Kiwi

I've found a TB thread which suggests they might not be compatible. https://www.talkbass.com/threads/regular-stingray-5-neck-pocket-size.378133/post-4891902

@thevintagebassist Hey Roger, are you able to share any measurements for Mike? We would need the nut width and depth, width and depth at 12th fret and same at 22nd fret along with the heel length from the end to where the shoulder starts.

I will let you know when they are ready to ship. I plan on recording the individual weights and adding them to the product information anyway.

Just a heads up that after the first five of these necks are completed, the price will need increase to £480. So if you are keen for a pb neck, I recommend securing an order slot sooner rather than later if possible.

CBS Fender started it...

Technically a 6 string is even more so. However I found the C string struggled to be heard in a stage mix. I also play fives because of those low notes. When I want to dig down and tap into some weight and authority, that B string is there.

OK batch 2 has been finalised and will be underway next week. I'll set up a new thread for updates on construction. For Batch 3, the price for the JB4 necks wil need to increase to £480 to match the SR necks. I'm sorry for that but it turns out that 450 per neck is just a little below the threshold needed to make other things like websites and scalability happen.

Technique - there are LOADS of youtube videos. I personally like Stuart Claytons stuff but there are others out there as well. Gear - Can't really go wrong with EBS. It's very clean sounding but their product line up offers great value for money, especially second hand. If you want something a bit grittier then there's Ampeg or GK but they are entering rock territory. Band integration - Getting out of tune isn't normally a problem. Learning how to use space can be a challenge for a guitarist, bass is a foundation that defines the energy in the song and guides it's harmonic direction. To begin with just learn the parts to the song until you develop a feel and appreciation for how the bass works. Check Sting in the Police (Walking on the Moon) and Adam Clayton in early U2 (New Years Day) for how to use space and simple lines to support other band members. If you want to learn about how to use music theory and chordal knowledge to enhance your fingering efficiency and harmonic modulation then the last word has always been and always will be James Jamerson - check out Reflections by the Supremes. Paul McCartney is also a master at using melody tastefully in basslines without swamping the song - check his Wings stuff especially Coming Up and Silly Love Songs. If you fancy having your boundaries pushed a bit, check out Stevie Wonder's basslines as played by Nate Watts especially Master Blaster. They might sound simple but your fingers will be all over the place because Stevie wasn't confined by the fretboard. If you want an example of how not to play bass, check out Ronnie Wood on Rod Stewart's Maggie May. It's lead guitar on bass...some might say it still works but probably a good way to get fired from your first function band.

This neck is modelled on the Moses made Steinberger 5 string neck fitted to my own self built basses. The string clamp can accept double ball end and single ball end strings. These necks have already been built and been imported into the UK. No wait for shipping, no customs duty or shipping charges. Features include: Indian ebony fingerboard (6mm thick) with zero fret 24 levelled stainless steel frets Double action truss rod (accessed through the string clamp end) String clamp that accepts single ball end strings Monocoque construction (a hollow shell) with resin core Matt polyeurathane finish Neck inserts and matching bolts supplied Measurements @ zero fret: 45.3mm @ 12th fret: 59.8mm@ 24th fret: 67.5mm Depths (front to back): @ zero fret: 19.57mm @ 12th fret: 22.2mm @ 24th fret: 26.75mm Neck heel: 75mm length allowed for. Please note: The measurements above are indicative. There might also be slight variations in appearance of the weave due to the hand made nature of this item. Installation: We recommend asking a local luthier to drill holes for the inserts, the process should take them about ten minutes and no more than 30 minutes to install the neck into a custom body.

See you in another six years!

That's great, thanks guys.

I'm pleased to say that this month we will be working up a mould for the standard EB SR5 bass, with the 22 fret neck. Measurements are to be confirmed but the same options will be available for this neck that are available for the other necks (below). Necks come with: PEEK fingerboard with MOP side dots, Luminay side dots are available for £10 upcharge. Rosewood, ebony and wenge fingerboards are available for a £75 upcharge. Fretless (lined or unlined) is a £30 upcharge. Fingerboard inlays: MOP or abalone dots are standard, MOP blocks or luminay fingerboard dots are a £30 upcharge. Abalone blocks are also available but slightly smaller than jazz blocks. Other options - please reach out and let's discuss what might be possible. TUSQ nuts installed but not slotted (slotting requires a string gauge to be assumed) 22 stainless steel frets (levelled to a straight neck) Double action truss rods (heel capstan wheel style adjustment) M4x40 neck bolts and inserts will be supplied. (NB the necks don't come pre-drilled because neck bolt locations vary from bass to bass, the inserts must be used) Tuner holes are drilled ( TBC) but screw holes for tuners are not (again, because different tuner designs have different hole locations) NB: Dimensions are consistent with SR5 necks but are not Ernie Ball Music Man licensed products or in anyway associated with Ernie Ball Inc. obviously. There may be fractions of a millimetre difference due to manufacturing tolerances, we recommend having an experienced luthier fit the neck for the best possible fit. All rights to trademarks belong to their respective owners etc. Specifications subject to change without notice due to continual, ongoing improvements.

