invertigo

My entry to the club - expect I'll end up swapping pickups out at some point as well as adding phase/parallel switching but enjoying it so far. Neck feels lovely!

The Player series also has modern voiced pickups vs vintage voiced pickups on the Vintera, as you might expect.

Replaced the wiring and pickups on my kit build P, so I guess that's me out. Reasonable effort at £50 spent all year though, I think!

This P body was done with Steve's Shell Pink lacquer and white primer, very happy with it and honestly the easiest spray tins I've ever used to get good coverage without runs or splotching.

Upgraded my kit HB P Bass with a Wilkinson MPB I believe it is, along with a Kiogon loom. Sounds lovely and old now when combined with LaBella Deep Talkin

Or DR Black Beauties if you want the roundwound tone

Sub-£130 for a finished neck with dressed frets seems like a pretty tidy price. Looks like most of them are heel access truss rods mind.

Bit of 2-part white wood filler will do the job of hiding the dent. I missed one on my own build recently and honestly the colour and clearcoats made it more obvious, not less. Seeing I follwed my polishing by banging up the body intentionally, I wasn't too bothered mind

Could the Mustang be Tidepool? Assuming it's a Mexican, it's one of the standard colours for basses in the Player series. Certainly looks very close to my Jazz in colour terms.

Fender 60s colours are some of my absolute favourite. Shell Pink, Seafoam Green, Candy Apple Red etc all beautiful. Was originally going to go Olympic White with this, then I saw a photo of a pink one when doing my planning and the decision was immediate! Very impressive, while the kit was by no means perfect (pretty much no holes bar the neck pocket were in the right spot etc, neck needed shimming) it certainly made me realise HB stuff is genuinely pretty darn good. Even the frets needed very little work, and the neck was straight as an arrow. Kind words from one of the master craftsmen! Thanks! So, I may have a niggle developing to build something else now too... This is how it starts, isn't it? I always used to do practical jobs, but I've been office based for the last 4 years. In that time I decided my old car needed some love so it's had lots of diy work done to it.... Ran out of jobs on that so this might be the next 'keep your hands busy' vibe

And we have the finished product, at least visually. Strung up with Deep Talkin Flats now, electronics may change in the future but that's the fun of modding! And a little detail shot of the lacquer checking. Rubbed it over with some thinned down woodstain and wiped off the surface, just highlights the checking a touch without being too 'in your face' Pretty darn happy if I do say so myself!

I tend to bounce between them and Hi-Beams on my Jazz. The SBs have a bit more mids and an overall warmer tone, but still plenty of that top end bite. Play pretty much the same as they're round core too, nickel feels a bit slicker than steel. That's about it really!

About to make my first foray into flats on a kit built P bass, just waiting on some material to come to make up a neck shim before it all gets bolted together. Ended up going for the LaBella Deep Talkin in Light guage, did a rough setup with Fender 7250s that came off my Jazz bass when new so hopefully they're a similar sort of tension.

Bit more progress, and it's now a fully playable instrument! Headstock shaped and waterslide decal applied (the back of the headstock makes it clear it's not the genuine article for anyone with issues with this, plus I won't ever be selling it anyway) Engraved and coloured in 'signature' Neck all built up, frets levelled and crowned And a 'dry run', still waiting on a couple of bits to finish it off but it let me see any rough setup needs. Neck needed a decent shim as the action was about 1.5cm off the fretboard with the relief and nut set perfectly and the saddles bottomed out. All sorted now and it plays pretty damn well. Need to sort out some more wall hangars now as the other half is already unhappy with the extra floor space occupied! Started doing some lacquer checking on the back, but I did not realise how quickly compressed air tins get consumed when used inverted. Got another 4 cheapo tins ordered from ebay, so it'll be getting stripped back down to install them. I also need to add a bit of wood where the lower pickup cover screw goes through the guard, as the screw misses the body and sits fully in the cavity, as well as some new LaBella flats to go on and really finish off the 60's P vibes. Electronics seem decent enough, certainly sounds a bit 'cheaper' than the Fender, but then you'd hope a near-£600 bass sounds better than an £80 kit. May upgrade them at some point, was considering sticking a Wilkinson Alnico V pickup in with a new loom (pots are scratchy and cheap, as expected) but that's something I'll look at soon.

