Winter Build Off 2026 - A Dark Rainbow

[Pep]

Some minor progress, followed by much deliberation.

Firstly, the headstock has been shaped

View attachment 7421417


Secondly, deliberations…

I set out to make this a demonstration of a budget build. But after wetting it down, it’s yelling at me to go all out.

View attachment 7421419
View attachment 7421420


So I’m facing three options.

TB brains trust, I need your help.

1. Put an ACG EQ01 filter preamp in it. The most expensive preamp I have owned and ridiculously powerful. I have one I’ve been saving for something special. Maybe this is it.

2. Run it as a stereo bass (Ricosound style) into my Hotone Ampero II. No switches or pots, just a stereo out. This would allow each pickup to have its own amp model, compressor, EQ etc, but without the pedal, it’s just a bass with no controls. That’s not really a bad thing; most of my gigging basses have pickups wired directly to the output jack.

3. Keep it a passive bass with some very cool switching (something like two four way rotary switches - one for the BEA and the second for the DG coils)

I have some task paralysis here, so help a bloke out.

I believe with your skill you have a couple more basses left in you, so save that preamp for something “really special” and make this one “exotically passive”.
I rebuilt a Mexican Stu Hamm Urge Bass to the American layout JPJ but made it completely passive. Volume, mini toggle (p-bass, j-bass, or both), a blend knob for the j-bass pickups, and a tone control. Love it!

 

[Why Nautilus‽]

STEREO STEREO STER-E-OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

 

[ctmullins]

The ACG is indeed a ridiculously powerful preamp. I would try to pair it with pickups that have a wide frequency response. P pickups don’t typically meet this description. Unless you wire the two halves of each pickup in parallel? That might work!

 

[Alex Xander]

STEREO STEREO STER-E-OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Ok, you win!

Stereo, straight into the Ampero.

 

[Alex Xander]

The ACG is indeed a ridiculously powerful preamp. I would try to pair it with pickups that have a wide frequency response. P pickups don’t typically meet this description. Unless you wire the two halves of each pickup in parallel? That might work!

I think that it's probably suited to pickups that a further apart than those in this build, too.

 

[joover]

Anthony Jackson only needed zero knobs. My 2c

 

[Alex Xander]

Anthony Jackson only needed zero knobs. My 2c

It's a good way to run. This was the last build I finished, which is my main gigging bass at present. I've had to learn how to gradually mute a string at the end of some songs, but it's not an especially difficult technique.

 

[Alex Xander]

Neck carve day today. I have mentioned previously that this was a bass built around cut-offs. The ebony portion of the neck is in fact two pieces, and they weren't especially big. End result? A neck that Ibanez may consider thin. I've given the truss rod (DADR) some serious cranking and there's have been no signs of failure, so I'm confident it won't explode.

Every neck i have ever made (i think) has had an epoxy bedded trussrod and usually some 12mmx3mm 304 stainless flanking the rod. My technique (unashamedly stolen from someone else; probably @Bruce Johnson ) is to bed the truss rod and reinforcement in the same step as glueing on the fretboard, using a thick structural epoxy. This is especially helpful with thin necks as it elimates any point loads from metal to wood. The business end(s) of the rod is completely encased in a structural epoxy, so even under high stress the truss rod has a much more uniform distribution of stresses that it might otherwise have.

I used to think of necks as some weird voodoo and admit that I have asked some folks on here some embarrassingly naive questions here about necks in the past. I had a penny drop moment when i realised that they are not unlike pre-stressed concrete bridges, and it all makes a lot of sense. Engineering is engineering.

Anyhoo, there's lots of rambling in this post, so here's a picture. I'll make an effort to increase the picture to word ratio in future posts.

Lastly, I have a hell of a time getting a crisp line when my headstock and neck are made of different woods for this one, I cut nice line in the neck material, then used CA glue to make the surface smooth. Does anyone have any other hacks for such a problem?

 

[Flamingo21]

I'll make an effort to increase the picture to word ratio in future posts.

There's no problem with telling us what your hands and your brain have been doing. Carry on.

 

[Alex Xander]

The body on this build is pretty well finished, save for mounting the bridge. I got ahead of myself and decided to finish sand and start applying oil.

As most people will know, ebony is very fine grained. The other woods in this build are not so much, so I spent a good amount of time with super thin CA glue sealing anything that wasn't ebony.

Some before shots

And after

Note the Ritter amount of neck screws...

My current (ever evolving) finishing technique is to start with some thinned down Osmo Polyx (50:50 Osmo:Automotive thinners), before moving to Osmo, then a fine buffing oil. I don't know how many finishing rules I'm breaking here, but the results speak for themselves. The above pictures are thinned Osmo only.

Now for the dumbest bit of luck I've had in a build. This bass will have a telecaster output jack, which I drilled with some forstner bits in my drill press.

From the edge of the bass to the pickup coil closest to the output was long enough that an 8 inch (200mm) drill was barely long enough, if everything went right.

This has to be the best bit of eyeballing ever

Perfect location - this felt better than that really rare occasion when you snap off a screw but manage to perfectly centre the hole you drill to extract it!

More to come...

 

[ctmullins]

The body on this build is pretty well finished, save for mounting the bridge. I got ahead of myself and decided to finish sand and start applying oil.

