Ya know, I've got a blue Hawaiian shirt that would look great behind that 
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Winter Build Off 2020 - Uke Space
- Thread starter dwizum
- Start date
It's done!
I might try to record some sound clips but I have to give a disclaimer, as a lefty it's a little awkward to play this right handed bass.
All said and done, I am super happy with it and I can't wait for my son's birthday so I can give it to him. It sounds amazing and it's just pure fun to play. If you've never played a uke bass, you need to find one and play it. Take my word for it, you'll be glad you did.
I might try to record some sound clips but I have to give a disclaimer, as a lefty it's a little awkward to play this right handed bass.
All said and done, I am super happy with it and I can't wait for my son's birthday so I can give it to him. It sounds amazing and it's just pure fun to play. If you've never played a uke bass, you need to find one and play it. Take my word for it, you'll be glad you did.
)
It is a beaut but I wish I had seen this thread when you first started, the D'Addario strings are actually Aquila Thunderguts. I've been playing with and modifying bass ukes for about 6 years and found that the Thunderguts get rough and "sticky" in a short time and will also "sausage" with indents at the frets. I much prefer Road Toad Pahoehoe strings, which are very smooth and don't sausage, but they are a little more difficult to install and take much longer to settle in with how much they stretch.
Still you did a beautiful job.
Thanks for the feedback. Strings for these are so different than anything I'm used to, it was very difficult to filter through all the feedback, reviews, forum threads, etc to pick a set. In the end I kind of assumed I needed to just pick something and put it on, on and then let him decide if he likes them or not, then go from there.
One question though - I found I needed a really high action with these strings. Is that typical for all uke bass strings or just this type?
Actually, two questions - are there any uke bass strings that are longer than this? Some day I'd like to do a longer scale length uke bass, maybe in the 26 - 28 inch range. These would definitely not work for something that long.
1. If the bass uke has an adjustment to lower the bridge, I will use it, and I've also had a lower nut made. You can get away with higher action because of how flexible the strings are.
2. The Road Toad Pahoehoe are made longer, available on the web site, string_store. I find they stretch so much, you may be able to fit them on a 28" scale.
My son's birthday party is this weekend so I'll be giving this to him then. I had a hard time finding a case for it. Just going by measurements, most baritone uke cases are about an inch too small. Kala makes some ubass cases, but I was trying to stay away from having a "confusing" branding on the case. I did see some half scale guitar cases that would have been big enough but they all looked really chintzy. I ended up with this generic Kmise case from Amazon. It's barreeely big enough, you have to pull it pretty tight to get the zipper to close. I'm guessing it'll spend most of it's life out of the case sitting around in his bedroom anyways.
I didn't mention this earlier, but after completing this thing, I decided I really wasn't totally happy with the electronics. I had put in a cheapo generic chinese piezo preamp I'd gotten on eBay. It functioned but was not really pleasant sounding - it would overdrive and get all farty if you played hard and it didn't have a very even response, way too much treble, no bottom end, and harsh. I don't know who the heck designed this thing but it sounds like they did a poor job. In fact, it sounds so close to a plain passive piezo with no buffer or preamp that I pulled the case on it open just to make sure there was actually something in there. It turns out it's built around a TL062 which doesn't seem like a terrible choice. I guess they just did a bad job with the design.
So I pulled it out and built my own preamp based on the J201 "Tillman" preamp that's been floating around the internet forever:
Discrete FET Guitar Preamp
I built three since I'm planning on trying this design in the tenor guitars I'm building now too.
It sounds about a billion times better. Much fuller response, way more bottom end, and less harsh treble. This was a dirt simple soldering project. I got the boards done at OSH Park. I'm going to order another batch so I have some extras, I might even put one in the fretless I built last year. If anyone wants to try making their own piezo preamp, let me know and I'll post the details for this design.
Anyways, I gave my son the bass this afternoon, and I don't think he's stopped playing it since he opened it. I think I can call this project a 100% success!
So I pulled it out and built my own preamp based on the J201 "Tillman" preamp that's been floating around the internet forever:
Discrete FET Guitar Preamp
I built three since I'm planning on trying this design in the tenor guitars I'm building now too.
It sounds about a billion times better. Much fuller response, way more bottom end, and less harsh treble. This was a dirt simple soldering project. I got the boards done at OSH Park. I'm going to order another batch so I have some extras, I might even put one in the fretless I built last year. If anyone wants to try making their own piezo preamp, let me know and I'll post the details for this design.
Anyways, I gave my son the bass this afternoon, and I don't think he's stopped playing it since he opened it. I think I can call this project a 100% success!
Oh, I just suggested a Chromacast baritone bag on another thread, Amazon has them.
https://www.amazon.com/ChromaCast-C...ocphy=1013587&hvtargid=pla-522603270168&psc=1
https://www.amazon.com/ChromaCast-C...ocphy=1013587&hvtargid=pla-522603270168&psc=1
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