It came from the black lagoon...

[neepheid]

Last night I was braver with my flatting, and I got it pretty much flat.  Unfortunately, I sprayed a couple of coats over the top and it's gone a bit orange peel-y.  Very frustrating, I've done the same thing in the same way for the past 3 nights.  I think I'll blast a couple more coats on it tonight before band rehearsal and see if it levels out a bit, after that I guess I'll just have to buff it out.  Pain.

 

 

 

 

[neepheid]

43 minutes ago, Stub Mandrel said:

 

'Test in inconspicuous area of the garment'

 

We're well past the testing stage now!

[Hellzero]

As your paint dilution and viscosity could be discarded, the orange peel effect appears when you're too far from the surface or too many passes (the paint is not dry enough between passes) or when there's a draft, or all of these.

[neepheid]

9 minutes ago, Hellzero said:

As your paint dilution and viscosity could be discarded, the orange peel effect appears when you're too far from the surface or too many passes (the paint is not dry enough between passes) or when there's a draft, or all of these.

 

Must be the environmental then (am spraying in an unheated, uninsulated shed, so save for wind whatever's going on outside is happening inside also).  I'm using the same timings as before, as instructed on the can (3 minute shake, 2 coats 5 minutes apart at 6"/15cm distance, 15 mins touch dry, 24 hour cure), so I left it 15 mins between double coats and that was working fine for the past two nights.  I know men cannot be relied upon 100% to know what six inches looks like, but I'd like to think I was in the ball park most of the time...

[Hellzero]

My late father would have had the exact answer in no time as he explained me why, once (he wasn't pedagogical at all, so only once), why the orange peel effect appears, so as all, but the environment has been excluded, it was certainly too cold that night compared to the other times.

[neepheid]

Ach, no matter, probably blast a couple more coats on that, then flatten back, then polish.  Should be fine.  Was just annoyed because it had been going on smooth and great until then.

[neepheid]

Left it for a few days, then did a proper flatten and polish - 1500 > 2000 > 2500 grit wet sanding followed by Meguiars Ultimate Compound for the final polish.  First time using Meguiars and wow, I'm sold.  The compound plus a microfibre cloth and job's a good 'un!  Not quite the "sheet of glass", but for a first go by an absolute beginner amateur who has never done anything like this before in his life, I'm pretty pleased with the outcome.  It looks... intentional?

 

 

Looks better than this IRL.  The camera does lie!

 

So, as you can gather, it's all back together again.  Gave the fretboard a drink of lemon oil which it greedily accepted.  I can happily proclaim the outcome of my first ever full fret level and crowning to be a success - no high frets, no buzzes, very happy with that!

 

 

It's playing pretty damn well, took a setup like a champ.  Truss rod on this super cheap neck is working great - obviously it was pretty slack from when I was doing the fret level, so when I put a fresh set of D'addario XLs on it it bent like a banana.  No matter, a full turn on the truss rod and it was back to straight - actually too straight for my liking so I loosened it about an 1/8 of a turn and then there was a sliver of relief - just how I like it.  Nut height feels OK to me - I'm no expert but I'm whizzing around the low frets no bother so I guess it's good.

 

There are only some minor things to sort out now.  The rotten bit at the bottom/back of the body.  I'm not wedded to these amber speed knobs.  I get quite a bit of touch buzz off the pole pieces of the Warman pickup and because it's fully epoxy potted, there's no way to earth them from the back, so unless I've done something wrong in the wiring, I'll have to do the old "lacquer/nail varnish on the pole pieces" trick.

 

And because some of you care about these things, it weighs 3.7kg/8.15lbs on the bathroom scales.  It's not a heavy bass by any means, but it has enough heft to keep me happy.

[Richard R]

Multiple Wows!!

Looks great, but I agree you need to swap the control knobs. Black and grey to match the headstock?

 

 

[SpondonBassed]

That's looking good.  I imagine you will have a lot of fun tweaking things like the knobs (as mentioned) and the control cavity cover.

 

I had a chuckle to myself when I saw how the G string obscures the view of your "deliberate" mistake of leaving out the line in the note's tail.  Did I see you had managed to fix it in an earlier image?

 

Why not make a feature of the rotted part?  Maybe a bit of faux gold filler to make it stand out.  Transparent coloured fillers can look good too.  Wire brush the rotten fragment out to leave an interesting texture and wah-hay!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited Sunday at 12:42 by SpondonBassed

[neepheid]

4 hours ago, Richard R said:

Multiple Wows!!

Looks great, but I agree you need to swap the control knobs. Black and grey to match the headstock?

 

 

 

Thinking black and chrome will tie it all in nicely with the large pole piece pickups and the chrome hardware.  Anyway, they're ordered, so we'll see if I was right later in the week!

[neepheid]

4 hours ago, SpondonBassed said:

That's looking good.  I imagine you will have a lot of fun tweaking things like the knobs (as mentioned) and the control cavity cover.

 

I had a chuckle to myself when I saw how the G string obscures the view of your "deliberate" mistake of leaving out the line in the note's tail.  Did I see you had managed to fix it in an earlier image?

 

Why not make a feature of the rotted part?  Maybe a bit of faux gold filler to make it stand out.  Transparent coloured fillers can look good too.  Wire brush the rotten fragment out to leave an interesting texture and wah-hay!

