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Double Bass Neck Thickness Question
- Thread starter lowphatbass
- Start date
Greg Clinkingbeard
Commercial User
Absolutely! Fingerboards should be at least 12mm. Much thinner than that makes creates problems installing extensions and CAN lead to warping necks. I’m hesitant to take it off the back of the neck but have done that too. IF the neck is already thin I prefer a nice thick fingerboard. Can’t really say without seeing the bass.
Well, really, on a double bass, is there really any meaning to "neck thickness" vs. "fingerboard thickness"? They're roughly equal partners in neck stiffness. If anything the ebony board should contribute more stiffness per unit of thickness - surely the modulus of elasticity of a super-dense wood like ebony is higher than that of a medium-density wood like maple.
Why no truss rods in DB necks?
Why no truss rods in DB necks?
I’m going to guess that the very volume of wood would make a truss rod less functional and more problematic than on a bass guitar.
i just measured my two basses,
from the back of the neck to the fingerboard at the location of A on the G string-
just shy of 44mm on one
about just over 40 on the other.
looking at the basses, the difference is obviously in the fingerboard - one being old/planed many times, the other being much newer and only set up once.
in general neck thinness is most effected by this factor...
some are just thin, though. which I agree, is horribly uncomfortable after a few minutes.
from the back of the neck to the fingerboard at the location of A on the G string-
just shy of 44mm on one
about just over 40 on the other.
looking at the basses, the difference is obviously in the fingerboard - one being old/planed many times, the other being much newer and only set up once.
in general neck thinness is most effected by this factor...
some are just thin, though. which I agree, is horribly uncomfortable after a few minutes.
Carbon-fiber reinforcement isn't particularly unusual, meant to make the neck more rigid. A truss rod of the sort used on guitars is designed to force a variable curve on a thin, more flexible neck assembly that (because of the frets) you can't plane to the right shape.
An adjustable truss rod won't help when half the fingerboard is sticking out into space on a double bass. You still need to work some relief in that area of the fingerboard manually.
The feel and stiffness may be the same, but "fingerboard thickness" is important in that it is a reference for how much utility you will get out of the bass before you need a major repair. Thick fingerboards can be dressed and worked on multiple times but a thin worn out 'board has very little room for adjustment and when you do thin it out more, it usually creates more of a problem:
- thin neck with worn out board bows too much
>plane out bow in neck with strings off
> add string tension and it is now thinner and bows worse and needs more work...
>et cetera.....
The feel and stiffness may be the same, but "fingerboard thickness" is important in that it is a reference for how much utility you will get out of the bass before you need a major repair. Thick fingerboards can be dressed and worked on multiple times but a thin worn out 'board has very little room for adjustment and when you do thin it out more, it usually creates more of a problem:
- thin neck with worn out board bows too much
>plane out bow in neck with strings off
> add string tension and it is now thinner and bows worse and needs more work...
>et cetera.....
Greg Clinkingbeard
Commercial User
Well, on something like a Kay, there is very little maple. Without the fingerboard on there, it’s a wet noodle. Getting close to 40mm requires a shim or a thick ebony fingerboard. James and others have more experience in this area as I’ve only done a few.
Neck density is surely a factor. A lot of Chinese maple is suspect and will warp regardless so necks should be baseball bats to give them a fighting chance.
Greg Clinkingbeard
Commercial User
Assuming the neck won’t be too thick, I tend to leave the fingerboard as thick as possible. Traeger and others recommend taking it way down, arguing that the bass will sound better that way. A mode matching, whateva. I’m not charging somebody $1000 for a bunch of work and leaving half of it on the floor so I can do it again in several years. I don’t buy worn out tires either.
What was the original question???
Necks are a pretty interesting conversation. I've got almost 50 years of playing music, several old injuries, and two decades of professional climbing guiding that all combine for some serious parameters on what works for me and what does not, so I'm quite a neck nerd.
