• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

What's the dumbest mistake you have made?

#84
Ok... here it goes! All on my the first body I made.

Drilled the holes for the neck incorrectly. twice. ok, ok...it was 3 times. I opened the holes up, and plugged them, then drilled them wrong again. Then I rounded the body off and cut through one of the holes. I now use templates.

After routing for the pickups with my plunge router I thought that the bit was recessed totally in the router, until I rested the still spinning router onto the body. I then spent some time honing my hand plane skills. I now have a thickness planer.

Trying to cut the neck pocket freehand. ...see above statement about templates.
Same with pickup routes.

Is that enough? Another dumb (and expensive mistake) I bought a really nice piece of wood for a one piece body, only to actually plan out the body and realize that the wood was 2 inches to narrow. Oh, well... It is going to be used for a neck thru now. So not a total loss. Just set the build back a couple of weeks.

I am sure that I will come across some more mistakes. Stay tuned :)
 
#85
This wasn't a building mistake but here goes. On the first ever bass I made on the way into the garage I fumbled it and severly cracked the body. It was about a day away from finish. :bawl: It was absolutely awful. Now sits in the pile in the garage known as the graveyard.

I decided on another project to put all the knobs up in the horn wich turned into an epic fail and the whole left side of the bass being redone and the controls put where they belong.

Had a guitar completely finished wax'd wired the whole nine yards until I realized when assembling everything after the finish was done that the battery did not fit in the control cavity. Now I always completely assemble before finish to make sure everything is working. Not to mention I actually extensively plan out all the major aspects of my builds before I do anything now. No more fly by the seat of my pants. No more surprises :eyebrow:

Used my drywall hatchet to do my first fret job. About 10 hours of work fixing every single fret ensued. While we're on the subject of drywall tools I also once attempted to put a router bit into my rotozip and use that to route a set of pickup cavities. Lets just say that body is also in the "graveyard". Luckily back then I was atleast smart enough to be using random cheap woods like poplar alot.

When I first started the vast majority of my ideas where way beyond my woodworking skills which resulted in many a hilarious mess! The more I'm thinking back the more I keep laughing to myself at how stupid some of the things I did were. :eek:
 
#86
Letting someone else do a fret job.

He was the best-known guy in town (ask me), had his picture in a national magazine, and I thought he could do my 1960 Fender guitar better than I could.

He just destroyed the neck. Hardened blobs of spilled glue, hammer marks, frets sticking up all over the place, bent tangs....

NBTS
 
#89
At a gig, the strap button came out of the body. I had a spotlight part in a song, and was holding my 4 string up and playing through it. I forgot about the button, raised my hand to fist-pump, and my trusty esp hit the floor. So I tried to kick the bass and get some reaction...and broke the Jack plug. I had to finish the set out with my wireless dangling to hold pressure on the connector. At the Flaming Lizard, Atlanta.

The VERY NEXT NIGHT, my Ampeg started cuttin' out, so I ran around the stage, playing THE SAME solo, and the DI signal had cut off....so Im playing, running around, jumping, and NO SOUND. That was at the Masquerade, in Atlanta.


For further intimidation, we followe the tightest band on the set. Some unknown Guys living in a van, playing the warped tour...Finger 11.
 
#90
On my first build, I attached the lower body wing without taking certain things into consideration, like where is the @##$%@ pickup gonna go!!!

Had to saw off the wing, make a new, larger one, and re-attach.
I'm sticking to more traditional body shapes till I get a little better at this building thing!
 
#92
On my current build(for me, thankfully) routed truss rod and reinforcing rod channels, installed rods, band sawed the rough shape, then applied my router template for doing the final outside contour...........upside down.........making my new neck a left hand model...........I do not play left handed :bawl:
 
#95
I drilled a hole straight through a body the other day after it'd been through paint. But the fix made the bass come out better because my painter "had an idea." There's usually no mistakes that can't be corrected.

My biggest mistake was using a company to supply bodies for me. I won't say any names but one of his relatives might own Playboy.

Pete
 
#96
Oh where to begin. I used a 35" neck template on an intended 34" scale 4 string neck. Didn't notice the extra inch of headstock/neck until all was said and done.

Same neck: All finished and installing hardware. Drilled right through the headstock installing a string retainer.

Same day as above: Installing pups on a 5er. Drilled through the body. Was not a good day for bass building.

Most recently: Not realizing the effects of putting a sprayed water-based lacquer finish on top of a boiled linseed oil finish. That finish was peeling up while I attempted to buff the body. Stripped it down and started over.
 

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back