Winter Build-off 2018: It had to be walnut...

[Big B.]

Howdy folks. That deadline is creeping up on us but I finally got my 10 string bridge and I'm ready to make some progress. Before we move on I'd like to thank Bill and Oscar and all the other great folks at hipshot who managed to work this bridge in during the busy NAMM season.

First, a picture of the goods.

The bridge comes with tiny notches in the gold colored octave string inserts but the regular string notches will need to be filed in. The octave insert is attached to the saddle so it raises and lowers with the parent string and a small Allen screw allows for the insert to be moved forward and backward for intonation adjustments.

Since I've never made a 10 string the first thing we need to do is get some strings on this bridge and calculate the width of the neck. I've got an older 5 string that I'm soon putting out of commission so before it goes to the old basses home we'll use it to calculate our measurements.

First we mount the bridge to the bass and string up the normal strings.

Once those string are attached to the post we'll take an old A string to use as a pair to the B string and a set of guitar strings to compliment the others. The guitar strings are too short to reach the tuners except the G string, which is perfect for our plan. We'll thread the B and G octave string through the string that's already on the post and then tighten the two strings together to bring them up to some tension. Having these two pairs of strings allows us to make the width measurements for the taper of the neck and fingerboard.

Now this is plenty of info to get the measurements we need but while we're here we all want a little preview right? Stringing the other strings through I managed to get some pics to foresee the future.

And a little close up so we can see what's going on with the bridge.

Now that our neck measurements are set we lay them out on our neck blank and we've got somewhere to work from.

I'll be spending the better part of the weekend in the shop so hopefully we'll be moving right along with this one.

 

[Big B.]

Now that our neck measurements are set we can get to work on the fingerboard. I was initially going to go fretless on this one but the fretted just has more uses for me, though in the future I definitely want to make a fretless 10 string as well. That means that for this bass we'll be using our gaboon ebony fingerboard with a 35" scale length.

First we set our tapering sled on the saw with the blade set touching the edge. We'll adjust the fingerboard so that the cut line is in line with the edge of our sled and then screw down some blocks to hold the board in place.

With the blocks set we taper the first edge and then we repeat the same process to taper the opposite edge.

With the fingerboard tapered to size we'll start installing the position markers. A 7 piece marker for the octave and a 3 piece marker everywhere else.

We'll use our feet slotting blade and miter sled to cut the notches for the markers.

Once the notches are cut we coat the notches with super glue and tap the markers in with a small hammer.

Once they dry we cut the excess material with a flush cut saw and use a sharp chisel to even them out with the fingerboard. Finally they are sanded flush.

Once the small markers are in we cut notches for the octaves markers and install them as well.

Next up we'll start working on the body wings.

 

[rojo412]

Damn it, I love those markers.

 

[Beej]

Damn it, I love those markers.

me too. I've thought about stealing that idea before and one day perhaps I will...

 

[Big B.]

Now that our fingerboard is out of the way we'll take a minute to find our wings.

Way back when, we glued up some body wing blanks and now it's time to knock the dust off and make some woodchips. First we'll bandsaw the rough profile of the wings, leaving an extra 1/2" on the inside to be trimmed off just before we glue the wings to the neck.

Next we'll stick our blank down with double sided tape and then line up our routing template and attach it the same way.

I see the question asked fairly often about what bits to use when trimming bodies to shape. For a long time I was looking for bigger and better bits but ultimately I find a router is just to small to do the job properly in one pass without tearout. My first choice would be a large shaper with a spiral head but until then the best method I've found is going smaller and taking more passes. I'm using a 1/2" diameter pattern bit and taking 1/4" or so on each pass.

Now once we go too deep for our pattern bit we switch to the router table for the last pass.

The plan is beginning to come together now.

 

[Big B.]

When we first glued up the blanks for our body wings you'll remember that we resawed a slice off the back of each blank for grain matched plates.

First we'll rough cut the profile and then use double sided tape to attach them to the wings.

We use the router table to trim the profile against the body blanks. Then we rough cut the plate and attach our template with double sided tape. We'll use the same setup as before to trim the plate to the template.

We use our opposite body template and work our way back with the router until the template matches the lines we drew before.

Our plate fits nice and snug and the grain is a very close match.

To make the control cavity we trace the template onto the wing and remove the majority of the material with the drill press.

Then we attach our template and use a 1/2" router bit to clean up the cavity.

 

[Big B.]

We repeat the process on the other wing for the battery cavity and template and then drill all the screws in with a countersink and drill press.

The screws and hardware will be black but for now these will do.

I've actually made quite a bit more progress on the bass but I dont have the energy to post more pics tonight. Next time we'll talk headstocks and neck angles. Until then...

 

[Panada]

Our plate fits nice and snug and the grain is a very close match.

That seems like an understatement. It looks terrific!

 

[Big B.]

Before we move on to the neck blank we'll set up a 3/4" roundover bit in the router table and roundover the edge in several passes.

You'll remember we left about 1/2" of extra width on the inside of the wings. This was to allow for any tearout that may happen during the roundover but these blanks came out very cleanly. Walnut really is a great wood to work with.

