Some of you may remember my resurrected lefty 6 string, which I completed recently - 19 years after starting the project. In that thread, I mentioned that I had started a 5 string right handed version of roughly the same bass and had originally intended to keep the lefty and sell the 5 string righty to finance the project. Well, time changes everything...
I finished the lefty per my build thread:
First bass, Zombie build, completed after 19 years
At that time, I basically set the righty aside, not really having any plans for it. Last weekend, my 12 year old son, who is right handed, asked me to teach him something on bass. None of my kids have expressed any interest whatsoever in playing bass, so I jumped at the chance and grabbed my old Ibanez, restrung it right handed, and showed him a few simple lines.
Well, he's been playing it literally non stop, and last night I was in my shop fiddling with something when it hit me - I should finish the right handed bass with him so he can play it! He loved the idea and we agreed to build it together.
I got it down off the shelf and examined it. It's in OK shape, and nearly complete, but back in the day I had torn half the frets out. I vaguely remembered being unhappy with a slight twist in the neck, and tearing the frets out so I could re-level the fretboard, so I got some appropriate tools and showed him how to take the remaining frets out safely, which he did in about 30 seconds.
Sure enough, there's a little bow in the neck, which I figured was fine, because the truss rod can straighten it. But there's maybe 1/32" more bow along the bass side vs the treble side. So I grabbed my truing block and helped him sand it mostly true. Then I got an allen key and attempted to remove the slight remaining bow.
An eighth of a turn was not quite enough. Another eighth, still not enough. I went for a third eighth, and was shocked to hear a loud POP accompanied with the feeling of the truss rod going totally slack.
So, that brings me up to date. I have a 95% completed bass, which now needs a new truss rod. I guess I can permanently fix the bow while I have the fretboard off.
My son has pretty small hands, ideally I would like to have him playing a 30" scale 4 string, not this 34" scale 5 string. Which leaves me wondering if I should attempt to re-profile the neck more narrow, cut the fretboard down, and rebuild this as a 4 string. Maybe even saw off the headstock, take some length out of the neck, graft it back on, install a totally new fretboard with frets spaced for 30" scale?
Or maybe just build this as-is, and pick up a cheap Ibanez mikro or other sub-$100-used bass in the meantime...
The good news is I have a set of bartolini jazz pickups for this already. The bad news is, the 3 band active eq I bought doesn't fit in the control compartment.
Lots of opportunity here. This will probably be a slow build thread now that warm weather is here and there's more to do outside!
I finished the lefty per my build thread:
First bass, Zombie build, completed after 19 years
At that time, I basically set the righty aside, not really having any plans for it. Last weekend, my 12 year old son, who is right handed, asked me to teach him something on bass. None of my kids have expressed any interest whatsoever in playing bass, so I jumped at the chance and grabbed my old Ibanez, restrung it right handed, and showed him a few simple lines.
Well, he's been playing it literally non stop, and last night I was in my shop fiddling with something when it hit me - I should finish the right handed bass with him so he can play it! He loved the idea and we agreed to build it together.
I got it down off the shelf and examined it. It's in OK shape, and nearly complete, but back in the day I had torn half the frets out. I vaguely remembered being unhappy with a slight twist in the neck, and tearing the frets out so I could re-level the fretboard, so I got some appropriate tools and showed him how to take the remaining frets out safely, which he did in about 30 seconds.
Sure enough, there's a little bow in the neck, which I figured was fine, because the truss rod can straighten it. But there's maybe 1/32" more bow along the bass side vs the treble side. So I grabbed my truing block and helped him sand it mostly true. Then I got an allen key and attempted to remove the slight remaining bow.
An eighth of a turn was not quite enough. Another eighth, still not enough. I went for a third eighth, and was shocked to hear a loud POP accompanied with the feeling of the truss rod going totally slack.
So, that brings me up to date. I have a 95% completed bass, which now needs a new truss rod. I guess I can permanently fix the bow while I have the fretboard off.
My son has pretty small hands, ideally I would like to have him playing a 30" scale 4 string, not this 34" scale 5 string. Which leaves me wondering if I should attempt to re-profile the neck more narrow, cut the fretboard down, and rebuild this as a 4 string. Maybe even saw off the headstock, take some length out of the neck, graft it back on, install a totally new fretboard with frets spaced for 30" scale?
Or maybe just build this as-is, and pick up a cheap Ibanez mikro or other sub-$100-used bass in the meantime...
The good news is I have a set of bartolini jazz pickups for this already. The bad news is, the 3 band active eq I bought doesn't fit in the control compartment.
Lots of opportunity here. This will probably be a slow build thread now that warm weather is here and there's more to do outside!
Last edited:
