Numbers 3 and 4 on my 'from scratch' list...
This has a weird beginning:
In August of 2023 I had a mini stroke. The circumstances surrounding said transient ischemic attack are for another post, maybe.
However, because of the mini stroke and some other unsavory events, I filed for early retirement, we put our house in Sumner Illinois and moved to Lewistown Illinois to live near my brother in law.
I set my shop up in the basement and began the long process of getting back to some semblance of 'normal'.
After a mod job on a 60's Hagstrom to get the creative juices flowing, my brother in law gave me two 3x3 posts made of hickory and the game was afoot!
Hickory neck thru the body with walnut wings and a maple fingerboard crafted from a piece of discarded gymnasium floor which I charred and sanded back, then radius sanded and saturated with Danish oil and rubbed out until the oil cured. A piece of plexiglass became a pickguard and a mini humbucker from C.B. Gitty provided the signal.
After some minor mods to make it play and sound better, I'm quite satisfied with the little beast. It has a very punchy tone and the string tension is very good. The second bass is constructed of the same wood combination: hickory neck thru, walnut wings and more maple from the gym floor cast offs, only this fingerboard is clear coated to show off some sweet birdseye figuring.
This one however, is tuned BEAD, necessitating some creative measures to ensure good tension on the B string.
Between this little hack and the reverse headstock, this 30.5" scale bass has better tension on the B string than a couple of 34" scale basses I owned in the past!
After some judicious routing, a Gibson style sidewinder humbucker ( known among bassists as a mudbucker), and a narrow string width bridge were fitted, with excellent results. So...now I'm the proud owner of two short scale basses, which my somewhat arthritic hands adore!
Well, that's it for now - stay tuned, because I'm just getting started! 😉
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