Official Nordstrand Acinonyx Cat bass club

Noticed yesterday on phone that some of those combos weren’t working.. figured I’d give it a day.. logged in today on the desktop.. LPB & Tortoise available.. in case that’s helpful to anyone.

I know that’s the combo that called out to me (although there are lots of cool combos, indeed.)
Proud player of a Nordstrand vJ5 for over a decade and grateful to order a bass new for the first time in my 20+ years of being a bassist. Super grateful to Carey and Mo and all of the good people at Nordstrand Audio.. I’ve always felt respected and taken care of. Cheers to a good round of preorders!

 

A very good ~sign~...!! (-Gotta be magic!!) (-Explained...)

Went on vacation several eons ago, a southern nights type of thing. NOLA, Eunice LA (for the great Cajun music and food), Clarksdale MS, and Memphis TN. In Memphis we caught the annual Blues Festival held at all the various clubs and venues, plus we toured Sun Studios and Graceland. T'was a blast, and we made several friends.
But the most interesting musically was Clarksdale MS. Claimed as the Blues Capital of the US, it had a good sized blues museum, several blues clubs, an art gallery with a small stage where one got some up close blues entertainment, and an old dilapidated 'motel' with a famous history we were at first unaware of...
This place had an old fridge and rusted bed springs on the sidewalk by the front door, and the six or seven small rooms inside had slanted wooden floors and small 60's style TV sets and the only two (shared) bathrooms were down a long and dimly lighted narrow hallway.
So why stay there? -Because the walls had posters and photographs signed by almost all of the famous blues players and singers, (BB King, Albert Collins, Muddy Waters, etc), was also signed by some of the Kennedys, signed by English royals, and by some big rock artists and writers. -Turns out the place once was an infirmary for Black folk and was considered sort of a shrine because it was where Bessie Smith died after being refused admittance to closer White-run hospitals after she'd had a serious auto accident. The place was considered 'holy ground' by many musicians and blues fans...
Also in Clarksdale was an interesting curio/souvenir/junk/music store that was fun to browse thru and I bought some good blues CDs, a poster, and a souvenir hat with the store's name on it. ('Cause that's what I do on vacation...)
This hat had subsequently disappeared somewhere into our home for a while, but with the season changing in NJ it somehow surfaced again in a clothing storage box on a radiator in our front hallway. And as I put it on again I had to break out into a huge grin because of what I'm into lately...
Here's the hat:

 

I love it!!

 

Here's link to that Cat Head store I found interesting when we went to Clarksdale MS. And the old 'historic' hotel we stayed in is "The Riverside Hotel".
~And no, I have no connection to or any vested interest in either of these places.
https://www.cathead.biz/

 

Any word on whether Carey might do a 5-string Cat bass at some point? I love my 4-string but miss having a low B string sometimes.

 

Carey is pretty much on record as saying this won't happen. See conversation in this video at 55:52

 

Thanks - that answers my question! I agree that the 4 string Cat is so easy to play and a lot of fun so I’m good with it. It would be nice for me personally to have those lower notes available occasionally. I don’t like detuners in general, particularly on this bass which I’m afraid would ruin the neck balance.

 

I'm not really sure why, but I'm sort'a glad there won't be a five string Acinonyx. I guess maybe I just want it to be a one-of-a-kind thing?

 

Tune it BEAD?

 

Yeah, I've thought about that. I play guitar in another band where the bass player does that with a regular 4-string.

 

Thinking about selling my black/tort cat as I’m not using it. It’s such a rad bass but I’m just not a short scale guy. It’s mint, pm me if you’re interested

 

Update on shielding my Acinonyx, plus "bonus" accidental fix for overlapping/touching tuning keys. Finally got around to it after my original post:

I have no background in electronics or guitar/bass shielding, so this was all new to me. Info from Nordstrand, StewMac, Fralin, and some reputable YouTubers all came in handy as quick references before I began.
Anyone can do this. Proceed with patience and keep all of the parts and pieces in order.

1) Removed the pickguard, exposing all the routed cavities. All the electronic cavities were painted with shielding paint except for the pickup selector switch cavity.


