4 Strings

Found them! Here's the top scratchplate idea, would have a raised section between the pickups for a thumb rest, or ramp, and to house the tuner. [url="http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/MiniScratchplate1_zps1cc74315.jpg.html"][/url] Here's the small version which would not compromise the top surface of the pup for thumb space. Could be extended in two pieces to the neck. [url="http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/065d3e1e-8d1a-46b7-956f-09f0d563bf5f_zps59bfce8a.jpg.html"][/url]

Pickup covers. Oh to merely have four strings! Original thought was to have black plastic covers. Utility bass. Ruach either make wooden covers or fit their own with 'Ruach' etched on the top, like this one bought by BCer 'lowregister' - hope you don't mind me using the pic. [URL=http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/Ruachpup_zps54dafaa0.jpg.html][IMG]http://i1341.photobucket.com/albums/o760/4Strings1/Ruachpup_zps54dafaa0.jpg[/IMG][/URL] Quite like this idea of this, but they've used up all the 4 string versions of the shape I need (MM style at the bridge and a Jazz style at the neck). Not to worry, Utility Bass, plain black plastic is fine, maybe change to an etched pair if or when they are produced. Unfortunately the only covers Aaron Kent have at the moment for 4 strings were not quite right either. I could wait, or, our Heath came up with a solution, he'd make some wooden covers from the neck waste. Hmm, Utility bass with rippled maple pup covers. He'd do them with no additional charge to keep the project moving. Oooh. So it looks like we'll be having some exotic pup covers on the Utility Bass. Well, I suppose it could be considered a prototype. This may effect the colour choice! Also, should they now be matched with this sort of thing, or have I now lost it? [url="http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/Maple-rwknob_zpsefd662d7.jpg.html"][/url] I found myself lying awake at night imagining fights and weapons, protecting my baby from thieves.

Thanks, sprocket123, unfortunately it's causing me to display amazing impatience as I'm so excited! Playing with a little scratchplate design at the moment. A never use a pick (not out of any principle, just don't) so a scratchplate in the usual position is going to be pointless. However, a small one above the pickups would protect the waxed body from my thumb. BUT, the pups will protrude a certain amount and the thickness of a (wooden) scratchplate may then lose the purchase area on the top of the pups. However, I quite like the idea of a ramp between the pups and Heath and I were talking about the location of the Wittman tuner. In their pics it shows it on the edge of the neck. Can do this, but I've no idea how long it will take for the tuner to arrive and how much fiddling to get it to work etc. So, mounted on the scratchplate will allow an easy wiring route straight to the pup cavities and for it to be mounted at a later date. So the current thought is to combine it on a ramp. The ramp will have a ledge on the top for my thumb and the tuner which will then reduce in thickness to nothing. (I sketched it out, when I find where it's been tidied I'll post it up!)

[quote name='pierreganseman' timestamp='1380551009' post='2226916'] ... but what about taking 3 minutes of your time to send an email to actually explain the situation? [/quote] I think this is the key, its disarming and gains sympathy and patience. Honesty and communication.

[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1380550114' post='2226896'] Really? You wouldn't thinkg it was a "great story" if it happened to you, believe me. I was only in my late teens at the time; I'd ordered the bass with money from my first job & dealing with the whole thing was a f***ing nightmare. No pics - the whole incident got very nasty indeed. If I found & posted a picture people would be able to see the bass & therefore who it was made by & that's somewhere I really don't want to go. [/quote] Sorry, didn't mean to diminish your experience. Sounds like the builder you dealt with is better out of everyone's way.

[quote name='neepheid' timestamp='1380545122' post='2226766'] Understood, but my point remains that you have to physically put the T-nut inside the cab somehow as opposed to the hollow wall fixing which is all done from outside. [/quote] Yes. (They use T-Nuts for the handles)

[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1380545736' post='2226778']The time quoted for delivery came & went & all I got from the arsehole building it was a series of increasingly bizarre lies about why it was not ready. The bass in question had a unique set of inlays designed by me - Imagine my surprise when I saw somebody on Top of the Pops using a custom bass by the same builder with exactly the same woods as mine & with my inlays! To make it worse this was about a week after the builder told me the bass he was building me had been destroyed in a workshop fire! The guy ended up leaving the country with a long line of people he owed work & money to chasing after him. [/quote] Great story! Any pics of the band and your bass?

