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Revised
October 29, 2006
Welcome to the Bass Guitar
page, which is mostly about my basses and my bass rig.
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first is a 70's vintage Jazz Bass copy that's been almost completely
rebuilt since I got it in 1985. When I bought it at a pawn shop
in Fullerton CA for $89, it was an all-blonde bass with black
rectangular-block position makers and black binding around the
fretboard. The finish on the neck was in really bad shape, and
the neck was a bit of a log. fat.thick. Really cheap tuners.
The body is ash with a high-gloss polyurethane finish, with some
nasty dents in a couple places. Still looks great, though. The
picture on the left is what she looked like in 1985, right after
I bought her.
Here's what I've done to it:
- The bass is now on it's third
bridge. The first one was a cheaply-made copy of the standard
Fender bass bridge. I replaced that with a Schaller bass bridge
with roller saddles, which I bought at a consignment shop in
Anaheim. The latest bridge is a Fender deluxe cast-metal bridge
with fine tuners--this is the type of bridge used on the Fender
deluxe models in the late 80's. This one was installed in late
2002.
- The bass is on its fifth neck
now. The first was the blonde icky one that was on it originally.
The second was a pretty nice flame-maple with rosewood neck I
got at TR Guitars in Tustin CA. Beautiful neck, but I didn't
like the feel. The third was a J B Player P-Bass neck I bought
at a music store in Brea CA for $75. That neck stayed on the
bass for 13 years until early 2002, when I replaced it with a
Made-In-Mexico Jazz neck I bought thru EBay for $125. For a short
time in late 2002 (like a month) I had a Fender-licensed replacement
neck by WD Music on the bass, but I didn't like the feel of it,
so I put the Fender neck back on.
- I installed genuine Fender
tuners when I put neck #2 on the bass in 1987. Got 'em from a
guy who had worked at the Fender factory in Fullerton a few years
before. The tuners have the Fender logo on them, and I understand
Fender made 'em this way in the late 70's. These tuners are still
on the bass, having been moved from neck to neck.
- About the same time I put
neck #2 on the bass, I also installed a set of EMG P/J active
pickups, which came with an on-board preamp, as well as a black
laminated pickguard with the cutouts for the P/J pickups.
- When I installed the Fender
MIM neck, I replaced all the small screws that hold the pickguard
with new stainless steel screws--the old ones were kinda rusty
- In early 2002 I installed
chrome Dunlop strap locks
- In late 2002 I installed a
Fender-logo neck plate
- In early 2003 I replaced the
control plate with a new one
- In May 2003 I replaced the
active EMG pickup set with Bartolini pickups: a model 8-CBP P-Bass
style pickup in the neck position, and used 9-JL in the bridge
position. I love them Bartolinis!
- Final mod - I installed a
Warmoth Tortoise Shell pickguard in June 2003
So what's left of the original
bass I brought home in Fall of 1985? Just the body itself--everything
else has been replaced at least once!
With the Fender neck, this
bass plays and sounds better that it ever has before. I think
the satin finish on the back of the neck contributes to the fast
feel of this bass's action.
Here's some pictures of the
bass: |
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Here's what it looks like now:
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Here's the body of the bass,
showing the tortoise-shell pickguard, the Bartolini P/J pickups,
and the Fender Elite bridge:
Intersting note: the original
pickguard was tortoise, and the one I got from Warmoth about
three years ago is tortoise also. I have no idea what happened
to the original, but the interim one was black/white/black. Like
this one, it was cut for P/J pickups, and I got it when I installed
the EMG pickups that used to be on this bass. |
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Here's a shot of the headstock:
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And the back of the headstock,
showing the late-70's vintage tuners:
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I built this bass as an experiment.
I exchanged several emails with a fellow in the Dominican Republic
who was interested in something like this, and I wanted to find
out how three pickups would work in a bass. They work REALLY
WELL. I can make this bass sound like a Jazz Bass, or P Bass,
or anythiung in between--it's more versatile than any passive
bass I've ever played. The pickups were made for me by Ron Sweet
of SweetSounds. The Jazz pickups are humbuckers, with one coil
for the E and A strings, and another for the D and G strings.
This is the result:
I completed this bass in May
2004. It's built pretty much to Jazz Bass specs, except that
the neck is only 1-7/16" wide at the nut. The neck is flame
maple with an Indian Rosewood fretboard. The pickups are a Bartolini
P/J set, with a two-band Bartolini preamp/EQ. The bridge is a
Fender Elite from the early 80's, and the tuners are Fender late
70's vintage with the Fender logo on the plate. The hardware
on this bass is chrome. The body is hard maple with a flamed
maple 5/16" top that has a slight amount of spalting. This
bass is the one I play most often.