So, now that our wings are done we can focus our attention on the neck blank. Before we can go any further we need to attach the headplate veneer to the blank. We'll take the offcut from the treble wing's figured top and resaw and glue it.

Once the pieces are glued we run our blank through the wide belt sander down to 1/16" thickness.

Next up we trace out our headstock on the blank and use a tiny bit of glue to attach our Big B. Guitars logo template.

We'll use a drill bit to punch out the small circle and then take the blank to the scroll saw. Well thread the blade through the drilled hole and then complete the cut with a unidirectional spiral blade. A small file and sandpaper cleans up our edges.

Now to make our logo pop we'll need something to contrast against. We sand down a scrap piece of ebony to 1/8" thick and cut it out a bit larger than our logo.

We'll then trace the shape onto the headstock and route it in to the thickness of our ebony block.

A little bit of CA glue and a clamp and our ebony "tone block" is set.

With the scroll saw we'll rough cut the shape of our headstock, adding some alignment points.

Using some toothpicks as aligning pins we'll clamp our template veneer in place, being careful that the plate is sufficiently glued without squeezing out of the cutout.

With our headstock prepped the next post will get into the fun business of sawing our neck blank down to final size.

 

[Five String]

Thanks for all this. It's really a guilty pleasure to watch the work of someone who's an artist and a pro.

 

[Matt Liebenau]

What is the best “tone block” for a headstock? You should put that in @reverendrally tone myths thread.

Great work, by the way. Can’t wait to see all these walnut basses done.

 

[Big B.]

So at this point our neck blank is still a big, square chunk of walnut. Using the big bandsaw at work we'll rough cut the blank to match our neck. 4 cuts have to be made.

First we saw the neck angle into the face of the blank. This allows the strings to hit the bridge saddles at the right height to allow for proper adjustment.

The saw leaves a nicely square cut so a bit of block sanding levels out the face. Our body thickness will finish at 1 1/2" but we'll cut it 1/8" heavy on the back side and will level it out once the wings are glued to the neck.

We'll also saw the headstock down to a heavy 5/8" thickness and cut a taper from the break angle to the body cut.

Fortunately our blank stayed straight and true after sitting overnight so we won't need to re-flatten the front face. Before we cut the taper of the neck blank we'll route in the truss rod. We'll start by using double sided tape to stick a straight-edge to our blank and then we can clamp a stop block on the end to stop the cut.

We'll use a 1/4" ball ended spiral bit to route the truss rod slot in a few passes. Once the initial slot is cut we'll use a 3/8" bit to route a slot for the nut end of the rod.

Finally, we need a slot to allow for the Allen wrench to access the adjustment nut. I use a 5/8" radius bit and a jig to route a short channel at the end of the fingerboard.

Looks good.

With the truss rod ready to go we can finally route the taper on the edges of the neck blank.

Again, using double sided tape we attach our straightedge to the blank and using our 1/2" pattern bit we'll route the edge in multiple passes.

We'll repeat the process on the other side of the blank, leaving us with a blank that matches the fingerboard taper.

With the blank tapered we'll align the wings and then drill for two 1/2" dowels, walnut of course, in each wing for alignment with the neck blank.

Finally we can clamp it all together and see what we've got.

Its beginning to look like a bass now.

 

[HaMMerHeD]

Well now I know where all the figured walnut went.

 

[Jon Clegg]

Well now I know where all the figured walnut went.

He used it all, and didn't leave any for anybody else

 

[Reedt2000]

I've got an older 5 string that I'm soon putting out of commission so before it goes to the old basses home we'll use it to calculate our measurements.

Your test bass looks killer! Can the "old basses home" be my home?

 

[Big B.]

When I started this build-off I neglected to check and see that the final week of the build was the same week as the South by Southwest festival here in Austin. Unfortunately after 8 shows and 50 hours of work in the last week I've barely been able to touch the bass so I'll be removing my submission from the competition. I'll still be finishing the bass in short order and will continue the thread until it's complete but that month waiting on the bridge really put the nail in the coffin. I hope you all continue to follow along and best of luck to the other entries.

 

[Fat Freddy]

Still looking forward to seeing that bass finished....

 

[Matt Liebenau]

Sorry you couldn’t finish in time for the build off but gigging is a pretty good reason, at least to me. Looking forward to the rest of the build.

 

[b3e]

That's unfortunate, but I'm still waiting to see the bass build. Good luck at SXSW, always wanted to go there!

 

[Scoops]

When I started this build-off I neglected to check and see that the final week of the build was the same week as the South by Southwest festival here in Austin. Unfortunately after 8 shows and 50 hours of work in the last week I've barely been able to touch the bass so I'll be removing my submission from the competition. I'll still be finishing the bass in short order and will continue the thread until it's complete but that month waiting on the bridge really put the nail in the coffin. I hope you all continue to follow along and best of luck to the other entries.

Yes, this is unfortunate.

Please be sure to keep us posted with the progress of this build.

You will have a gorgeous instrument when done, and many people will want to drool on it