wesfinn

looks great Kevin!

Looks cool man!

Friday is nearly over so here is another update on the J.. Bit of bad news about the build, the neck has moved a bit too much since cutting the shape so I'm going to scrap it and start again. I would try and work around it but there not enough meat left to get it back to being flat and true. This is why I leave the timber to settle after cutting. Most of the time they don't move much at all, but this was one of the blanks that did! OH well, thats the nature of wood! So heres a little interesting thing for you, after realising the neck was going to the land of the scrap I decided to make the truss rod routing jig. and after the first pass (note the scrap neck being my test subject!) Works perfectly! Bang in the center and perfect depths etc! not as exciting as the usual posts I know...I have been doing a bit of restoration work this week though which has seen most of my time! Right I gotta make me another neck

not quite as good as the fodera but I got a fretless MIM jazz bass in sunburst about 5 years ago from cash converters. It was as new and had labella flats on it. i paid £85, had to go and extend my overdraft to get it as I was skint at the time!

Great minds indeed Andy! I just love the colour!

Thanks guys! I am becoming very tempted to finish this in burgundy mist now.....hmmmm......not vintage correct for the ash body but as this bass is for me..we shall see!

Thanks Clarky! Means a lot that people are enjoying seeing my work!

couple of things done today. I'm still waiting for my templates for neck pocket, pickups and control cavity which is kind of holding me up....so I decided to do it the hard way and Pencil them out and rout them completely free hand...I don't usually do this as it takes much longer and a lot more concentration. (sorry the pics arent as good quality as usual, I forgot the camera again and took them on my mac photo booth thing) heres the control cavity after routing and heres the neck pocket all aligning perfectley along the center line next up I pencil out the best section of the Brazilian Rosewood board and cut out on the bandsaw to just out side the line. and heres a how it looks with the bridge and control plate, neck and finger board all place together.... can ya guess what it is yet?? thats all for today folks, will do the Pickup routs when the templates arrive as I;d rather not do them freehand! thanks Wes

Tomorrow i'll be doing some more on the J. Have ordered the 5/32" hardened steel silver rods to make the truss rods, these will be had made and have the correct vintage threads and square block anchor (these truss rods are not available off the shelf in the correct size) I need to make some new curved Jigs for the truss rod routing, I'll make a few one for slab boards, a reverse for Maple boards and one for guitars. These need to have the correct curvature for the years and the angle for the adjustment nut drill needs to be 2 degrees to minimise the risk of the fingerboard developing a hump around the 15th fret. untill the next lot of progress heres some pictures of the Tele I'm making. This is going to be a 62 Black with mint guard and slab brazilian rosewood board, it's also the first guitar I have ever made so it's all pretty fun and a learning curve for me! It's made from a one piece lightweight alder. Heres some of the swamp ash and alder I picked up last week and also a lovely figured spalted maple top which is going to go on one of my custom builds, maybe a singlecut!

Nice review Andy! The ones we had in at GAK have all been pretty heavy (10 - 10 1/2lbs) which is dissapointing...other than that they are very good! nice feel and sound great with the new N3 pups! We will be selecting the lighter ones for the shop in future!

Hi there, Wes here at GAK bass dept. Sibob is correct in saying that you should bring the bass back to us if theres any issues such as bad pickup grounding. This will be covered under your 2 year warrenty. These basses fantastic instruments for the money. Although there is a large rout for the neck pickup, this is done to cut factory build time as it takes much longer to manually drill the cable runs from the pickup to the control cavity. cheers Wes

you have got some awesome gear there guys/girls! Wish i had that kinda gear when I was a teen! I couldnt afford a bass when I started many years ago...I could afford a tanglewood rebel neck though and a block of basswood which I crudely fashioned into a bass in my dads shed! It actually sound pretty damn good even though the pickups are nameless and I got given a very simple active circuit for it. Its still hanging on my wall though to remind me of how not to make a bass!

