Adding veneer to my old bass

I had a similar situation with my first P. We stripped the old paint off, and sprayed on new (actually my dad did it at the body shop and I just watched). But the whole process took only two days with heat/putty knife, then orbital sander and lots of hand sanding (I got to do a lot of that part) on the first day and then sealant, undercoat, color, and then a generous allotment of clear coats (I think 6) on the second. Two days after the work, we started assembly (dry time from 10 coats of enamel). Got it together and the sound was simply not great. But we tweaked the electronics (DiMarzio pickups and a slightly bigger cap on the tone control) it sounded brighter, but still had sustain issues. We machined down an International combine shear pin to make a brass nut, and everything came together. Lots of tweaking with height adjustments and etc. etc. etc. and we had a beautiful bass that I played for 15 years.

Probably the differences in sound and sustain were just from drowning the bass in enamel, but it WAS there, physics or not. But maybe it was because I was 14, or because I was getting my dad to help me and wanted the project to last longer, or maybe I just wanted my dad to dole out more cast for the better pickups and the brass nut...that's a matter for a shrink, I guess. :thumbs up:
 
GONZO-X said:
nah, it's just an old wives tale.

LOL
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sorry ..... but a 14 year old hardly counts as trained ears and the memory many years later of sound is something that can't be called evidence.
Quite a few studies have confirmed that humans' memory of subtle sound changes lasts only a few minutes with any accuracy.
 
agreed, nothing beats first hand experience.

i know what i know, so it's interesting to just kick back and watch it unfold.

there are always success stories, i root for those guys.
 
Again, I agree with Bob. The sound difference was probably more my wanting to spend more time with DAD than anything real.

;)
 
Resurrecting this thread.

Started on the 2nd project. I bought a body and neck blank from Guitar Fetish. I didn't get the body I was expecting. The one I got was a lightweight jazz body and it is made from Palwinha or something like that. Very soft. I thought I ordered the ash jazz body, but looking through the emails, it was my mistake. Oh well.

I trimmed down the heel of the body so the signature "jazz Body" shape wasn't so prevalent and I shaped the headstock then applied a veneer. Came out pretty nice.
Here's a pic. I'll get more posted later.

IMG_0527web.jpg
 
Thanks. Everything is going to be black chrome. I've got some options on pickups, but I think I'm going with a MusicMan style neck pickup and a jazz style bridge pickup. I bought a jazz pickguard and can use it install another jazz pickup, but I really don't want a pickguard.

Here are some links to the items I bought.

Neck

Jazz Bass Lightweight Body Unfinished (This one they changed the picture from what I got. The neck pickup cavity is routed out to join the control cavity.)

MusicMan Pickup

Jazz set Pickup (They used to sell these as a neck/bridge set which is what I got a few months ago. I'll be using just one of them)

Here's a pic of the body. I routed out the control cavity wider to accommodate the Active EQ board I'll be using ( got it off of Amazon for a pretty good price) I reshaped the body to remove the heel and make it more round. (Compare it to the GuitarFetish pic to see the difference)

IMG_0528web.jpg
 
Wow, they have some pretty good deals there. It's cool that you can almost "one stop shop" there, and make yourself a pretty cool guitar. I've started buying parts on ebay from Chinese vendors. Usually things arrive within a couple of weeks, and for a far better price.
 
JCH said:
Wow, they have some pretty good deals there. It's cool that you can almost "one stop shop" there, and make yourself a pretty cool guitar. I've started buying parts on ebay from Chinese vendors. Usually things arrive within a couple of weeks, and for a far better price.
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guitarfetish is the shit ..... I've been almost begging people to buy from them for years. Those 200 dollar gits they have? EXCELLENT gits. I have a red metalflake tele thinline that just an awesome ax period and it cost 150 bucks since it was a blem (which I never found).

And I'm tellin' ya' ...... their p'ups and hardware are really good and cheap as hell. I want one of their jazzboxes
 
I know. I bought a blonde tele from them as a blemish. I can't find the blemish. It might be some pencil marks under the finish. It's difficult to see. I took it to a tech to have it set up and it plays beautifully. Can I quote you Steve??

guitarfetish is the shit
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:D

And we know all this stuff is made in China. I personally can't see myself buying stuff from someone in China from ebay or anywhere else. I worry about getting ripped off. So, I'll let a US planted company buy it for me and I'll pay the mark-up.

And I gotta say the neck looks good. The headstock is a blank so you can cut your own design and the fretboard is like anything I'd expect from a manufacturer. For less than $50!! The only thing I didn't like with the neck was the holes were pre-drilled for Fender sized tuners which have a large diameter. I wanted a different style tuner, but the diameter was much smaller and they were too small to fit properly in the pre-drilled holes. so, I had to buy the goofy looking elephant ear style tuners because they are the only ones that fit the pre-drilled holes.
 
JCH said:
Wow, they have some pretty good deals there. It's cool that you can almost "one stop shop" there, and make yourself a pretty cool guitar. I've started buying parts on ebay from Chinese vendors. Usually things arrive within a couple of weeks, and for a far better price.
Click to expand...





Way to go!


I have a elec. 6 guitar from Ebay, think I paid $40.00 and it plays as good as any other Fender or Gibson.
Just as smooth and fast, as the LPs and Strats.

Haven't taken it apart yet to compare electronics. Sounds fantastic.

Fast sanded neck.

Just ain't as pretty.:D

Need to get it back out of the case and do a little tweaking.....new strings.....
 
Chili said:
I know. I bought a blonde tele from them as a blemish. I can't find the blemish. It might be some pencil marks under the finish. It's difficult to see. I took it to a tech to have it set up and it plays beautifully. Can I quote you Steve??

:D

And we know all this stuff is made in China. I personally can't see myself buying stuff from someone in China from ebay or anywhere else. I worry about getting ripped off. So, I'll let a US planted company buy it for me and I'll pay the mark-up.

And I gotta say the neck looks good. The headstock is a blank so you can cut your own design and the fretboard is like anything I'd expect from a manufacturer. For less than $50!! The only thing I didn't like with the neck was the holes were pre-drilled for Fender sized tuners which have a large diameter. I wanted a different style tuner, but the diameter was much smaller and they were too small to fit properly in the pre-drilled holes. so, I had to buy the goofy looking elephant ear style tuners because they are the only ones that fit the pre-drilled holes.
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Next time plug the holes and veneer both faces then re-drill. Job done... I'd normally do that any way. Drilling the tuner holes is one of the last jobs I do then ream them to suit..
 
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