NBD- Guild Jumbo Junior acoustic bass

[steve_rolfeca]

This is my second bronze/nylon-strung acoustic mini. My third mini bass, if I count the Ashbory fretless I had in the late '90's, and my third ABG if I include the full-size Epiphone El Capitan I had around the same time.

I've been interested in these little guys for a while. Uke basses never hit the spot for me, and I don't like most full-sized ABG's.

The original Taylor GS Mini-Bass looked more appealing, although I didn't like the fret clank I heard in most demos. Ditto for the original NAMM videos of the Guild when it came out. It wasn't until I heard the smooth, round tones I in the plugged-in portion of this Ibanez demo video (starts at 36 seconds), that I was finally hooked:



I could imagine playing that on stage, just as much as on the couch.

Sure enough, I ended up with an AVNB1E. I preferred it over the Taylor because of it's larger size and better electronics. A set of La Bella CB40 strings raised the tension a bit, and I've been using it for acoustic sets for the better part of a year.

However, the more I used the Ibanez on stage, the more the 12th-fret body joint grated on me. Meanwhile, there's been a lot of chatter about the Guild over on the Guitar Scale Acoustic Basses thread: Guitar Scale Acoustic Basses

It's hard to find a stocking Guild dealer in my part of Canada, but my ever-inventive wife located one, and has given it to me as an early birthday present.

It’s also hard to understand just how small these things are, until you see one beside a regular guitar:

 

[steve_rolfeca]

The Ibanez and the Guild are priced similarly, play great, and are surprisingly similar in performance. Both have laminated back and sides, with a solid top.

Considering the price difference between these and the more expensive Taylor GS Mini, I think these basses represent excellent value for the money.

Still, they each have their pros and cons:

AVNB1E
Pro:

• Feels expensive- comfortable, excellent fretwork and perfect setup right out of the box.
• More comprehensive electronics. Proper XLR DI out, built-in tuner, separate bass and treble controls.
• Longer scale (25") and wider spacing (43mm at the nut) feel surprisingly "grown up".
• Louder output, both acoustic and plugged-in.
• Huge low end available, good for Reggae with the bass boosted.

Con:

• Looks cheap- painted headstock logo, no binding on the body, open-pore finish a little uneven.
• Twelve-fret body joint is confining.
• Tiny preamp controls are hard to operate.
• Wide dynamic range can be a bit much at times- emphasizes any clumsiness in my attack.
• Treble has to be rolled back to avoid harsh treble and excessive finger noise.
• No gig bag provided.

GUILD:
Pro:

• Looks expensive- inlaid headstock logo, crisp lines, bone nut and saddle, ebony fingerboard and bridge, nicer tuners, bound body with flame maple veneer on the back and sides, well-padded gig bag included.
• Nice, slender neck (just over 41mm at the nut). Rewards careful technique.
• Despite the shorter scale (23.75", only a quarter inch longer than the Taylor), string tension is still pretty good, helped by the higher action.
• Smoother, sweeter tone unplugged.
• Plugged in, it sounds great without any external EQ- warm, woody tones, with a nice growl in the mids.
• Recessed volume and tone in the soundhole are more convenient.

Con:

• Feels cheap- needs some TLC out of the box, to correct various minor shortcomings out of the box:
  • Sharp edges on bridge and fingerboard.
  • Rough fret ends.
  • Slightly gritty feel in places on the neck, back and sides.
  • E string a little loud when plugged in, until I levelled the bottom of the saddle.
• Action a little high, pushes the intonation sharp in the upper register.
• If you want to shape the low end or mids, you have to use external EQ.
• No tuner, although a Korg Rimpitch C fits well on the treble side of the sound hole.

Now that I've finished setting it up and rubbing the neck, back and sides out to 2000 grit, I'm very happy with the sound and feel of the Guild. I've already got my Ibanez up for sale on consignment.

My best description of the Guild vs the Ibanez at stage volume (plugged in, obviously), is that the Guild sounds more authentically acoustic, and the Ibanez more electric.

 

[Keger Jupit]

my ever-inventive wife located one, and has given it to me as an early birthday present.

Does your wife have a sister?

Sorry Have a ball, & nice writeup! Very comprehensive

 

[steve_rolfeca]

La Bella CB40's arrived in the mail.

As they did on the Ibanez, these strings raise the tension a little. It's not enough to require a truss rod adjustment, but it does improve the feel of the instrument. The overall sound is fuller, a little darker, and more dynamic.

Job #2 is to find a suitably light and compact amplification.

I've already determined that I'm probably looking for the sort of rig that upright players use. Supportive, but not too boomy or coloured in the low end. Otherwise your ABG starts sounding too electric. Plus, they tend to feed back early and uncontrollably in the low mids.

I'm already looking at acoustic combo amps, but I'm also curious about small keyboard amps, powered PA speakers, etc.

 

[steve_rolfeca]

Update: The La Bellas have played in, and are holding pitch nicely. Of course, tuning stability isn't as good as on a solid-body bass, but that's to be expected...

I'm very happy with how this little guy sounds and plays.

On the amplification front, I ended up purchasing a Bose S1 for amplification.

It's expensive for a compact, full range powered cab, and under-powered compared to the AC-powered competition. But it has some serious advantages for use with an acoustic instrument- up to 6 hours of off-grid play time, and extremely low weight at 15lb. It also has decent 2-band EQ on two of it's three inputs, built-in reverb, and a tone preset for acoustic guitar.

I can get a decent tone for acoustic jams out of this rig- just the Guild, a cable and the S1. The whole deal weighs less than 30lb, and I could transport it on a bus or a bicycle.