Annoyingly I forgot to take my camera today, got a fair bit done, although I've been commisioned to make a black 62 t style g****r so was getting stuck into that more than the J today. The J neck has been robo-sanded and is looking lovvverly! Ill take some pictures next time I'm at the workshop. cheers Wes

thanks steve and ebs so today I didn't manage to get much done apart from drum sand the fingerboards, I did go and pickup loads of wood though which includes swamp ash, alder, rock maple neck blanks, flame maple neck blanks, spalted maple and absolutely gorgeous old growth DARK indian rosewood for fingerboards! Also I have a new compressor and spray gun coming! Im waiting on some CNC cut templates made with correct dimensions to arrive. Once they are here I will route the pickups and cavity and neck pocket etc. tomorrow I shall do some more work on the neck and maybe make a start on a 59 P style and a 55 P style!

Well good!

looking good man!

Did a little bit more today... first up heres a shot of the neck where you can see the light flame! going to look gorgeous I reckon! After some comparisons with early 60's J images I decided to recut the belly contour and make it a bit deeper and also make the forearm more rounded as they were back then. looks a lot nicer now. I always find it good to go back to things like the next day as you see things in a different light which you might miss when youve been staring at the same piece of wood all day! got my harness together too with some sweet reproduction caps alongside switch craft jack and CTS dual concentric solid shaft pots. and heres some of the hardware (still awaiting the rest and the Pups). note the string mute set which will be going on this! I was going to relic this bass but I think it'll look much better as 'Factory Fresh' especially with the flame in the neck! Here I am drilling the strap button holes to specs. note the rear buttons were not drilled on the centre line! thats all for today. Hope everyone has a nice Easter weekend! Wes

And with regards to it being quick, if you plan what you are going to be doing properly everything should run pretty smoothly! this bass has had about 12 hours work in total so far!

[quote name='Sibob' post='793838' date='Apr 1 2010, 10:54 PM']Looking awesome mate, and quick too lol! Is this going to be the natural Jazz, or colour finish? Si[/quote] This will be the blonde one mate. Im getting the timber for the solid colours next week.

[quote name='BassBod' post='793649' date='Apr 1 2010, 07:21 PM']Your workshop looks very tidy..... Can't wait to see some spray-gun action![/quote] Haha. My Mum always made me tidy up after myself! I'm going to start making my spray booth soon. Thats also a reason I keep the shop tidy as when I do the spraying I want there to be as little dust as possible to avoid contamination. I'm getting an air filter soon which will take any dust out of the air. and I've got a pretty powerful vacuum/extracter for cleaning everywhere else!

next up I roughly cut out the neck on the bandsaw then check for straightness as the neck has been relieved of tension. I will let the neck settle for a few days and check to see if it needs to be flattened again. Heres a shot of the body and neck and fingerboard I have picked out for this build. I have decided to use a brazilian board after all More soon! Thanks Wes

heres an update on the build first job was to run the body round the pin router with the correct radius ovolo cutter. On the back making sure to stop at the correct points by the heel for an early 60's. Then its time to do the forearm and belly contours. I mark these out free hand as they were always slightly different. Also gives the bass a bit of character! Then to rough cut the forearm. The way the contours were cut in the olden days was on a large belt linisher, which i dont have. So I do mine with a rasp file by hand. Then the same for the belly contour. I then use my sander to level them off ready for the final sanding. Heres some shots with the contours nicely blended in. I think it looks quite nice Next I place the template onto the front of the body and drill the bridge holes and the neck holes.

[quote name='niceguyhomer' post='731325' date='Feb 1 2010, 08:09 AM']I've owned all 3 makes - Aguilar GS112s, Bergantino 112s, an Epifani UL310 and a 410. I'm currently using two Aggies - a GS112 and a 112NT and I love 'em to bits. I don't know if it's my imagination but since I got the Aguilar AG500 head, they've been astounding me with their tone ever since. The two Bergies I had were also fantastic cabs with better mids than the Aggies, great build quality etc. The Epifani UL410 was monstrous - a fantastic cab with a huge sound and ridiculously light too but I think the cab that gave me the most pleasure was the UL310 - it ticked all the boxes, light loud, small, punchy, articulate etc. Truth is, they're all good cabs - well made and they sound fantastic, I don't think you can go wrong with any of them.[/quote] I'll second you on the Aggies with the AG500! I used to use a markbass little mark with them which I thought was great, then I got the AG500 due to needing the 2 channels. Since then the GS112's really have come into their own!