anyway, this base leaves a lot to be desired in the details. But it's playable. I also noticed that it killed my neck to sit in a chair and look down at the bass while trying to play for roughly an hour. So, that's something to look forward to. I think the next bass will be all about ergo.
These Hipshot "licensed" tuners are garbage. Not sure if they are cheap knock-offs and they paid to use the name, or if this is just the bottom end of Hipshot tuners, but they're junk.
Now I just have to learn how to use Audacity and the little Behringer interface and record a few clips (after I practice a little and it doesn't sound like I'm falling down the stairs, holding my bass).
I will say that I did notice a slight change in the sound from before. It seems a little more mid rangey and has a little more character than before. It had a pretty sterile tone before.
Differences are a thicker wenge board, walnut and mahogany wings, smaller frets and I tension matched the strings as closely as possible. As well as they don't have silks. Not sure if that's enough for a noticeable change in sound, but it seems like it did.
Before, it had a thin rosewood board, soft maple wings, bigger frets and silks.

 

[Rôckhewer]

It seems a little more mid rangey and has a little more character than before. It had a pretty sterile tone before.

...& Now it looks badass...
I'd call that a win.

 

[RichterScale]

I forgot to weigh it!
I'll do it tomorrow. I'll have to go back and see what I said it weighed before. I wanna say 9 lbs. It's definitely heavier.
I'm gonna guess 10.8.
We'll see if I'm close without going over when I weigh it.

 

[Reedt2000]

How bout a whole bunch more pics?

 

[RichterScale]

How bout a whole bunch more pics?

If it's decent weather tomorrow, I'll bring it outside, do a bunch of makeup and lighting tricks and snap a few.
The phone is the only camera and the LED shop lights glare off the new strings. And also make every scratch and spec of dust show up if I get too close.

 

[RichterScale]

While waiting until I get home,..I was looking at pics and vids of these for about an hour last night and holy crap. Never really looked at them at length before. No wonder everyone is ga ga over these. What a work of art.

I'd like to model the next one somewhat after this. I want light and comfy. I'm thinking 4 string and a different pup and bridge setup. Maybe a custom diy bridge. We'll see if I wanna cross that bridge (get it?!) when I get to it. Also, I want frets. So, loosely based on a Diva.
I have a chunk of rigid 2" foam board. I'll carve up a few bodies and start with the diva shape and adjust to fit. Maybe it won't end up anything like it.
Another thing I have to look into is if Rocklite sells ebano boards in long lengths. I thing I would like to mimic the straight through design and I want a black board.
I also want to do a simple passive setup with single vol & tone. Also a switch for parallel/series etc. Maybe 2 singles right next to each other, or one big soap bar with the internal P setup. I'll have to look into what pups are good for a setup like that, or look into having someone make one for me. I'll def need advice in the pup realm.
Anyway, that's what I'm looking at next.
When I get home I'll do some pics of the burger bass and then try to figure out how to record on a laptop.

 

[RichterScale]

Also, does anyone know the thickness of a diva body? They look very thin, but I couldn't find a single word about it on the entire internets.

 

[dwizum]

I'll have to look into what pups are good for a setup like that, or look into having someone make one for me.

Let me know when you are getting near the point of figuring out the pickup and I'll hook you up!

 

[RichterScale]

Awesome

 

[Rôckhewer]

Marleaux uses Delano. But yeah... I wouldn't go with that setup.
I used that same oval single Delano pickup on my fretless "Fusión" build.
I didn't really dig it. By itself it's rather nasal & mid heavy.
If it weren't for the fact that that bass also had Graphtech piezo bridge, Acoustiphonic preamp, and Hexpander MIDI interface....
.... I would have been bummed at that Delano 's tone.

 

[TerribleTim68]

Marleaux uses Delano. But yeah... I wouldn't go with that setup.
I used that same oval single Delano pickup on my fretless "Fusión" build.
I didn't really dig it. By itself it's rather nasal & mid heavy.
If it weren't for the fact that that bass also had Graphtech piezo bridge, Acoustiphonic preamp, and Hexpander MIDI interface....
.... I would have been bummed at that Delano 's tone.

I mean, yes and no, right?
Yes, Marleaux uses a Delano. But they use a custom wound Delano made specifically for them, right? So the one you and I can buy isn't the one they are using.

 

[TerribleTim68]

@Rôckhewer I re-read my post later and I sound like an arrogant a$$. That was not my intention so I apologize for that.

I did check the Marleaux website, they have a sound clip on there. It is "nasaly", I see what you mean. But I don't know that I hate it that much either.

 

[RichterScale]

What I'm picturing in my head is kind of a raw single coil sound. Almost Ric-like. I was thinking maybe 2 single coils right next to each other in one big soap bar and then a switch that can toggle between parallel, series, single, etc.
I really have no idea what I'm talking about, how it really works, if that's possible, how to get a raw, passive tone or what the bass would really sound like when done. I've picked up a little bit by reading some of the conversations about pups, but still don't know enough to know what I want.
I'm going for a really stiff yet thin and light construction. Hopefully I can pull that part off and then I'm hoping the electronics I'm picturing won't make it sound like a tin can.
Is this pup designed anything like what I'm describing?

 

[RichterScale]

How bout a whole bunch more pics?

Almost forgot. The kid was cutting the grass when I got home, so I went in the basement and did a beach towel backdrop and Ryobi work light photo shoot. I botched the finish work and a lot of the little fussy work details, but Im ok with that for this one. I feel like I got a good enough feel for the main bits that I can put a good effort into a real scratch bass. I'm getting pretty psyched to start a real build.

 

[ctmullins]

Ya done good, squirrel.

 

[Beej]

Really, really came out nice. I know you play an idjit on TV but this is unfortunately some very hard evidence that ya ain't no idjit. You clearly have an eye for making lines and shapes look good and look balanced, which is an excellent asset when building.

 

[TrustRod]

Is this pup designed anything like what I'm describing?

A stingray pup is functionally the same as 2 J's in one shell. Some come with series/parallel/single switching so that will work. OLP and Tobias have wired it with a volume for each coil.

You can also run a blend between each pair and then a blend between those pairs.

A fave of mine is a single switch that is - outer coils off / all coils on / inner coils off, it's a simple passive layout with few controls and lots of tones.

As I'm writing this I'm thinking you could do a double humbucker with 1 knob, 2 mini switches. A volume, a 3 way pup selector, a coil turner offer switch, and a push pull on the volume to get a preset tone roll off. 18 tones, no battery.

 

[RichterScale]

That's a really cool idea and something I will definitely have on the drawing table for a 2 pup, passive setup. Sounds like a lot of options without having to go active.
For the next bass, I want to go fairly bare bones. Sounds like the stingray pup is setup exactly like I was picturing. So it would be a single pup (2 singles in 1 shell), a volume, a tone, and a switch for pup config.
I was looking at the Lace alumitone bass bars earlier. Then I came across their slim acoustic pup. It's only 5/16" thick. Does anyone know how these things are built/configured internally and if there's anything about their design that would make them undesirable in a solid body electric application?

 

[TrustRod]

I've found in most cases a magnetic pickup for one instrument works just fine for other stringed instruments. It would be neat to have a sliding pickup that doesn't have a huge trough routed out for it.

Here's one vote for you spending the money and time to let us know

 

[TrustRod]

My head is already designing a track system to allow it to slide from bridge to neck and show just two thin slots on the body face.