Still, for the best plugged-in tones, it really needs a little more processing. HPF, LPF, EQ, and maybe a little compression. Of course a little reverb can be nice in smaller spaces...

At the cheap end, a Zoom B3n or even better, the battery-capable B1 Four or B1X Four will get the job done. However, I ended up splurging on an HX Stomp. It’s overkill for this application, but I’ve wanted one to use with my other instruments for a while anyway, so I took the leap.

The only remaining upgrade I have in mind at this point, is a gig bag with a larger string pocket. The Guild bag looks nice, but the single front pocket is very tight. With just a cord and an iPad in there, I start to worry about the amount of pressure on that nice solid spruce top.

 

[steve_rolfeca]

I just realized that I’ve been remiss in not reporting on a minor problem I had with the Guild.

This relates partly to the slightly scruffy finish, and partly to the La Bella CB40 ball end strings that I like to run on these mini basses.

As I mentioned above, I attacked the neck, back and sides of the Jumbo Junior with 600 through 2000 grit polishing paper to knock down little inclusions in the finish, and give it a nicer feel.

I neglected to mention that I also decided to fix the bridge while I was at it. On closer examination, the edges of the bridge were very sharp, and there were visible sanding scratches on the front face. To make matters worse, pair of ebony dowels cover holes in the top of the bridge, and the ends are very rough.

it’s the sort of minor imperfection that isn’t obvious in most lighting conditions, but once you’ve seen it, it can’t be unseen.

I did the obvious, and smoothed everything out. I didn’t want to polish the bridge too much, as then it wouldn’t match the natural open-pore finish of the fingerboard. Stopping at 800 grit gave me exactly the look I was going for.

During this process, I ran into a minor problem: the La Bella E string is a touch fatter than the stock D’Addarios. It has a tapered tail that just barely fits the hole in the end of the vintage-style tuning post.

To be more accurate, the tail fit fine on initial installation. Perhaps I was a little clumsy when I removed the strings, but when I went to reinstall them, I discovered that the tail on the E string had distorted just enough to make it an interference fit in the peg.

I imagine that most people would try to bend the metal winding a little tighter, in order to get it to fit properly again. Having dealt with classical guitar strings in the past, I know that it’s a pain to re-shape a thin piece of wire when it’s wrapped around a floppy, multi-stranded silk or nylon core.

Instead, I decided to fix this little sizing problem with the Guild tuner.

I have done a number of baritone guitar and 5-string bass builds over the years, so this isn’t the first time I’ve had to open up a peg hole. This has to be done very carefully. If not, it’s possible to drill too deep and weaken the post where it attaches to the body of the tuner.

Also, vintage-style tuners with slotted posts represent a special challenge. If you try to hog the hole out too much on the first cut, there’s a danger of having the bit catch and break off one of the “fingers” on the end of the post. I can’t see that happening with a US-made tuner like a Hipshot or a Sperzel, but import tuners are sometimes made of pot metal.

NOTE: This will definitely void any factory warranty on the tuner. Don’t try this at home unless you’re very confident in your skills!​

Anyway, all it took in this case, was a quick buzz with a bit one size larger than the stock hole. The metal was fairly soft and drilled out very easily (thus my comment about caution needed with cheap pot-metal tuners).

If you look closely, you can see that:

1. The string is a little long as well. A tapered tail onThe end of the tail is snugged right up against the shoulder of the slot in the post. I didn’t bother to fix this, but La Bella does provide a way to deal with this, given that nylon-strung basses and contrabasses come in a variety of scale lengths. CB40’s come with little plastic dice over the ball end of the string. If you feed the strings into the bridge through the sound hole, then you can leave the dice on the E string, or even add a couple more.to identify each string. This will pull the string further into the body at the bridge end, solving the problem.
   
2. The drill bit I used was maybe a couple of thou larger than the slot in the tuner post. There’s just the slightest discolouration visible where the drill bit shaved the chrome plating on the wall of the slot. I wouldn’t go any larger than that, as it provides the perfect fit.

 

[steve_rolfeca]

A side note regarding the Guild: The bridge pins (or their holes) are unusually sized, at least on my example.

Whereas I could simply drop the ball end of the La Bella strings down through the bridge on the Ibanez, I have to feed them through the sound hole and then up from underneath on the Jumbo Junior.

The sound hole is large enough that this isn't a problem, but I've never run into that issue on other instruments.

 

[steve_rolfeca]

Did a little work on the HX Stomp this afternoon. Created a patch for the Guild using the Deluxe compressor, Tilt EQ, and Parametric EQ.

I'm new to the Stomp, so it took me a little while to get it tuned for very light, barely-on compression. Ditto for the parametric EQ to take some string noise out, firm up the E string, and bandpass it to reduce sub-bass mud from the Piezo and any HF noise that creeps in. I'll probably drop a reverb in there later.

I've done the same thing for my Dingwall. It's a cinch to bypass each effect as needed on the Stomp, depending on whether I'm feeding my Bose S1 Pro (mostly on battery power for acoustic jams, open mics and small venues), my G-K/AudioKinesis rig, or direct to FOH.

With everything on, the Guild patch sounds tighter, more refined, and the string-to-string balance is more even.

I love Tilt EQ's. I've had them on various pedals, including my Diamond BCP-1 compressor. They are handy for making minor adjustments to suit different rooms, PA systems, etc., without changing the character of the instrument or the string to string balance.

Man, what a great little instrument for stage use- The Jumbo Junior is not just for the couch!