New Fretless Build

[Peaty]

 

 

Hello Basschatters 

I had been looking for a fretless for a while and there have been several on the forum that I nearly went for but in the end decided to build one for myself. 

 

The plan is for a fretless four string, with a single Bartolini MMC pup coupled to an East filter preamp.

 

I used to do a few builds, some of which I posted on a previous incarnation of this site, but I haven't done one for ten years or so now so it will be interesting to see how much I remember. Anyhow the idea is to keep the budget down to the cost of what I was going to spend on buying a fretless so a notional budget of ca. £400. This will mostly go on parts as I have an unused mahogany body blank, maple neck blank and a wenge fretboard left over from when I last built a bass, although I will splash out on a nice walnut top for it.

 

Here is a pic of the last fretted bass I made, the plan is for the fretless to be the same shape and style if i can find the old template and hopefully source a similar grade walnut top.

[kodiakblair]

2 hours ago, Peaty said:

although I will splash out on a nice walnut top for it.

 

I've had some lovely drop tops from these folks.

 

https://edelholzhandel.com/Amerikanischer-Nussbaum-Black-Walnut

[Peaty]

Thanks Kodiak I will give them a look.

 

In the mean time

I located the template on the useful things shelf in the garage and used the router to cut the rough shape of the inner body block.

There is still lots of tidying up on the front and back to get the shape flat enough plus I need to remove excess glue from the initial glue up of the blank.

 

I now need to order the walnut  top and some light coloured veneer for laminating. The back is coming out of a nice pice of hard wood shelving that I rescued from a local skip, not sure quite what the wood is but it is a nice deep red colour with a pleasing grain and very hard, so perfect for fending off belt buckle rash.

Hopefully I can get that planed down to the required thickness and sanded over the festive break.

 

 

[Hellzero]

Following with interest.

[Mediocre Polymath]

Funny thing. For years I've been playing a home-made bass with a bartolini MMC and a jazz pickup at the neck. I originally added a jazz to my stingray copy back in the early 2000s, and have used those same electrics for years.

 

Recently though, I came to the realisation that the jazz pickup has never really helped me get the sort of deep woofiness I was looking for as a counterpoint to the growly Bart.

 

I learned to play on a my dad's old EB3, and I have been considering replacing the jazz with a mudbucker, but I've never seen that configuration anywhere. Well anywhere before now.

 

How do you find it?

 

 

[Peaty]

I had used MMC's in a few builds prior but always had a soft spot for the dimazio model one as it was what was in my first ever bass, so decided to try it paired up with an MMC. It can be a bit too much soloed, but blended with the bart they sound great together.

 

In that fretted one in the pic above the signal goes from the blend  knob to a bart NTBT pre to give treble and bass cut and boost which it provides plenty of sonic flexibility. When I first built it I was considering parallel / series switches for  one or both pickups but having played it for ten years or so now I don't think it is needed, plus it would turn an already busy control cavity into a spaghetti monster.

 

For the new build I am aiming for a more tidy wiring set up built around an east filter pre amp, sourced second hand from the forum (pic below).

 

A Question I have for anyone who might know is, what are the pros and cons of a separate battery box over mounting the battery inside the main control cavity ?

[kodiakblair]

2 minutes ago, Peaty said:

A Question I have for anyone who might know is, what are the pros and cons of a separate battery box over mounting the battery inside the main control cavity ?

Pros.

 

Only 2 screws to slacken instead of 4.

 

A few more grams of weight shaved off.

 

Less chance some ham-fisted oaf can disturb components when prising the clip off the battery.

 

Cons

 

There is no universal standard size for 9v batteries. That can cause problems at a really inconvenient time, box was designed for Duracell but you're holding Eveready.

Not an issue with a control cavity mount.