JohnH89

The first iteration worked very well as a proof of concept and was built to a tight timescale so don't beat yourself up . The alterations to the design and engineering have been spectacular . Any help I can offer from here on in is willingly given . I do have a few ideas on the pickup front ......

Jeez Rob , you've been busy . Looking mighty fine so far . I'm guessing the filament suppliers will be taking a holiday on the business you put their way .😁

I loathe and depise amazon . Working practices , anti union stance etc etc . Never have and never will buy anything from them . BUT . It is sharp business practice as people are lazy and money/value oriented . My major gripe is that customers expect every business to be the same 24/7 , feedback etc and answering emails at all hours of the day . My business consists now of 2 people . I am not going to answer emails at 0330 on a sunday . We are doing fine by the way 😁

Great work

Looking good mate . 😁

Dots and lines are for a little bit of guidance only . You will get used to playing by ear .

Entirely dependent on what frets are fitted . Slots can be recut with appropriate kerf saw and made to fit the veneer .

A bit more extreme but I have done a couple . The veneer was about 9mm thick . I guess you would call it a new fingerboard . 😁

Always happy to have my brains picked . It shouldn't take long 😁

Fate amenable to change ?

Wago connectors from any good electrical supply shop . Or screwfix . I use them for testing mostly and would always solder a permanent connection . I'm sure they would be alright as a permanent solution.

Yeah . Pretty much that . Need to swap ground and feed on one lipstick 👍

They need a bit of work if you are going to do it yourself . Need to alter wiring on one lipstick to get humbucking effect . I reckon it's worth a go . Need something off the wall to go with the 3d printing .

How about a pair of lipsticks wired as a humbucker ?

Telecaster neck pickup has 6 polepieces under the metal can . The lipstick pickup is essentially a bar magnet wrapped in wire , encased in a tube . Used by Danelectro amongst others . They can be picked up from ebay or similar for £10-£15 . They punch way above their weight to my ears . The hotrail one below it is a strat style pickup and also can be had relatively cheaply . The EMG comes in several flavours , mostly active but they do passive as well . They do run to about £100 though .

Went through a lot of these boards building a small amp powered by an 18v drill battery . TDA8932 and TPA3118 . Every TPA3118 board that I bought let out the magic smoke , except for one . Bought from various suppliers but all defective . Settled on the TDA8932 . 100% reliable so far . Caveat emptor .

Single lipstick pickup in the P bass position ? You may well be surprised how good they sound . A cheap strat sized rail humbucker ? blew me away when I tried it on a bass mounted up near the neck . Or maybe an EMG active soapbar ?

Bog standard poly caps is where you need to be . Don't buy in to the whole mojo tone cap thing Rob . Snake oil salesmen . Paper in oil capacitors died out about the time of Marconi for good reason .

Did you volume/volume/tone ? If not I would like to see the wiring diagram as that may be your hum problem if not wired right . I have a noisy power supply on my bench which I will sort out one day . I use a home made 40W amp that runs off a drill battery to test . Took that up to island in Scotland last week and between use with the bass , and as a bluetooth speaker , a 2mAh battery lasted over 8 hours .

Loving the JP pickup configuration . Not one I've seen before . Is it wired with two volumes or volume and blend ? Hum without the bass plugged in can't really be blamed on the bass . You will get hum with the J pickup soloed if you are in an RF noisy environment . I suspect that your problem may be with the control plate wiring as it is of suspect quality . If you need any assistance with either the setup or wiring debugging , let me know either here or via DM . Astounding progress in such a short time Rob . I will be interested on peoples thoughts after your bass bash this weekend .

Glad to see its all coming together mate . I am now back in the land of the internet so will be able to offer (un)helpful comments where appropriate . Its nice to see the neck and hardware in its new incarnation . Keep up the good work .

Somewhere near a P bass position will work for a single pickup . A few mm , or even cm will not hurt . Nearer neck will be darker , nearer bridge will have more treble . There really is no right or wrong . Just get them in and play it and see . Its amazing how much can be done with minor eq changes and right hand position .

TBF , I Iove a thick dubby sound . The 734a works for me for any songs I play . It really is the go to bass for me . It will do pretty anything that I want it to do .

The preamp is far from a waste of space IMO . And its not a lot of space to be fair . You can flick a switch and run it passive . Not sure what is to be gained by a body swap 🤔

Great work dude . The offer of the headless neck is still there when/if you get round to it . The idea that you can make such a thing of beauty , but reckon that a neck would be a step to far is alien to me , but everyone has their areas of expertise i suppose . I wouldn't have a scooby where to even start with 3D printing . No need to be too wary of chinese necks . Who is the seller ? . I've bought a couple over the years and after a bit of finishing they have been fine . Both of the last two have had fingerboards removed and replaced with homemade fretless ones . I do think that you may be a bit tight for 18mm spacing with that neck but would not hurt to have a measure .