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Semi-hollow Starfire style 4 string bass build

Drake Custom

Drake Custom

Commercial User
Aug 24, 2010
440
1,082
Iowa
www.drakecustombass.com
Disclosures
Builder/Owner:Drake Custom Bass Guitars
#1
I had a lot of fun with the Fretless 5 string build-off. I would like to congratulate Simo for his outstanding build in the Comp. Well done!

As for me, it has been awhile since I have posted anything on TB so I thought I would show my latest build. This bass is going to be a semi-hollow bodied Starfire type bass. She will have a 32 inch medium scale set neck with 22 frets. Her body will be of Mahoagny and her neck will be of Wenge. The fret board will be Wenge and she will have figured Mahogany fret board binding with MOP crown inlays.

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Here is the rough plan I have in mind. The template is for a Gibson style guitar but I think it will work for the shape of my bass body. Please note that I will not be using the pick up layout you see here nor will I be using the old neck I have in the picture. They are just to show what I have planned.


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First let's get the tedious rough work done so we can get to the fun stuff.
This is the piece of Wenge I have selected for this build. It is a two piece neck blank of quartersawn wood. My blanks are about 3 1/2 inches wide and about an inch thick. I usually start with 38 inches long so I can use the cut off for heel blocks as this will be a deep set neck (glue in).


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This blurry picture is of the blank after I cut the Scarf. I used my table saw with a gig to get the 12 degree angle I needed. The cut off piece is then flipped over to make the headstock. This makes a very tough joint.


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And the blank with the headstock being glued on. Some cut the headstock off and glue it under the blank like on an some acoustic guitars but I like it to be under the fretboard. It creates sort of finger joint after the peghead veneers and fret board are glued on. I have never had one of my necks break at this joint. Come to think of it...I have never had one of my necks break.


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Anyway...for those who have seen my builds before, know that I use toothpicks as locating pins for glueing on various things. These are very handy for glueing on headstocks, veneers, and fingerboards. Later, if you have to cut through one they do not damage bits and blades. They are placed in the waste areas of my headstock. In this photo you can see the veneer laying on the neck blank. Note the holes. They match up to the toothpicks sticking up out of the headstock. I will put some glue down and use the toothpicks to guide the veneer on. The toothpicks will keep the veneer from moving around while applying the clamps.

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Here I am glueing on the peg head veneer. The wood is of Quilted Maple cut from the same wood I am going to use for the top. You will get to see some pictures of the top later.

This post is not too exciting but I promise that once I get the basic prep work done, you will get to see this bass take shape.
 
#8
This will not be an actual arch top as in it will not be carved inside and out like a violin. It will be a semi-hollow bass with large tone chambers and will have some contouring of the front. It will not have much for acoustic properties but the tone will be a bit more round due to the chambering. Look at the picture below to kind of get an idea of where I am going with this build. It is hard for me to describe.
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Here is the Mahogany I have chosen for the back. It is two borads that have been bookmatched so that the grain will help hide the glue lines. You have to see it up close to see what I mean. I will show some close ups later in the build.

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Glueing the back for one side of the body. When I put tops and backs on a bass, I make the two complete sides first and then glue them together.

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While the glue dries on the backs I can show you some progress on the neck. There is some missing steps obviously but you did not miss much really. Last time I finished by glueing down the peghead veneer. I then cut out the rough shape of the headstock and sanded down the part of the peghead veneer that stuck up above the face of the neck. I then ran the neck face down over my jointer. This left everything nice and flat so that I could route the truss slots and prepare for glueing on the fingerboard. You can see how I set up my router for making the truss slot in several of my other builds.

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I did not get any pictures of making the fret board as I made it months ago, but you can also find that process in some of my other builds. Note that I do not taper the my necks until after I have glued on the fretboard. Then I taper everything at the same time with my router. This alows me to use tooth picks off the the side of the fret board to help keep the thing centered during the glue up. When the fret board and neck are shaped the area with the toothpicks will have been removed.
 
#10
Well I have had quite a bit going this last week so I have slacked off on the posts but will try to keep up with them going forward.


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In this picture I am glueing on the Wenge fret board. I use a ton of clamps to ensure that the board is well attached.

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Here I have trimed off the excess. As I said earlier, I glue the fret board onto the neck blank and then trim both together. This works for me quite well. I use a plexiglass template and a large pattern bit to trim everything nice and smooth. This makes routing binding channels easier as well.

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I used a bit I bought from Stewmac to route the channels for the binding pieces. I am using figured Mahogany for binding on this bass.

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This photo is from another build as I can not seem to locate my pics of the core I am using on this bass. This core was cut the same way only I remove much more of the core. I basically traced the pattern on the core and sawed within an inch from the line. I used a bandsaw to cut this part out. and then use a spindle sander to smooth out the inside. Doing this makes the inside of the bass look nice when someone looks into the F-hole or removes the electronics cover. This is a easy way to make a semi-hollow. Another way I have used is to route it all out with a router. I core out most of the wood with a forstner bit first.

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Next I glue the face onto the core. I used way too much glue on this but I would rather have too much squeeze out than to have some dry open areas. On porus woods like Mahogany I noticed that the wood soaks up a great deal of the glue when spread too thin. Tip: Sanding the surface with coarse grit sandpaper lbefore glueing lets the fibers raise up when soaked with glue causing a near invisible glue line. This works mostly with softer woods.

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After routing the F hole. I will then route the area under the top to remove some of the thickness. This makes the top look more like a thin plate. I obviously need to do this before I glue on the back pieces. Next time I will glue the body together.
 
#18
Thanks for the feeback everyone. I am sorry as I did gloss over the whole routing of the F-holes. It was not very difficult as I used a template that I made a long time ago. The hardest things was getting the template correct. You do have to be careful when routing inside small areas like the F-holes. Some of the corners want to rip off. To counter this, I first use a forstner bit to remove some of the center. Then I thread my coping saw into the F-hole and clean around the areas that chip real bad. These are the corners of the holes at the ends of the hole. I then file and sand the area down to the line. After that the router just follows the template. Voila! the F hole is complete!

I do hope that this bass turns out as good as my last one ( in the picture from the last post). I did learn a few tricks from that one and she was my first semi-hollow body like this.

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In this picture you can see that the top is glued onto the core. I had cut the top to a rough shape but left the core a bit chunky. Notice that the core has several flat areas on the outer edge. This is so that I have some places to clamp the clamps square. It helps to make sure the body halves do not slide off center.

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This is just another shot of the two halves.

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I have cut the back pieces to a rough shape and glued them onto the core using the same process as the top. Toothpicks and glue.

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It the clamps she goes. The clutch clamps on the ends are to keep the top line even across the body. Nothing looks worse than the top being off center at the butt end of the bass.

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At last a picture of the bound neck and body together. You can start to see how she will look. Next time, I will have the neck pocket and pup cavities routed. We will see the neck and body joined. Thanks for the comments and for looking at my build.
 
#19
I absolutely love quilted maple tops on mahogany cores. I absolutely love big round semi-hollowbodies. I absolutely love this build!

What do you have planned for electronics?
 

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