[quote name='neepheid' timestamp='1380538392' post='2226644'] Oh, missed that about T-nuts. The only difference I can think of is that the entire installation can be done from outside the cab with hollow wall anchors, no need to get inside - surely you'd have to press/drive the T-nut into the inside face of the base of the cab, or am I being mental? [/quote] Well, not mental, but they get drawn into place by tightening the screw.

[quote name='LukeFRC' timestamp='1380541792' post='2226698'] Just on the flipside of your letter.... Alan at ACG, Chris and the Guys at Overwater, Rob and Dawn at Status Chris at Alpher, Aaron at whatever Aaron armstrong's pickup making business, Alex at barefaced apart from Alpher and ACG I've not bought from them, but in talking to all of them and the way they conducted themselves, I would trust them 100% in their integrity and communications. The good guys should be celebrated I think! [/quote] You could add John East to that, been very helpful whenever asked

Do you have money tied in with the pickup order? Otherwise I think I would have cancelled it by now.

[quote name='owen' timestamp='1380533699' post='2226552'] The grain is enough as it is. It does not need adorning. Do you give the straight grain on a violin front a sunburst finish? No. Opinionated? Moi? [/quote] Perhaps a light tint to a highly translucent stain. Any stain will bring the grain out more. Green?

Lastly, for now, we're going with the Wittman built in tuner, talking to John East about a switchable pull-up volume control on the preamp.

Haven't come up with a suitable stand design. There's a Guild Thunderbird with a built in stand. Apparently, one of the features of many examples is a repair to the headstock from it falling over! [url="http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/GuildThunderbird_zps86f10af3.jpg.html"][/url] A better way round for the tripod would be to have the two feet on the stand (taking most weight) and a single point on the body. The limiting thing is the length of the stand, causes the body to lean back too far. Current thought is a flexible foot of some kind simply to allow it to be leant against something: [url="http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/AdjFoot_zps04b94372.jpg.html"][/url] or: [url="http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/flexyfoot_zpsb2f5f058.jpg.html"][/url] Might be a bit too clumsy looking, and the bass may spin when leaning. Instead, simply two rubber pads either side of the strap button would prevent this. Also wondering about a strip of rubber set into the back of the headstock near the top to allow leaning (and a bit of grip) without damage and not being visible from the front.

Not much to report at the moment, the pups and electronics are awaited, should start to arrive this week. In the meantime work continued on the neck, the front has been lacquered and this bit will now be all nice and shiny: [URL=http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/Ruach%20Utility%20Bass/photo_zps4e78a20f.jpg.html][IMG]http://i1341.photobucket.com/albums/o760/4Strings1/Ruach%20Utility%20Bass/photo_zps4e78a20f.jpg[/IMG][/URL] Heath popped over with his callipers to talk neck thickness dimensions. Also, he left the body with me to think about colour, rounding, arm rests, belly cavities etc. The latter has been started for positioning. The body wood has been treated with wood bleach to remove some black discolouration in some of the end grain and there is a patchy yellowing to the face which is likely to come out with similar treatment. You can see the shape properly here. Loosely based on MM and G&L bodies, it has received the Ruach style. I'm wanting a 'slab of wood' effect so the rounding of the edges is likely to be limited to the corners (maybe Tele style) rather than fully shaped like a Warwick. [URL=http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/Ruach%20Utility%20Bass/2013-09-30100838_zps7bb598a8.jpg.html][IMG]http://i1341.photobucket.com/albums/o760/4Strings1/Ruach%20Utility%20Bass/2013-09-30100838_zps7bb598a8.jpg[/IMG][/URL] The pencil marking on the back marks the approximate extent on the smoothing once the neck has been mounted. The neck will have an asymmetric profile and so the centre point of this bit will not end up central. [URL=http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/Ruach%20Utility%20Bass/2013-09-30100850_zps2018b790.jpg.html][IMG]http://i1341.photobucket.com/albums/o760/4Strings1/Ruach%20Utility%20Bass/2013-09-30100850_zps2018b790.jpg[/IMG][/URL] I'm enjoying being able to handle and hold the body, it's a lovely bit of wood with a lovely pattern, but as you can see it's not very pronounced (there is a series of vertical ripples which haven't come out). So I'm wondering about how opaque the finish should be. And what colour. No idea why the current fetish for green, never really like green guitars, I hope it passes soon!

