This is my submission for the Special Edition Build off
Special Edition Build Off: The Thumfinizenvette
This bass is a mashup - While the design is largely my own, it is heavily inspired by design elements from various Warwick basses - the bridge, the curved body blank, and the general shape at least, which began as an outline of a Corvette on a top set I had bought.
My goal for this bass was to make myself a versatile and easy to play 4 string. Something that felt like my own voice and fit in my favorite styles of music.
Specifications
Body: Bubinga body with some gentle butterfly wing figure with figured Madrone top. I chose the Madrone because I wanted something with a little more color and character than figured maple. I like the straight, tight grain lines in the Madrone, it has a character very similar to most topwoods used in acoustic instruments - yet it also has a gorgeous flame figure and a really rich tan/brown/pink coloration. It's subtle but beautiful. And who doesn't like figured bubinga? Such a great color and depth!
Neck: Laminate of Ovangkol and ziricote with thin maple veneers to help the stripes pop. Neck is J bass width but a fairly deep and round profile - I like a narrow neck that fills my hand, I feel that many narrow necks on mass market instruments feel too small.
Finger Board: Spiderweb ziricote. My first time using this. I have a bunch more of it. It's gorgeous, hard to show in pictures but the dark vein lines give it a lot of character. In terms of workability, the ziricote looks/feels exactly like ebony, except maybe a little easier to deal with.
Finger board radius: 20". My first 20" radius, nearly everything I build is 12". I like this flatter shape and I plan on using it more in the future.
Scale Length: 34"
Tuners: Generic Gotoh knockoffs
Bridge: Older-style Warwick 4 string I had bought used.
Bridge Spacing: I don't remember! I'll have to measure and fill in here later.
Pickup: I had originally put Nordstrand fat stacks in it. Great pickups, but not quite the character I was looking for. I swapped them for Bartolini BC42J pickups, since I'm a sucker for Bartolini's tone.
Electronics: I started with a DIY preamp that had been designed by member
@Ripthorn. That was a great project and taught me a lot about preamp design - I've done lots of other hobby electronics work, but never a bass preamp. I ended up branching out and building a few other preamps based on other schematics I'd found. The "final" design that's in the bass right now is basically a DIY copy of the Bartolini NTMB with a few parts values changed to get the results I was looking for. I'm very happy with this design but I plan on continuing to tweak a few different preamp designs, and trying them in other instruments I own.
The preamp is three band, and I also have volume and a miniswitch for a pickup selector. All 4 pots are push/pull - so I can coil split either pickup and I can also switch between series and parallel for each pickup. This gives a ton of possible combinations (I'm not even sure I've actually tried them all yet) and I can find a bunch of different voices.
Finish: Wiped on satin oil based poly with wax on top.
Strings: I have a mix of a set of D'addario nickel wound and Fender nickel wound strings on there right now. I had started out with the D'addarios but the E string was too long to avoid getting wraps at the tuner post so I put an old Fender string on for the E. I have a new set of Fender 7250's that's going on soon.
Weight: 10 pounds and 0.4 ounces. That's what I get for choosing dense woods!
Some photos:
Upside down (aka left handed) pickups!
And just for all those of you who were following along the whole process, the still-to-be-addressed unintentional lower bout strap hole:
And for those of you who followed the "I'm obsessed with picking/matching straps with new instruments" sub-plot, here's what I ended up with. A diamond stitched quilted leather strap from D&A. This is my first "beefy leather" thick padded strap, I normally gravitate towards less substantial woven straps. At first this felt a little massive and uncomfortable, but I've gotten used to it and I love it.
And that's it!
I enjoyed this build, it involved some new techniques for me (router jig to carve the curved body, DIY preamp). It's easy to play - the body shape and parts layout gives good playability in terms of having anchor points and good reach around the strings - my hand nestles down next to the neck pickup really well for slapping, and the strap buttons are well located to help this balance and hang right. The neck fills my hand nicely but has the small width I like, and the flat fingerboard feels great and is easy to play. Overall a very successful build that I'm really happy with!
Sure enough, vref is a fraction of a volt instead of the roughly 4.5v it's supposed to be, hence the distortion.
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