Well here it goes

fatmarris

fatmarris

Nov 9, 2024
35
190
33
Twin cities transplant
#1
Hey TB,

Long time listener, first time caller, thought I would share this with a community that cares! I’ve been playing for probably close to 20yrs.. I’ve had a couple of basses most of the time but that’s not super relevant at the moment..

The real story is that years ago I got bored.. So I started tearing things apart figuring out what did what and how everything worked and how to change feel and playability not so much electronics at first but construction..

Any ways drilled and filled a number of holes until I had all my ideas in one place then I played that guy for the last 5 years or so as my backup while I designed more things in my head..

A couple years of thinking learning and collecting tools and parts later and here we are…

NEW BASS DAY!!!!

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It’s an original design that was inspired by a few of my favorite 60s era basses

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I’ve got one more in the pipeline but I just finished this guy last night

let me know what you think!
 
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#5
I knew I wanted a shot scale and I knew I wanted some kind of double cut and I knew I wanted a natural finish and I thought multiple woods would look nice

I had a couple basses that had a more modern sound and I wanted something that had a more 60s rock, pop rock, whatever else kind of sound so I thought it would be fun to use a mudbucker

This is my really bad hand drawing 😂

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And I then found a block of maple and walnut on sale for cheap and matched it to a used AM Mustang short scale neck I had in the basement

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#6
I probably cheated compared to some of you guys but I designed everything in a CAD program and did a bunch of mock ups and then cut it out on a friends CNC

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Then it came time to cut!

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I put it basically together to verify

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Then went home took back apart and started sanding and finishing

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I decided to go with a few coats of linseed oil and a lot of wet sanding and buffing basically.. the finish came out awesome
 
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#8
Then I waited.. let it cure for two weeks or so and buffed it every couple days to get oil residue off and whatnot once the buffing was over I let it sit for another week then started putting it together!

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I think that’s basically it I’m happy to answer any questions about anything else!

As for the wiring I basically bought a 6 way varitone switch with a choke from a seller on reverb then wired it in place of the tone cap to make a blend knob and then it’s a standard volume with a treble bleed all 500k pots.. had the same guy on reverb actually build the harness for me with a solderless connector so i could remove easily for any finish touch ups and whatnot..

In truth I could maybe have made a nicer harness myself but I was just ready to put it all together and he had the parts all ready..

Thanks for reading
 
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#13
fatmarris said:
I knew I wanted a shot scale and I knew I wanted some kind of double cut and I knew I wanted a natural finish and I thought multiple woods would look nice

I had a couple basses that had a more modern sound and I wanted something that had a more 60s rock, pop rock, whatever else kind of sound so I thought it would be fun to use a mudbucker

This is my really bad hand drawing 😂

View attachment 7073339

And I then found a block of maple and walnut on sale for cheap and matched it to a used AM Mustang short scale neck I had in the basement

View attachment 7073342
Click to expand...
Uh oh! Feet in the pic!! Haha!

Just kidding, but there have been some pretty infamous posts here on TB where visible feet caused a hilarious derail.
 
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#15
fatmarris said:
Understood! I’ll see what I can come up with!View attachment 7073331this was fit test.. can I sit with it as I kinda made all the decisions up I didn’t really know what it would look like.. so first I made a foam mock up to make sure everything fit and was in the right place and scale length and whatnot
Click to expand...
Is it what they mean by "sea foam blue" ? (Okay, just an old uncle joke ! )
 
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#18
deepestend said:
Love it. Very cool. How does it sound?
Click to expand...
Very 60s in my opinion.. which was the goal so I’m glad it worked out!
It’s probably not a perfect recreation of anything specific but with the varitone switch I get a couple different aggressive rock sounds like a mad thunderbird or something that moves into some lofi stuff.. it also gets a pretty good Beatles or Rolling Stones era tone that can get a little crunchy like Cream or something which I really like and then the choke setting is just really thick and warm like wider than any of the other sounds but not distorted at all just glorious.. so all pretty unique and usable sounds I think

But honestly the best part of all is it makes me want to play! For hours..
 
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