Short Scale Body - Standard length neck?

JasonBassman

JasonBassman

Aug 22, 2023
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#1
I've got a Fender PJ Mustang Bass, and love the sleek body & pickups in it, but have 2 problems. First, the short 19 fret neck ain't cutting it, so I want to slide in a new standard-sized neck, it'll be weird but I don't really mind. Problem two, I'm a college student.
(poor)
Any ideas? Any places to purchase such necks? Anyone for hire? Is there an alternative I'm not seeing? Considering ditching my beloved Mustang for a Squier PJ (I shall transplant the pickups and still get a new neck)because I don't know how this will fit.
 
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#2
JasonBassman said:
I've got a Fender PJ Mustang Bass, and love the sleek body & pickups in it, but have 2 problems. First, the short 19 fret neck ain't cutting it, so I want to slide in a new standard-sized neck, it'll be weird but I don't really mind. Problem two, I'm a college student.
(poor)
Any ideas? Any places to purchase such necks? Anyone for hire? Is there an alternative I'm not seeing? Considering ditching my beloved Mustang for a Squier PJ (I shall transplant the pickups and still get a new neck)because I don't know how this will fit.
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If you want to change neck lengths, you need to go unlined fretless. A fretted neck will have all the frets incorrectly located. the tone of your hybrid bass will change too because you are effectively changing the location of the pickups. You will probably get some neck dive too.

Swapping for a 34" scale PJ is your best alternative
 
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#3
It might just be possible. I don't have a Mustang body handy to verify, but my rough calculations tell me that the bridge saddles would need to move back slightly less than an inch, and looking at pictures of Mustangs, the bridge is high enough up the body that you could probably get a standard P/J type bridge to fit in the proper location for a 34" scale.

To mount the neck you would have to either widen the neck pocket, or Slim down the heel of the neck. Either way would also involve plugging and re-drilling the mounting holes in the body and or neck. So while it is probably possible to do the conversion, it will involve quite a bit of work, and the end result may not be great.

The ideal thing would be to have a 'conversion' neck, that allowed you to use the original bridge in its normal location, and fit into the unmodified neck pocket. You wouldn't be able to get a 20-fret 34" scale that way, but maybe 20 or 21 frets on a 32" scale or something similar. I haven't seen that specific neck for sale, so you would likely have to have it custom made. I wouldn't worry much about changing the pickup locations; they change relatively every time you fret a note anyways. They will have a slightly different tone than they did with the other scale length, but so will the whole bass overall. Also, a Mustang with a longer neck could probably benefit from some lightweight tuners to help it balance.
 
#7
My issue isn't the frets, I agree that it'd be a bad idea to do all that for something rarely used. I don't really like the feel of it's neck, and want to get this mustang to fit "normal" cases - I'll be taking it on flights.
 
#8
JasonBassman said:
My issue isn't the frets, I agree that it'd be a bad idea to do all that for something rarely used. I don't really like the feel of it's neck, and want to get this mustang to fit "normal" cases - I'll be taking it on flights.
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You shouldn't make the bass fit the case, you should get a case that fits the bass.

Sprite Douglas BGC-200 3/4 BK Short Scale Bass Case Fits Fender Mustang

G&G Standard Hardshell Case - Mustang® Bass/Musicmaster™ Bass/Bronco™ Bass | Accessories
 
#9
You could try a Fender Jaguar SS 32-inch scale neck, but you only gain one fret. If you want more frets, you are better off selling the bass and getting another one. I am currently in the middle of a frankenbass project putting a Jaguar 32-inch neck on an Epi SG body, because I prefer 32-inch scale. It is going to require routing the body and possibly repositioning both the bridge and the mudbucker, depending on how inset I have to mount the neck to avoid dive. I put another Jaguar neck on an Epi Rock Bass body, the Epi 90's J-bass takeoff. I needed to move the bridge up so far that the bridge pickup is not really usable.

One option for more frets is to get a short scale neck and body from Warmoth. Their 30-inch scale has 20 frets and their 32-inch scale has 21 frets on a slightly smaller body. You can get the neck in right-hand-reverse-headstock, so you can use a standard long scale set of strings on the 32-inch scale. This is what I am considering for my next bass.
 
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#10
Here you go: Mitchell short scale. P/J 22 frets. On sale right now at Musicians Friend for $135.99. I wanted to see if there were any more comments before I posted about this one. I have one. It is my travel bass that I took to Mexico several times when I was still going down with my party band's annual week tour to raise money for the Zihuatanejo schools as the featured band for the ex-pat sailboat club. I have upgraded it with a Nordy Mustang pickup under solid P covers, a Seymour Duncan Stack J-neck pickup in the bridge position, real 250 kohm pots, a standard .047 tone capacitor, and a narrowed bridge more like Mustang spacing (yes, it came with 500 kohm pots and the guitar .022 tone capacitor). A great buy. But it is good out of the box, I just wanted my preferences. Put a set of GHS Balanced Nickels short scale strings on it and you are good to go.
Mitchell SS Bass.jpg
 
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