SBO 23 Frankenbass

[trevorpell0]

Are your pick guard scraps held down

I taped down some of the pieces on the outside to keep the form, and I taped a few pieces on the inside together, but generally, no. I do have some floaters, but overall I think things look good. I think its alright since I'll try to plane it down much thinner than it is right now.

How does one usually hold down the scraps? hot glue? tape on the bottom?

 

[Max Bogosity]

I taped down some of the pieces on the outside to keep the form, and I taped a few pieces on the inside together, but generally, no. I do have some floaters, but overall I think things look good. I think its alright since I'll try to plane it down much thinner than it is right now.

How does one usually hold down the scraps? hot glue? tape on the bottom?

Good question! Those sound like reasonable ideas, but I've never done it, so I'm not the right guy to give advice. Just wanted to make sure you don't suffer from this:

 

[Beej]

I use CA glue to hold them on a thin piece of veneer, the sand the veneer off the back when it's done.

 

[trevorpell0]

Just wanted to make sure you don't suffer from this:

Ah, yeah, i did get a little bit of that, but not a ton. My pieces were so thin and I only put a shallow pool of epoxy.

I use CA glue to hold them on a thin piece of veneer, the sand the veneer off the back when it's done.

That's a good idea, I ended up having to sand off a bunch of masking tape from the back.

I ended up running into a different issue where the epoxy didn't set hard enough. Locally, its hard, i.e. can't indent it with my fingernail, but globally, its a bit flimsy and bendy. Maybe its because I'm using the cheap stuff. It's not too big of a deal because it will be screwed flush with the body of the bass, so hopefully the flimsiness will be neutralized.

 

[trevorpell0]

It's amazing what having time to work on the thing will do. Here's my progress for the day:

I was able to reroute the neck pocket, route pickup cavities (including cavities for the wild cherry on top of this weird cake) and do some round-over.

I also took out the mosaic pick guard from the mold -- I've got some more work to do here but I think (other than the issues mentioned above) we're in good shape.

Tomorrow, I'll (hopefully) carve out the belly curve and forearm curve and maybe get around to shaping the neck and head stock at some point.

 

[trevorpell0]

I got some body shaping done today and started working on getting the bolts into the back of the neck. Turns out purpleheart is pretty hard to screw into. My plan is to contour down a bit for the front two neck bolts.

 

[trevorpell0]

Okay, I'm not going to be finished-finished, but I might be able to get some strings on in the next day or two.

Yesterday, I shaped the neck and cut out the pick guard - I ended up losing a lot of the mosaic to the cavities, which is a shame, but that's okay, I didn't really have a clear vision of what I was shooting for there.

I ran into a major setback, two of the neck screws broke off into the neck. I had to drill them out of the body, but I don't think I'm going to get them out of the back of the neck. Last night I plugged the holes in the body and my plan is to redrill slightly inwards. I'm not totally sure what happened, maybe my pilot hole wasn't big enough and the purple heart is really tough to screw through. If I move them a bit inwards, I think I can get them to go through the Mahogany strips instead.

 

[Matt Liebenau]

The screws should not screw into the body on most bolt on necks. They should be a pass through fit. I almost always drill a larger sized pilot hole even on hard woods like maple much less purpleheart.

 

[trevorpell0]

The screws should not screw into the body on most bolt on necks. They should be a pass through fit. I almost always drill a larger sized pilot hole even on hard woods like maple much less purpleheart.

Ah okay, noted. How much do you go up in size? I'm using #8 screws, ::this page:: suggests using 1/8 inch pilot holes in hard wood, which is what I did. I re-drilled the holes today using 9/16 and that seems to make things work better. Maybe 9/16 is good for the purpleheart neck, and 5/8 for the walnut body?

 

[trevorpell0]

I got more work done today. I got the screw recovery holes plugged, and did more contouring on the back of the neck pocket.

Then I did some headstock shaping. It seems like my "brand" is "lets stick some weird pieces of wood onto the headstock and see what kind of thing happens when we go at carving things."

 

[Matt Liebenau]

Ah okay, noted. How much do you go up in size? I'm using #8 screws, ::this page:: suggests using 1/8 inch pilot holes in hard wood, which is what I did. I re-drilled the holes today using 9/16 and that seems to make things work better. Maybe 9/16 is good for the purpleheart neck, and 5/8 for the walnut body?

A #8 wood screw is 5/32” so that should be the size of the hole through the body or even 11/64”. That way the screws aren’t threading into the body wood and can pull the neck down into the pocket.

As far as the pilot holes in the neck you may have to experiment. My thought would be to find the letter or number drill but that’s a few thousands above 1/8” (0.125”) and try that. Another thought is did you wax or somehow lube the screw threads before you tried to run the screw into the neck? I have a candle next to my workbench and not just in case I meet that special bass. I usually use stainless sheet metal screws these days instead of wood screws. The thread is a little different and they seem to bite in better and don’t break as easily.

 

[trevorpell0]

Hey look at that, its a thing with strings. Something still seems a bit off...

 

[trevorpell0]

I know the build off is over, but I'm going to finish this thing out.

I made zebrawood and walnut dowels to use for front and side dots. Then I stained the walnut. I'm just finishing up the oiling process, then its time to put the thing together.

 

[trevorpell0]

Starting final assembly and making a mess in the living room. One version of me would have happily stayed up another hour or two to finish soldering and stringing up and adjusting and getting it done, but I'm trying to have a reasonable bed time these days.

 

[trevorpell0]

I got the Frankenbass put together and operational, I'll post better pictures soon to see the details and maybe even a better-recorded video, but for now here are two clips, the first showcases the synthesizer part, the second, more of the magnetic part.

 

[trevorpell0]

A better look at the Frankenbass.

Overall, I'm happy with how it turned out, it plays really nicely. I cut away way more of the pickguard than I was imagining I would have, but that's okay. The long upper horn makes it sit a little bit lower with a strap than I'd like, maybe I'll do some surgery on it at some point, but its not urgent.

 

[JRA]

A better look at the Frankenbass.

outstanding!