Wondering if purchasing paints and tools to build a kit that was gifted to me counts as a fail... Technically the tools are useful for many things, but the paint less so and already used up...

So a bit more done yesterday evening, got the body sanded back and roughly polished - now I don't want it to look 'new' so I haven't gone to the extent of buffing out every little mark as I'll likely end up scuffing it all again in the future. Did a quick mockup with the hardware too, unsure if the pickup cover is going to last but I have it so I'll see if I can get used to it.

Slow progress! But it's getting there bit by bit

It's a colour I've always thought was a classic Fender vibe, so quite happy to be using it and the lacquer is top quality stuff, very easy to use and spray neatly. Ordered a fret levelling beam and crowning file today as I'm going to give it a proper fret job, plus they'll have uses for my other guitars and basses so seemed worth spending a bit more and buying from a reputable UK luthier seller rather than hoping to get a perfectly straight beam from China. I'm also running a bit low on clear nitro so unsure I'll have enough for the neck, and certainly not enough for the headstock front. As such, I picked up some cheap polyurethane lacquer to do the front of the headstock, the back of the neck already has a light coating so probably doesn't need any more doing to it, only needs a flash coat where the paddle headstock has been cut and sanded. The nut looks incredibly high and also feels like cheap plastic, honestly just considering knocking it off and getting a Tusq pre-slotted nut.

So, got some work done on the Harley Benton kit this week, fortunately the weather round here was absolutely ideal for painting on Sunday too (humidity dropped right down to sub-60%). So, first off the body. Reasonably well finished with a few machining marks but well sealed, just gave it a run over with some 600 grit before any paint to tidy up the marks. The ground wire hole is a very rough job, but that will all be hidden under the bridge plate. 3 piece body, looks and feels like basswood to me. Had to fill in the drilled pickguard holes as they were a mile out from the included pickguard, and even more so from the replacement I'm going to be using. So, toothpicks and wood glue to the rescue! Cut back and sanded flush before paint. Pickguard fitted - nowhere to drill for one screw above the controls, debating just leaving it off as it makes no difference or gluing a bit of scrap wood to the cavity to drill into. Will figure this out later down the line. Headstock, shaped! Going to an early 60s colour scheme but wanted to strink the headstock a bit. The body is very lightweight so trying to avoid any neck dive issues. As such, used a template for an American Deluxe size headstock rather than a vintage sizing. Primer! And colour coat, Shell Pink nitrocellulose. Used a full fin of both colour and clear coat and it's looking good with a decent shine to it. Now to leave it for 3 or so weeks to fully cure before wet sanding and buffing.

@Teebs what paint did you use for this? I'm putting the same kit together and can't decide what type of paint to use, be it poly, nitro etc.

I've got one of these sitting at home after being delivered yesterday, just got a query on the finish if you could! Seen you've used Northwest Guitars lacquers, assuming it was just 1 tin of each primer, colour and clear? But maybe a few more coats than 3

I understand completely that, for something you want to use regularly, quality tools are worth it. I have plenty of Japanese saws, rasps, files etc, high quality power tools and so on, but I have no idea if these would ever really be used again and it seems insane to spend nearly as much as the kit is consting on some tools that may never see light again. Hence the question, does anyone know any tools that are decent for a reasonably cheap price. Longevity doesn't matter in this case. If I get the bug, I'll get proper tools.

My other half has told me she's ordered me a diy bass kit as a gift (I suspect to keep me occupied rather than getting bored at home) and I've had a realisation that, while I have a decent set of tools, none are really suited to guitar/bass applications. Namely, I think I could do with a levelling beam, fret rocker, crowning files and possibly nut slot files. I can't imagine a kit neck being perfectly straight and level with level frets, so believe I'd need all of the items. Can anyone offer any advice? They may never end up being used again, or very rarely at best, so I really don't see a point in going out buying high quality stuff from the likes of StewMac or Crimson etc

Restrung my Jazz today with DR Sunbeams, and I honestly fell in love with the sound of them immediately. Had DR Hi-Beams previously, but always felt they lacked a bit of mids. The Sunbeams have a lot more vintage sort of sound, which works suprisingly well with the more modern Fender pickups in the Player series. On the other hand, I now have a mad desire to get a P Bass and string it with some La Bellas...

It's actually cheaper than the solid colour ones, they're up for £900+ preorder. Seems to be a very high price in my mind, near enough putting themselves against the Fender American Performer range.