TC Electronic do a pedal called the MimiQ which is supposed to replicate double tracking. Phasing might become an issue depending on how the signal is treated along the chain.

Ok another update:. The necks are in QC having some visual things sorted out before I recieve them. Walman has graciously and kindly offered to recieve a full shipment (if thats what ends up being most cost effective) this one time, and make sure each of you get the neck you have ordered. I did estimate 390RMB (excluding duties) for a shipment up to 20kg but for a final cost I need to give the logistics company final weight and volume and see if we are over the minimum (which seems unlikely)and how much extra that would cost. Timing wise, hopefully I will have the necks early to middle of next week because the extra painting i have asked for needs time to dry and we are just coming out of a week long public holiday. Assuming there are no further QC issues that need necks to be returned for further work, then I'll weigh and send the info to the shipping company and update everyone on the final shipping cost. At that point we will all know the final balance and I will check if prepaid duty shipping is available. If any of you are happy to pay the £40 for shipping an individual neck then I can send the neck straight to you. It will mean the necks in the bulk shipment might cost a little more.

My knowledge is limited but I know it's possible to make carbon fibre conductive. There are a variety of ways to make it happen though, including embedding prefabbed circuits, metallic meshes and just using more conductive materials in the resin (e.g. graphene nanotubes). I believe it's also possible to design in specific resistances but it's not as efficient as metal.

Given the voltages at most could be 9-18v if an active circuit was used, what would your safety concerns be based on? Interference could be managed. However it would be possible to ground a metal live rail prematurely if its touched. The problem could be designed out with judicious shielding...and thats why I referred to drawing inspiration rather than simply using. For example, assuming acceptable tolerances are achievable, the same rails could be fabricated in carbon fibre or printed plastic and the ribbon contacts run inside the tracks in each rail.

How about borrowing inspiration from the guiding rails on CAM milling systems? Make one rail live and the other earth for the pickup connections using roller bearings and adapt the Seymore Duncan Triple shot system for your own pickup housing? That way you don't have to faff about with pickup switching via the rail system.

I have hopes/aspirations to make not only standard PB JB and SR models with PEEK fingerboards available but also have them warehoused in the UK so that delivery doesn't require 6-8 weeks wait. (And...the warehousing has already been found.) Ideally it would be great to have something similar in the US as well given the shipping costs are so reasonable. However managing stock and always ensuring there is a contingency of necks available might be a challenge given the lead in times for fabrication...but how that gets managed really depends on the level of demand and my plans are very much led by demand. Yes, when the website is set up there will be a provision for custom orders. I'm loathed to call it a 'Custom Shop' but that's what it will effectively be. Pretty much anything could be possible if you have the 3D model or we can modify one that we already have. Custom fingerboard inlays, compound radii and woods, compensated nuts, fanned frets, fingerboard bindings, coloured weave, choice of fret material, through body necks, custom dimensions, custom decals even twisted neck profiles are possible if there is a 3D model available. Maybe at some point in the far off future true tempered frets might even be possible. The custom orders will be shipped direct from China obviously.

It's a little surreal for me as well. Can't believe things have come together like this but I'm thrilled to be making it happen.

My first reaction on reading that you had made an offer was 'oh no, I hope he didn't accept.' Think these kinds of sellers are the ones we just walk away from until they have a light bulb moment...assuming that happens at all.

An excellent idea, along similar lines to the Apathist's Club?

