Neck dive requires you to divert energy into keeping the neck upright, which can lead to ergo problems and can detract from the performance.
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Neck dive requires you to divert energy into keeping the neck upright, which can lead to ergo problems and can detract from the performance.
Are you sure it wasn't all in your mind? At least one previous post suggested something along those lines.
My Thumb Bolt on did remove/shift my tshirt when used with a grippy strap. Oh Thumb, how I loved your sound/build quality/looks, how I hated the way you hurt my joints.
"I guess I could see the novelty (?????) in a bass that feels well-balanced..............."
A non-neck heavy bass is not a novelty. For most of us, it's a requirement.
I have a neck heavy Warmoth Precision body P/J. Just yesterday, I was sitting on a stool playing and the neck kept working it's way against my playing hand. Very annoying! (Warmoth's necks have a 6 oz steel reinforcement rod causing some of them to be neck heavy.)
Sometimes neck dive can be cured by light weight tuners which and take 5 or more oz off of the head stock.
Most basses with the strap button behind the 12th fret will remain neck heavy.
I think that your strap idea is a good one for neck dive.
A non-neck heavy bass is not a novelty. For most of us, it's a requirement.
I have a neck heavy Warmoth Precision body P/J. Just yesterday, I was sitting on a stool playing and the neck kept working it's way against my playing hand. Very annoying! (Warmoth's necks have a 6 oz steel reinforcement rod causing some of them to be neck heavy.)
Sometimes neck dive can be cured by light weight tuners which and take 5 or more oz off of the head stock.
Most basses with the strap button behind the 12th fret will remain neck heavy.
I think that your strap idea is a good one for neck dive.
If you typically play with a baseball grip on your neck, it’s no big deal at all, but, if you believe in playing with a light touch, it’s incredibly difficult to do so while you are trying to counterbalance neck dive.
Right.
Soo you are telling people what they like/prefer is incorrect, but I am the one who thinks his opinion is the only correct one
Sure. Dude, you're hilarious, in a sad kind of way. Plonk.
Neck dive is one of those things I didn't know or care about before I found this forum, along with scale length and nut width. Not saying those aren't all things. They just aren't things of concern to me.
I've never encountered neck dive as an issue, but I think I know why - compared to some players I hold my bass higher and in a relatively horizontal position, and I rest my right forearm on the body, see below. I think the weight I naturally apply with my right arm keeps the neck from diving.
Not saying I'm doing it "right" or that my solution should work for everyone. This is just the reason I've never noticed the issue.
Yeah, I use a somewhat similar position, holdover from my guitar playing position, really. Feels comfortable for me, I imagine many others would feel differently. Years ago, my bass was a Guild with very pronounced neck dive, could not get comfy with it, put me off playing it. I tried counterweighting it at the forward strap button, wasn't enough, design was just not up to snuff. It looked good ...
Lowendtech
Happily trending in my own peculiar direction.
Lol. I’ll call shenanigans on this. But it made me laugh.
If what you're doing works for you, don't sweat the details. If you're not experiencing back pain, I wouldn't worry about it.
We used that term decades before TB even existed. The term and the problem have been around for a long time.
OK, some thoughts...
1. Yeah, it would be really great if all 23 basses that I own, were perfectly balanced. But... they aren't. Since they're all basses I really like to play, I just install whatever strap best alleviates most of the dive (or stops it) - and just... play the thing.
2. With respect to @iipopes' post about changing your bass' tuners; certainly a good idea, but... not a cure-all in every case - for every bass. My aluminum-necked Kramer 450B, for example, would dive almost as hard and as fast as it does now, even if I removed it's Schaller M4 90 tuners - and didn't replace them at all. It might take... oh, 90 seconds, to pull my shirt over my head when I let go of it - instead of the 70 seconds it takes now. Which, TBH, ain't much of an improvement. It's the dictionary definition of a neck diver - period. At my age now? No, I can't play it continuously for as long as I used to, but... I still enjoy playing it.
3. I have other basses that most people routinely condemn as divers; Ricks and T-Birds, for example. Personally, I've found that, if I play my Gibson and Tokai T-Birds like a lot of people play them - slung low, with the headstock pointed up toward the ceiling? Not only does the neck dive go away, they're also very comfortable to play. They aren't P-Basses, so... why try to play them like they are? As for my Ricks? Played at the angle I like to play most of my basses - headstock about 15 degrees above the horizontal - they don't dive at all. But, hang them parallel to the floor? Then they start to dive... IME, how I play any of my basses, makes a lot of difference on their propensity to dive...
4. Let's face it; there are basses that, no matter what you do, are not - and never will be - "well balanced". None of my violin basses, nor any of my other hollow- and semi-hollow body basses, are. They aren't bad; and, TBH, I don't consider holding up a neck that "weighs" about as much as an Egg McMuffin to be much of a chore. My long scale hollow-body bass? Well, holding up a double hamburger - with cheese - is a little harder, but... still not much of a problem. If you really want to own, say, a Hofner 500/2 Club Bass? You're going to have to deal with it's quirks, foibles - and a little neck dive. If that's too much for you to deal with? I feel sorry for you; you're missing out on something special...