2) Removed everything from the pickguard. Photo is before the input jack, volume pot, and button screws came out.
WARNING: Many screws, springs, etc. Keep them organized. Take note of what pieces go where and in what order or what orientation. The labels on the back of the pickups end in 'F' and 'R'. 'F' is neck and 'R' is bridge. Don't know if there is a difference in the pickups but am assuming there is.
The chicken head knob pulls off, but took some gentle prying on either side to get it started. The pickup mounting springs are cone shaped, so be sure to reinstall in the correct orientation.


3) While I was at it I removed the bridge to make sure the ground wire was actually making good contact with the bridge. About 1/4 inch of wire was exposed, so I stripped off about a 1/4 inch more and then made sure the stripped end was flat on the wood and reattached the bridge (smaller finish indentation shows original position, larger indentation shows new position).


4) Using a 2 inch wide roll of copper shielding tape (containing conductive adhesive), I cut long strips and laid them lengthwise over the back of the pickguard, overlapping each piece by about 1/4 inch. I had never used copper tape before. This stuff is THIN, and prone to curling up on itself if you don't control the ends of your strips. Scrapped a few strips that curled up and stuck on themselves.


5) Trimmed the tape around the edges and holes of the pickguard. Used a very sharp blade that I could easily control. A razor or X-Acto is perfect. I went slowly so I didn't cut into the pickguard, and I had to clean up a few spots where there was some overhang visible from the top of the pickguard. Also poked small holes for all the screws.


6) Placed a few small strips of tape touching the shielding paint and then coming out of the cavities so they'd make contact with back of the pickguard. Did this solely because numerous references on shielding cavities using copper tape said to leave a lip of overhanging tape that the pickguard can make contact with. While I wasn't taping the cavities, it seemed like a good idea to still 'connect' them to the pickguard. Perhaps this is unneeded.


7) I carefully reinstalled everything onto the pickguard, and then attached the pickguard itself. The front of the pickguard slips under the overhanging end of the fretboard (where the truss rod wheel is).

8) While the strings were off I gently cleaned and oiled the fretboard with a soft cloth and a little bit of Dunlop 65 fretboard lemon oil.

9) BONUS >> Accidental fix for overlapping or touching tuning keys: Before restringing I also used a wrench (taped to protect the tuners) to gently snug down the tuning post nuts. A couple could be snugged down a bit more, and in tightening them it straightened the tuners so that the two tuning keys that slightly overlapped were now properly aligned and no longer touched each other. Yay!!

End Result: The bass is noticeably quieter now when amp is turned up loud and the flat tone switch is selected or the 'all pickup buttons in' series mode is selected. There is still hum when you are not touching the strings, but it is at a much lower volume than before. These are single coil pickups, not humbuckers or P-Bass style, so I am assuming there will always be some level of hum when not touching strings and treble is high/no tone roll off/flat tone switch selected.
Total time invested was about 3 hours. In hindsight I should have measured pickup distance to the strings before removing the strings and pickups. Not doing that I had to tinker with pickup height in order to rebalance string volume between E and G strings and pickup volume between bridge and neck.
Since I was a first time newbie at doing this, there are probably some things I could have done better or more efficiently. Please feel free to chime in with any helpful comments or criticism if there is something else I should do, or something I should have done differently. Thank you!

 

outstanding documentation of this project

 

Thank you Holdsg - appreciate it! Hoping to be helpful--

 

"This time I'm walkin' to New Jersey
I'm walkin' to New Jersey
I'm going to need two pair of shoes
When I get through walkin' me blues….."

The Cat is coming, the Cat is coming...!

 

Can´t wait to get my hands on this cat!!! Countdown to end of December

 

So I went ahead and did it — I ordered a second Cat so I could have one with rounds and one with flats. I feel a little dumb, but also pretty excited!

For those with Cats wearing flats, what have you tried? What do you like?

 

Take a look at this sexy beast! It's a custom order that Carey Nordstrand posted on FB. Not mine unfortunately.

 

Wow, that would be perfect for the Deep Purple/Rainbow tribute I am in.

 

I just put LaBella Low Tension Flats on yesterday. Too soon to say...haven't had much playing time. I've had trouble getting the saddles happy. The G saddle likes to buzz. Also open E buzzes on a fret even if I raise the action. They sound and feel good, though.