The wood is ordered for two basses!

I have ordered the wood for my next two basses from Larry at Gallery Hardwoods. The first is going to be a single cut 5 (maybe a 6) string for myself with the following specs:

Neck through 5 piece neck, center strip of ebony, then two strips of purple heart, then flamed maple. Swamp Ash body wings and back with a figured walnut top. Haven't decided on a fingerboard yet, but leaning towards either rosewood, bocote, or birdseye maple.

The second, will have the same neck except for birdseye maple instead of flamed maple on the outside pieces, ebony fingerboard. Black Limba (Korina) back and sides with a natural bronze colored quilted top.

Here are pics of the two tops from Gallery Hardwoods:

Walnut top



Bronze Quilt top



Planning on EMG active pickups and hipshot hardware.

I'll post more as I make progress.

:^)~

 

Yeah.. Larry ROCKS! He emailed me a few pics of the walnut and I had to have it! It was exactly what I was looking for. I can't wait to see it in person! He did mentioned that he sold a very, very, similar walnut top to another builder that frequents talkbass, so there is a similar bass somewhere or in the works now by another builder.

The body blanks and the two tops above are shipping this week, the neck pieces to follow soon.

I can't wait to hold the wood in my hands and start in on creating basses out it it!

:^)~

 

Hey Pilot,

I had that same thought, and I'm going to really check it out once I have the piece of walnut in my grubby mitts! I figure what I'll do is cut out a reverse body shape from a big piece of paper (ie: the shape of the body will be cutout...) and lay it over the wood, lay some pickups, knobs and a bridge on it, and a fingerboard blank and see how it looks.

:^)~

 

Hey Mgood,

I had Larry at Gallery Hardwoods glue up the neck blanks for me. I will shape and carve them myself, carve out the headstock, as well as route for and install the truss rod, radius and install the fingerboards, frets, etc., myself. You can by fingerboard pre-radiused and pre-slotted, if needed.

I've built just a few in the past, and those were one of a kind basses that I made for a few friends that I had also done quite a bit of repair and setup work for. My wife and I have decided to let me have a go at making this an official tax paying business and hopefully, in the next 1-2 years my full time, income generating job/business!

The real trick is to have a solid, working knowledge of wood working tools and wood, and to take your time! I'm still trying to come up with some type of router jig and router bit that will allow me to get the neck profile about 90% or better with a router vs. hand profiling, but we'll see. I'd like to be able to do this just to save myself labor hours (which, for a 1 man shop equates to $$$) where possible. If not done properly, though, you can screw up a lot of wood in a short time with a power tool vs. a combination of rasps, planes, spokeshaves and sanding blocks. We'll see.

:^)~

 

Well Poo-poo!

When Larry started milling / resawing the bronze quilt piece into a bookmatched set, there were some checks and other things inside the piece, so I can't really use it.

Sooo.. I snagged this niece piece of spalt instead.



Also, he just sent me these pics of the Black Limba for the bass. OIY!



Man, he has really nice stuff!

:^)~