 

 

It will be fun to have a play about with these minor things, but I'm mostly looking forward to road testing it with the bands later this week!  Sounding good in the cans, but it's not the same as having a thrash at war volume with a full band.

 

I did fix the little gap in the logo, ultra fine Sharpie and a ruler, then more clearcoat on top.

 

The rotten part is super low priority, but because it'll be nigh on impossible to fix it invisibly, you're right - I might as well make a feature of it instead.  Cool ideas, had a few others, will mull it over.

[neepheid]

Well, a quick update - I've sorted the touch buzz on the Warman pickup.  My mistake, I bunched together the main pickup ground with the ground of one of the coil ends instead of it going to "chassis" ground.  Separated them then soldered the braid to the copper shield and that sorted it.

 

Weirdly enough, there's touch buzz on the bridge pickup, but only when it's out of circuit (well, it's not truly out of circuit because it's still connected to the blend pot), which is pretty odd.  No matter, I don't ever rest my thumb there so I'm not super concerned about that.

Edited Sunday at 17:31 by neepheid

[Hellzero]

I also think that making the rotten part obviously obvious (voluntary redundancy) is the thing to do...

[SpondonBassed]

4 minutes ago, Hellzero said:

obviously obvious (voluntary redundancy)

 

Good one!  A doff of my hat to you sir.

 

(You can collect your redundancy payment on your way out... heeheehee)

[neepheid]

These knobs.  I think they tie things together nicely with their half black, half shiny nature.

 

[SpondonBassed]

2 hours ago, neepheid said:

These knobs.  I think they tie things together nicely with their half black, half shiny nature.

 

 

Knobs.  Eh?

 

Heeheehee.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I don't often find myself admiring a knob but those look good.

[snorkie635]

Yes indeedy Neeps, easily the best thing to come out of Aberdeen since Denis Law. Well done that man.

[neepheid]

30 minutes ago, snorkie635 said:

Yes indeedy Neeps, easily the best thing to come out of Aberdeen since Denis Law. Well done that man.

 

Ha, Annie Lennox is going to be so annoyed at that.

[Si600]

2 hours ago, SpondonBassed said:

 

Knobs.  Eh?

 

Heeheehee.

 

I don't often find myself admiring a knob but those look good.

There had better not be a volute involved as well Spondz.

[SpondonBassed]

1 hour ago, Si600 said:

There had better not be a volute involved as well Spondz.

 

Oh you know me so well.  Fender seems not to like them.  Maybe they detract attention from the Land of the Giants' headstock logo too much...?

 

@neepheid

 

Neepster?  If I bought this could you change the neck for a nice Ibby SR series neck for me?  If not... knock the price down enough for me to buy one and I can take care of it m'self.

 

Joking aside, I bought a selection of metallic powders to see if mixing them with resin & hardener would work as a metallic looking filler to do an inlay on one of Jack's uke builds.  It didn't bling as I'd hoped but it looked eye catching anyway when flatted and buffed.

 

I've still got some somewhere if you want to have a play before you decide how you want to fill the water damage.  PM me and I can pop some in the post for you.

[neepheid]

2 minutes ago, SpondonBassed said:

 

Oh you know me so well.  Fender seems not to like them.  Maybe they detract attention from the Land of the Giants' headstock logo too much...?

 

@neepheid

 

Neepster?  If I bought this could you change the neck for a nice Ibby SR series neck for me?  If not... knock the price down enough for me to buy one and I can take care of it m'self.

 

Joking aside, I bought a selection of metallic powders to see if mixing them with resin & hardener would work as a metallic looking filler to do an inlay on one of Jack's uke builds.  It didn't bling as I'd hoped but it looked eye catching anyway when flatted and buffed.

 

I've still got some somewhere if you want to have a play before you decide how you want to fill the water damage.  PM me and I can pop some in the post for you.

 

Girl, I'm just a Neepster for your love?

 

I'll get my coat.

 

PM incoming.

[Richard R]

Re: "neepster"

on reading that word it just occurred to me that @neepheid should probably be pronounced "neep-heed", in a Scottish accent. 

 

Not "neeffeed" in an English accent, which is how I have been reading it in my head for the past seven years.

 

Am I correct, or now being thick in a yet another novel and embarrassing way??

 

Edited 2 hours ago by Richard R
Typo

[neepheid]

23 minutes ago, Richard R said:

Re: "neepster"

on reading that word it just occurred to me that @neepheid should probably be pronounced "neep-heed", in a Scottish accent. 

 

Not "neeffeed" in an English accent, which is how I have been reading it in my head for the past seven years.

 

Am I correct, or now being thick in a yet another novel and embarrassing way??

 

 

You have indeed stumbled upon the correct pronunciation.  It is simply "neep" as in swede/turnip/rutabaga and "heid" as in head.  A silly person, basically.  I came up with it as my internet nom de guerre/plume because I was wanting a Hotmail address (in the pre Microsoft days, so around 1996?) with no numbers in it and I wondered what no American would think of.

[Richard R]

I can't think why it took me so long to realise! Clearly the turnip-head in this instance is south of the border.

[LowB_FTW]

9 minutes ago, Richard R said:

I can't think why it took me so long to realise! Clearly the turnip-head in this instance is south of the border.

You are not alone in the way you thought it was correctly pronounced. 😳

 

Mark