I'm not having that experience with Ruach, although the build has currently lost a bit of momentum while they await the arrival of hardware etc (mostly from independent makers!). I get almost daily updates and pics and I have sent them a nauseating amount of emails with suggestions, pics, ideas etc, all cheerfully received and replied. They have also popped round to my house when in the area to drop colour samples, show me wood etc.

[quote name='stevie' timestamp='1380489361' post='2226176'] Customers shouldn’t have to use wood glue, sawdust and matchsticks to stop bits falling off a product that costs over a thousand pounds. [/quote] Fair enough, although they're not quite as expensive as that! Also, unlike many other manufacturers, you're not dealing with lawyers and letters of the law in warranties but a small group of very nice people who want to get things right.

[quote name='Protium' timestamp='1380452646' post='2225376'] I'd send it back to barefaced, tell them to fix it and stop penny pinching on cheap sh*te hardware. [/quote] Even as a very happy BF user, I think this is fair comment, although the feet and fixings are no different to many others. The BF cabs are, I understand, made from ply with varying density, ie tough and hard outer plies and softer but lighter in the middle. Perhaps this give less for the screws to bite into. As I mentioned, i appear to have solved the problem on my cabs with a dab of glue in each screw hole.

If it's drummer 'with crappy time' he has to. (Or shout things like 'TEMPO!' when each drumfill raises the song by 2bpm)

Subscribed - very interested in the neck insert especially

The neck wood is wonderful. I was almost sad that the body had a top, the walnut is also beautiful but that's going to be an outstanding body. I'd be interested to know why they make the body thinner at the neck joint. Need more update pics! Walnut pup covers?

This is an amazing piece of work! Hope the horn holds up (as it were).

A few minutes of drizzle will do little more than make some surfaces wet. Anything more then I think I'd be packing things away. There will always be better opportunities to play. How many will be in the wet watching? I'm not a fan, but radio mics etc all helped this situation: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adD-9JxQ8kc

Maybe, but those details are on every cheque issued and so are hardly secrets. Sounds like he has a deal somewhere along the line for getting paid for hits to his site. This could just be a way of improving that number of hits. If you can be bothered, could see what the net step entails, you're clearly cautious already so I'd doubt you'd do anything silly.

Reeeeally Nice! I must admit, the spec sounded a bit stealth/matt black for me, but the result is beautiful. Subtle and balanced. I also really like the scratch plate and the curvy bit in the head. Well done, also please it plays so well!

Little update: Headstock inlay - I asked for the full 'Ruach' as opposed to the more normal 'R'. It will be set on a black background so it will stand out more. Heath cut it to match the lower curve. [URL=http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/Ruach%20Utility%20Bass/IMG_3525_zpsa4a67b52.jpg.html][IMG]http://i1341.photobucket.com/albums/o760/4Strings1/Ruach%20Utility%20Bass/IMG_3525_zpsa4a67b52.jpg[/IMG][/URL] The headstock has a curve to the top and so the string posts will have a partial, shallow recess. We both like a slim headstock (the poorer quality guitars in my life have always been a bit chunky here, lower quality materials maybe. Even MM and Fenders show a thinner headstock on the older models.) [url="http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/IMG_3570_zpsa16ec785.jpg.html"][URL=http://s1341.photobucket.com/user/4Strings1/media/Ruach%20Utility%20Bass/IMG_3570_zpsa16ec785.jpg.html][IMG]http://i1341.photobucket.com/albums/o760/4Strings1/Ruach%20Utility%20Bass/IMG_3570_zpsa16ec785.jpg[/IMG][/URL][/url]