5 String bass guitar

Dave Black

Member
Messages
638
Location
Central PA
Here is a 5 string bass I made from scratch. It is made from walnut and ash. It is a 7 ply laminated neck through body. There are 2-3/4" ash stripes between the neck and the walnut wings.


PS the end vise on the bench that I made was made specifically for this project.
 

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Here are a few more pics. I made the bass in march of 08 and just refinished it 3 months ago. I stripped it down and stained just the walnut and put a higher end bridge on it. The pics on the first post were from 08 and these pics were just taken a few minutes ago. There are also some pics of a case I made for it when I refinished the bass. The case was a whole other project by itself. I hot pipe bent 2 sets of sides and laminated them together. The sides were 1/4" and laminated the case sides are 1/2".
 

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Dave,
Beautiful Bass, I built a 12 string Guitar earlier this year, but haven't come up with a case for it. do you have any pics of the case build?? I'd love to see a tutorial on building one.:thumb:
 
The first finish was just shellac, the refinish is ebony stain on just the walnut and formbys tung oil applied by rag. The finish came out really smooth, I think there are 7 coats.

I don't have any pics of building the case. It wasn't very hard, this was the first thing that I have hot pipe bent, I don't know how many people are familiar with hot pipe bending. I have never heard of it untill a few months ago. This is were I saw it done. http://www.finewoodworking.com/SkillsAndTechniques/SkillsAndTechniquesArticle.aspx?id=32490
So basically I made a template out of plywood and formed the maple sides to it. I laid the bass on a large piece of paper and traced the shape that I wanted the case to be. I then took 2 pieces of 1/2" ply and screwed them together so I had a 1" thick piece. Then I copied the shape onto the plywood and cut out the shape. I then unscrewed the boards so I had 2 pieces exactly the same. I took those pieces and sandwiched 2x4s on edge between them, this essentially gave me a thick template that I could clamp to. I took some 3/4" x 5" maple and resawed it on the table saw and planed it to 1/4" I soaked the maple for an hour or so and used a hot pipe I made from a 3" copper pipe with a 200 watt bulb inside to bend the wood to fit the form. (I tried a pipe with a torch like the guy on the video used but I couldn't keep the temp down enough to keep from scorching the wood.) After I bent the pieces I glue laminated them together. The total length of the wood for the sides is 9', I didn't have anything that length so the added a 30" piece to make it up. I did a half lap joint to glue them together, The 30" piece is where the flat side of the case it. So after the sides were glued together I cut about 1.5" off the width, doing this created the "body" and the lid peices. I then used a rabbiting bit in the router table to do a rabbit that the plywood top and bottom fit in. I used 1/4" ply for the top and bottom and glued it in the rabbit. Then I spray glued fake leather on the outside and cut foam and covered it with cloth for the inside. and thats about it. I did make a bent glue laminated handle out of walnut and ash (matching the bass) and screwed it to the case. I think that covers the case, I hope this makes sense.
 
Awesome-looking bass, Dave, and with the EMG pickups and the neck through the body, I'll bet it sings like a son of a gun. :headbang: Great job, man. The case is one of the nicest I've seen, too. :thumb:

I have an old BC Rich Mockingbird that was made with a similar construction out of koa and maple. If (or rather when) I finally get around to building an electric guitar, I'd like to also do the neck through the body like that.
 
Dave its simply all awesome. You make these things sound so easy.

I am really keen on trying that hot pipe bending. Loml wants some salad servers. Thanks for the link to the video I saw the article in the magazine but missed the video. A picture is worth a 1000 words.

Question i have and this comes from a musical philistine when it comes to instruments, does the wood etc affect the sound of a bass guitar like this design or is it all in the strings and pickup?

This was a trully inspirational post thanks.
 
Truly awesome bass, I like specially the encounter of the neck with the end, I don't know how it is called I'm a complete ignorant about guitar parts in english.

Dave you mention an end vise but I can't see it on the pics:dunno:
 
Dave its simply all awesome. You make these things sound so easy.

I am really keen on trying that hot pipe bending. Loml wants some salad servers. Thanks for the link to the video I saw the article in the magazine but missed the video. A picture is worth a 1000 words.

Question i have and this comes from a musical philistine when it comes to instruments, does the wood etc affect the sound of a bass guitar like this design or is it all in the strings and pickup?

This was a trully inspirational post thanks.

According to the research I did while building the bass, the different woods do make a tonal difference in the sound of the instrument. There are charts online about different species and their tone qualities. Walnut is supposed to have a "darker" tone. I don't have personal experience since this is the first and only guitar I have built(that will most likely change) My opinion is that strings and pickups have more to do with the tone than the wood but I could be wrong. Now if you are using pine to build a guitar then I don't think it would matter what strings or pickups you had it would still sound bad. Acoustic guitars are a whole different beast and I think that wood would probably make the second most tone difference right after bracing design.
 
Truly awesome bass, I like specially the encounter of the neck with the end, I don't know how it is called I'm a complete ignorant about guitar parts in english.

Dave you mention an end vise but I can't see it on the pics:dunno:


The curved part at the neck joint is called a volute, The end vise is somewhat visible in the pic of the bass hanging. If you want to see more of the vise I have more pics in my shop tour thread called "family shop"
 
According to the research I did while building the bass, the different woods do make a tonal difference in the sound of the instrument...

This is very true. Even two pieces of the same species of wood will produce a slightly different tone. The strings and pickups do make the majority of the difference, but the wood is indeed a factor, too.

Dave, I still can't get over how nice that bass looks. You did a superb job on it. :clap:
 
This is very true. Even two pieces of the same species of wood will produce a slightly different tone. The strings and pickups do make the majority of the difference, but the wood is indeed a factor, too.

Dave, I still can't get over how nice that bass looks. You did a superb job on it. :clap:

Thank you, I am very happy with it. I play it in my church's band and it sounds great, sorry I don't have any way for you to hear it, unless you live close to Shiremanstown PA
 
Dave,

Great looking bass. I'm like Vaughn, as I also have one of the old Mockingbird guitars. Did you buy the fret board with the grooves for the frets already existing, or did you do it the old fashioned way measuring from fret to fret.

Look forward to future instruments.
 
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