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 I
completed most of the work on this bass in December 2003, and
put the finishing touches on it after the gig in Hawaii ended
in April. The bass has the following features:
- The body is two layers of
hard maple, the top being a single piece of flamey-quilty maple
that I bought on Ebay about 2 years ago. Very heavy, but I made
the body pretty thin - about 1-1/2" thick to compensate.
- The neck uses the standard
oakhurst-model construction - it's built up of seven pieces of
wood: a walnut center stripe surrounded by quarter-sawn hard
maple, with Bolivian rosewood and curly maple accent pieces on
the headstock. The neck is attached with 6 #10 by 1-3/4"
stainless steel screws, using gold-finished ferrules rather than
a neck plate.
- The bass has a 34-inch scale,
and fingerboard is is 1-11/16" wide at the nut, 2-5/8"
wide at the neck heel, and the string spacing at the bridge is
16mm.
- The fingerboard is Indian
Rosewood, has 24 medium-jumbo frets, and abalone-shell 1/4"
dot inlays.
- The pickups are Bartolinis,
Model 59J1LS. This is a 2-pickup set of 5-string hum cancelling
pickups that fit in standard-size Jazz-bass pickup cavities.
The electronics are passive, consisting of a volume control for
each pickup, plus a single tone control.
- The hardware is all gold.
The bridge is a heavy cast metal one with through-the-body string
attachment.
- The bass is equipped with
miniature diecast bass tuners with a gold finish.
- The bass is also equipped
with a set of gold Dunlop Strap-Loks.
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This bass is still in progress.
It's another instrument of the "Oakhurst" design.
The body sides are a sandwich
of curly maple between two layers of claro walnut. The top is
a bookmatched set of heavily flamed claro walnut. The neck core
is quarter-sawn hard maple with a center stripe of purple heart.
The fingerboard is pau ferro with 24 medium jumbo frets and mother-of-pearl
diamond inlays. There's a 1/8" layer of purple heart between
the neck core and the body sides. There are accent pieces of
purple heart and curly maple on the headstock. The pickups are
MusicMan type, from CustomShopParts.
The hardware is chrome, with MOP accents on the tuners and control
knobs.
5-string
Oakhurst Vintage Bass
I built this bass as the latest
in my quest for the perfect 5-string bass. I got pretty close
with this one! :-) Basic specs:
- Flame maple neck with Pau
Ferro fingerboard & medium-jumbo frets; double action truss
rod and steel stabilizing rods; 35" scale, 22 frets
- Body is a three-layer sandwich
of black walnut, curly maple, and crotch-figure black walnut
- Pickups were custom-wound
for me by Kent Armstrong
- Bartolini 2-band preamp
- All gold hardware
- String-through bridge
Here are some pictures:
 
The Electric Upright Bass
General characteristics:
- The body is solid swamp ash
with a 3/8" bookmatched flame maple top; The body shape
is based on the shape of a Bass Viol, but narrower for compactness
and to keep the weight down
- The neck is laminated from
two pieces of birdseye maple with a 3/16" center stripe
of black walnut; The neck design is a somewhat stylized version
of what you'd find on an upright bass, but the shaft of the neck
is about 2 inches longer
- The fingerboard is Macassar
Ebony, and the neck has a two-piece single-action truss rod assembly
- The neck is bolted on. The
neck can be easily removed for storage and transport
- The bass will be equipped
with the same type of bridge that upright basses use (I'm buying
this one from Bob Gollihur)
- The scale length will be approximately
41-1/4 inches, pretty much standard for a 3/4-size upright bass
- The electronics consists of
Pure Western pickup system made by K
& K Sound, with a Bartolini 2-band preamp
Finally, there's my bass rig.
There are two components:
- The amp is a Peavey MegaBass
unit that I bought used on Ebay. This amp features a compressor-limiter,
chorus, and two 200-watt power amps. It can be run Biamped or
Full-Range, but there's something wrong with the biamp circuit,
so Biamp mode doesn't work. But the full-range mode works fine,
and this is a great-sounding amp with lots of power. It's all
packaged in a 2-U rack-mount unit.
- The cabinet is a Peavey 1820
cabinet with 2 x 10-inch speakers and an 18-inch Black Widow
woofer. The cabinet can be run biamped or full-range. So right
now I run it full-range, with one power amp driving the 2 tens,
and the other driving the Black Widow. Great-sounding rig!
Here's a couple of pictures:
The latest addition to the
bass rig is a Digitech BP8 preamp that I picked up at Skip's
Music when they had their annual tent sale and swap meet. I'm
still learning how to use this unit's many capabilities--the
thing is VERY complicated. Here's a picture of it, with my Peavey
power amp:
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