I tend to shop for basses for my personal use based on the body and the voice, knowing that about 90% of the time I'm going to either rebuild the original neck or I will build a whole new neck for that bass. It is very rare that I go into one of the big shops loaded with tons of great old basses & feel that I need one particular instrument as is. I love some of the bodies; 'hate others. Some necks feel good; some impossible. The same with the voice. Getting everything just right for just one person and not the rest of the owners during the life of the instrument is pretty specific.
I feel like I've learned a tremendous amount about the potentials within an instrument by building a lot of my spec necks for existing basses. Building a whole bass is a huge task, but a neck is mangeable and you'll have a completely different understanding of the instrument afterwards. Knowing that you can change the scale length, the heel stop, the width, mass, depth, and make anything have the option of a removable neck opens up a world of possibilities. I highly recommend at some point everyone take a class or spend some one on one time with a skilled builder and educator building up a new neck for a nice old body and then go through the setup: tremendous life skills for all players.
To paraphrase:
"I can setup your neck for a day or teach you to build all of your necks for a lifetime..."
Necks are a pretty interesting conversation. I've got almost 50 years of playing music, several old injuries, and two decades of professional climbing guiding that all combine for some serious parameters on what works for me and what does not, so I'm quite a neck nerd.
I tend to shop for basses for my personal use based on the body and the voice, knowing that about 90% of the time I'm going to either rebuild the original neck or I will build a whole new neck for that bass. It is very rare that I go into one of the big shops loaded with tons of great old basses & feel that I need one particular instrument as is. I love some of the bodies; 'hate others. Some necks feel good; some impossible. The same with the voice. Getting everything just right for just one person and not the rest of the owners during the life of the instrument is pretty specific.
I feel like I've learned a tremendous amount about the potentials within an instrument by building a lot of my spec necks for existing basses. Building a whole bass is a huge task, but a neck is mangeable and you'll have a completely different understanding of the instrument afterwards. Knowing that you can change the scale length, the heel stop, the width, mass, depth, and make anything have the option of a removable neck opens up a world of possibilities. I highly recommend at some point everyone take a class or spend some one on one time with a skilled builder and educator building up a new neck for a nice old body and then go through the setup: tremendous life skills for all players.
To paraphrase:
"I can setup your neck for a day or teach you to build all of your necks for a lifetime..."
I’m not seeing anything unusual or wrong there. Possible technique issue?
That neck looks normal, but I will second that taking a tiny bit of meat off the sides has a huge effect on the feel, and back to front distance is rarely the real issue. If you think about it, your thumb moves behind the E string when you play on the G, and vice versa - and because of the angle your hand is much more open when playing on E and G than when your thumb is actually behind the thickest part of the neck while playing on the D and A strings. Some necks are too "D" shaped, and would benefit from getting down to more of a "V" kind of shape.
Move around your neck with that in mind and see if there are any areas where this distance seems way off and uncomfortable. Try fixing it with technique (but don't start doing something weird with your hand to accommodate it), and if it is still an issue a year from now then some subtle reshaping of the neck seems like a reasonable next step.
Move around your neck with that in mind and see if there are any areas where this distance seems way off and uncomfortable. Try fixing it with technique (but don't start doing something weird with your hand to accommodate it), and if it is still an issue a year from now then some subtle reshaping of the neck seems like a reasonable next step.
My Thompson Ply is 39.5 "ish" mm to 49 mm. It is a lot thinner than my previous "cheapie" bass. I prefer the thicker neck. It took me a long time to be comfortable with this neck. But I do have arthritis in my left thumb (this was the first time in 61 years that I have ever set my vernier to metric)
Could just be my eyes playing tricks on me, but, judging from the pictures, a bit of nut work will make this instrument much more playable than any amount of neck reshaping.
I like the idea of making the maple part as stiff as possible (see "carbon fiber reinforcing rods").
My non-Kay bass gave me a lesson on the stiffness of the neck by itself when I dropped it and the fingerboard popped off the neck. Hoo boy, the curve in the neck under full string tension! (I instantly took all the tension off and made an appointment for repair, of course) And this one has, I believe, a fairly thick neck.