5. I can understand - and even sympathize - with people who won't/can't deal with a bass that has some neck dive. A professional "busy" player, who's all over the neck for every song - and who has to play for hours? Yeah, I'd probably be less tolerant of neck dive than I am. The music I play, though, doesn't need me to do that - at all. But, if you don't have to play like that, and still refuse to deal with a bass that isn't absolutely, perfectly balanced - no matter how you play it? I feel kinda sorry for you. You're doomed to fish in a very small pond for your basses. You won't pull many out of that pond - unless you're happy with the same bass in 3 or 4 different colors. And, you'll miss out on playing a lot of wonderful (but not perfectly balanced) basses. Like most of the basses in my herd...
1. Yeah, it would be really great if all 23 basses that I own, were perfectly balanced. But... they aren't. Since they're all basses I really like to play, I just install whatever strap best alleviates most of the dive (or stops it) - and just... play the thing.
2. With respect to @iipopes' post about changing your bass' tuners; certainly a good idea, but... not a cure-all in every case - for every bass. My aluminum-necked Kramer 450B, for example, would dive almost as hard and as fast as it does now, even if I removed it's Schaller M4 90 tuners - and didn't replace them at all. It might take... oh, 90 seconds, to pull my shirt over my head when I let go of it - instead of the 70 seconds it takes now. Which, TBH, ain't much of an improvement. It's the dictionary definition of a neck diver - period. At my age now? No, I can't play it continuously for as long as I used to, but... I still enjoy playing it.
3. I have other basses that most people routinely condemn as divers; Ricks and T-Birds, for example. Personally, I've found that, if I play my Gibson and Tokai T-Birds like a lot of people play them - slung low, with the headstock pointed up toward the ceiling? Not only does the neck dive go away, they're also very comfortable to play. They aren't P-Basses, so... why try to play them like they are? As for my Ricks? Played at the angle I like to play most of my basses - headstock about 15 degrees above the horizontal - they don't dive at all. But, hang them parallel to the floor? Then they start to dive... IME, how I play any of my basses, makes a lot of difference on their propensity to dive...
4. Let's face it; there are basses that, no matter what you do, are not - and never will be - "well balanced". None of my violin basses, nor any of my other hollow- and semi-hollow body basses, are. They aren't bad; and, TBH, I don't consider holding up a neck that "weighs" about as much as an Egg McMuffin to be much of a chore. My long scale hollow-body bass? Well, holding up a double hamburger - with cheese - is a little harder, but... still not much of a problem. If you really want to own, say, a Hofner 500/2 Club Bass? You're going to have to deal with it's quirks, foibles - and a little neck dive. If that's too much for you to deal with? I feel sorry for you; you're missing out on something special...
5. I can understand - and even sympathize - with people who won't/can't deal with a bass that has some neck dive. A professional "busy" player, who's all over the neck for every song - and who has to play for hours? Yeah, I'd probably be less tolerant of neck dive than I am. The music I play, though, doesn't need me to do that - at all. But, if you don't have to play like that, and still refuse to deal with a bass that isn't absolutely, perfectly balanced - no matter how you play it? I feel kinda sorry for you. You're doomed to fish in a very small pond for your basses. You won't pull many out of that pond - unless you're happy with the same bass in 3 or 4 different colors. And, you'll miss out on playing a lot of wonderful (but not perfectly balanced) basses. Like most of the basses in my herd...
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I don't care if I feel good and comfortable playing bass. So, as someone else said, it's more like a "personal rant" than a big problem or deal breaker...
12+lbs. !?! Really? My '78 Kramer 450B is no lightweight, but... at 10.05lbs, (according to my postal scale) it's not my heaviest bass either - by quite a bit...
12+lbs. !?! Really? My '78 Kramer 450B is no lightweight, but... at 10.05lbs, (according to my postal scale) it's not my heaviest bass either - by quite a bit...
There were a lot of Kramers that had walnut and/or maple bodies. Those could be VERY heavy, and still neck dive with the best of them. I had an 11.5 (fretless DMZ 5000) and an 12.25 (fretted Stagemaster). Great basses for a kid who didn't know better.
Truss rod? We don't need no stinkin' truss rod! the sustain was phenomenal, however. If I was a studio musician (where I could sit down all the time and play one song and then rest), I'd absolutely have one of those in my herd. But live? no way.
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No, not to me, I use 3 1/2" cotton straps and you still know it's a neck diver but they become manageable, I'm playing a Gibson EB4-L long scale SG style bass right now and it doesn't bother me.
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Yeah, I know. I own one of them - Maple center, Walnut sides. That's why I was surprised at the weight of Singlemalt's 450B. But, maybe I just got a very lightweight one...
- Jun 30, 2010
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Yeah, I know. I own one of them - Maple center, Walnut sides. That's why I was surprised at the weight of Singlemalt's 450B. But, maybe I just got a very lightweight one...
My Stagemaster was (IIRC) Ash, with a brownburst finish. Ash can be (at the high end of its density) even more dense than maple or walnut - I think I lost the lottery weight wise.
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