As most people will know, ebony is very fine grained. The other woods in this build are not so much, so I spent a good amount of time with super thin CA glue sealing anything that wasn't ebony.

Some before shots

View attachment 7432287
View attachment 7432288

And after

View attachment 7432289

View attachment 7432290

Note the Ritter amount of neck screws...

My current (ever evolving) finishing technique is to start with some thinned down Osmo Polyx (50:50 Osmo:Automotive thinners), before moving to Osmo, then a fine buffing oil. I don't know how many finishing rules I'm breaking here, but the results speak for themselves. The above pictures are thinned Osmo only.

Now for the dumbest bit of luck I've had in a build. This bass will have a telecaster output jack, which I drilled with some forstner bits in my drill press.
View attachment 7432291

From the edge of the bass to the pickup coil closest to the output was long enough that an 8 inch (200mm) drill was barely long enough, if everything went right.

This has to be the best bit of eyeballing ever

View attachment 7432292

Perfect location - this felt better than that really rare occasion when you snap off a screw but manage to perfectly centre the hole you drill to extract it!

More to come...

Wow, you must be living right!!

 

[Alex Xander]

Wow, you must be living right!!

Damn straight!

 

[Alex Xander]

I guess this would be what the car world calls a rolling chassis.

I did this for two reasons. The first is that if it needs a neck shim or something similar, it’s easier to do without a finish when I don’t have to be especially delicate. Same thing for cutting the nut.

Secondly, I wanted to work out what the scale length is for side dots. To borrow a term from a fellow Australian builder, I’m a scale agnostic. I frequently (and fairly easily) switch between 35. 37, 38 and 39”. It’s not something I would do mid set, but I can do it. This build was more a case of putting the neck and bridge in place and seeing where the scale length ends ups. In this case, it’s about 38.5”.

Dots later today, followed by final sanding of the neck, then I’m on the home stretch.

 

[Alex Xander]

Between late nights and chasing around children, I managed to find an hour to work on the neck today.

Position makers are in, and the back of the neck is finish sanded with the first coat of oil applied. The fretboard needs a final level, but I like to leave that until the very last step so the neck can do all the moving it likes from previous steps before I flatten the board.

This one (like most of my builds) has no radius. I’m very happy to argue with anyone who thinks a radius is required on a bass guitar

Relative to some of the Australian desert timbers I have been working with, this macassar ebony is a delight to work with.

Next step finger board levelling, then it’s just an assembly job.

 

[Flamingo21]

I’m very happy to argue with anyone who thinks a radius is required on a bass guitar

At least you have me on your side: the bass guitar I'm building doesn't have a radius either! See my build thread:

Thread 'WBO 26 - Bass Mandola'

Jan 3, 2026

Some years ago, I bought an old guitar with the purpose of turning it into a bass. It was an old, run down guitar: its neck had been reset rather clumsily, and it was missing some frets. It also had a lot of cosmetic damage.

I did make a functional bass of it, with four bass tuners instead of the six old ones, and new wooden hardware. It has a piezo pickup in the bridge. I think the strings are Gold Tone. There's a thread about the conversion in Luthier's Corner. (I'll give you the pics later, they're on another device.)

I like what this bass does, but I've grown dissatisfied with its...

• Flamingo21
• Replies: 32
• Forum: Luthier's Corner

• 

 

[Alex Xander]

This one is finished. Glamour shots to follow, but here's a sneak peek for now.

This puppy plays beautifully. The icing on the cake is that wood aside, there's less than $150 USD in this, strings included.

 

[Why Nautilus‽]

A stunner as always!

One of these days I’ll get around to ordering from you.

 

[Alex Xander]

This is my submission for the WBO 26, Unfinished business category:

Specifications:

Body: Macassar ebony/rose mahogany/silver ash/red cedar/hoop pine/cypress
Neck: two piece Macassar ebony with mystery wood from about the fifth fret. Epoxy bedded trussed with 12 stainless reinforcement
Fingerboard: Macassar Ebony
Fingerboard radius: flat
Scale length: 38 in
Tuners: Aliexpress
Bridge: Aliexpress
Pickups: 2x Aliexpress Precision
Electronics: nil - stereo wiring for outboard processing
Finish: Osmo Polyx
Strings: Newtone customs with about 50lbs tension per string.
Weight: more than a feather, less than a t40

Before the photos, here is the list important part - this bass cost less than $200. It makes good use of off cuts and Chinese hardware. I understand that Chinese hardware is on the nose in some circles, but some of it is damn good, and equally cheap.

This marks the 30th bass I have built and I will say with confidence that despite its low price of materials, it is every bit as good as anything else I have built. In fact, this one is a “not for sale, leave it for the kids to inherit” build. It’s a confession to say the parts were so cheap, but a cork sniffing player would likely not tell the difference with a blindfold.

Note the lack of grass in the photos. Normal rainfall in my part of Australia is about 300mm to May (12 inches). So far this year we haven’t broken the 50mm/2” mark.

Don’t let price of materials stop you from building! I’m happy to have an offline discussion with anyone about the parts used on this build.

Happy playing, everyone.

 

[ctmullins]

Amazing! Congratulations!

 

[Flamingo21]

Nothing about this looks cheap. Just a beautiful bass that makes you want to play it.