Time for an update given it's been over five years. Mostly I have been focussing on guitar but I'm pleased to welcome the following to the stable. Moon MBC5TN There were two guys I found on YT playing these basses. One called Terry Romanio, based in Australia, who was playing one of these on a Chaka track. And other guy Igor Odaryuk playing one with modified electronics and a delicious amount of chewy midrange. This japanese import was intended to be a better value alternative to the Warwick Thumb 5 but it's more like cross between a Smith and a Warwick. Featuring a through body neck of wenge and bubinga with mahogany wings and pomelle bubinga facings, it has the Smith high end smoothness but the Warwick growl in the mids although the action has to be lowered to get that. The lows are boomy and a little unfocussed so pairing it with a class D amp is a good match or maybe replacing the Barts with some tighter sounding pickups could work. It's also a bit on the heavy side and the nut is fairly broad at 48mm. The electronics include twin pickup volumes, a passive/active switch and a three band eq which seems little clumsy so they've been replaced by an East Pro circuit. The truss rod is proved to be a little sensitive to tweaking, a little movement creates a lot of curve but after a fret dress it plays like butter. Really nice bass and great value second hand, at the time of writing I could pick two more up in China for about 1300-1400 quid each. Good bits: Smooth, bell like high end that you might find on a Smith bass Mid range warwick growl when the action is lowered. Deep deep bass Comfortable body ergonomics Dual truss rods Neck through construction Astounding value for money if you can bag one in the right location Not so good bits: It feels closer to 5kg than 4. Compared to my Spector NS5CR, the low end is a little unfocused Electronics are a little illogical. Nut is on the wide side (48mm) Musicman Stingray Classic 5 I never set out to buy one and I was never really interested in owning one. This was a complete impulse buy, in mint condition, due to it's ridiculous asking price from some rich kid who aspiring to be a professional musician and didn't care about the money he lost. I was planning to sell it on in the UK to cover my airfare but I played it back to back with my '78 stingray and it was close enough (and impressively so despite differences in neck profile) that I had second thoughts. Then when the graphite neck thing started, I wondered whether there might be a chance of having the 5 string OG Cutlass bass I'd always wanted but could never have...watch this space. Good bits: Rich, deep character with some midrange growl thanks to the ash body. Beautiful 3A flamed neck Genuinely gets close to the sound of a preEB bass - fatter sounding than the standard SR5's I've played. Not so good bits: Nut width and neck profile is way too chunky, was it really necessary? It weighs over 4kg Vigier Passion III 5 string There was a guy on YT called Alex Bankovic who used a Passion III on some of this play alongs and I couldn't get that B string out of my head. This particular bass popped up on Ebay and I snagged it for a song, although it later turned out to have some cracking around the control socket which was repaired solidly but the refinishing is a little clumsy. The bass was also sold as "low action" but after I set it up properly, it turned out to have exactly the same built in relief as the others I've played. Still, the neck is ridiculously fast to play - the nut width is 42mm, the same as a stratocaster and the body is comfortable and light. Apart from the built in relief it's a very very good bass to play. So I will be getting the phenolic fingerboard replaced with PEEK at some point because it's very clearly lacking in thickness around the upper frets compared to the lower ones. Whether I add a truss rod at this point remains to be seen, it's mechanically the safest thing to do but its not certain whether it might have an impact on the sound of the bass. This bass has a replacement Lusithand GK RB800 preamp installed which on paper looks like it might be an ideal match for the character of the bass but in practice, the centres of the frequency bands miss the sweet spots of the bass, there isn't any onboard gain trim control so it's a little quieter than the Moon and the treble and attack is piercingly bright so I have it turned down. This one will be getting a repalcement preamp, I have a Noll 4 knob semi parametric in my spares department but will see what other options there might be. I'm also thinking about a Passion II type refinish in pearlescent white to hide the repaired cracks as I've got artwork for replacement waterslide decals on the headstock and body. Good bits: Ridiculous neck profile, probably the fastest and narrowest I've ever played. Toit low end (especially the B string) and chewy mid range growl Light weight Comfortable and well balanced Kahler bridge allows you to customise the string spacing. Not so good bits: Replacement preamp isn't as effective as it could be. Tone is a little too bright. That pre-set neck relief and no truss rod...for the love of god, WHY?!! Also, I replaced the Alembic filter in the Pedulla with another East Pro and it now feels like it's reached it's full potential after nearly 20 years of ownership. The Shuker Headless 6 and Pangborn Warlord graphite were sold through the Bass Gallery which helped free some cash up for the above purchases. The Status Series 1 had an East Pro and Bartolini pickups installed for a little more warmth and more versatility, overlapping the bass and mids yields a result that could pass for a warm Series 2 and it will do pretty much anything else with some knob twiddling. No changes on the amp side although I finally took possession of the Trace Hexavale and it's everything I want in a valve amp. I have yet to try it in anger though and the brackets got bent out of shape during shipping because they weren't up to the task of holding the amp during transportation...which is a bit of a concern. They need hammering back into shape at some point. Effects=wise, I sold the Source Audio C4 as it was too complicated and had too many compromises (like no MIDI DIN socket) so I'll probably be sticking with Future Impact. Also up for sale are the Cooper Fx Moment Machine sequencer pedal, Alexander Colour Theory sequencer pedal, newly acquired Boss SY200 (after 4 weeks of ownership), EBS Microbass II pedal. I also see that a company called Polyend have released a pedal based sequencer in August so I'm aiming to get one of those in the next 12 months and put it through it's paces.

Definitely wouldn't pay late seventies Series I money for what was a basic model originally in Alembic's line up.

I'll take a closer look as part of the QC check.

And the necks are done but I still need to eyeball them for QC.