A couple of new basses for blablas

[paulo]

And another cool project!
That's awesome!

[blablas]

The faker is no project, just a bit of doodling around in between full builds.

This will be a project.

A new DIY build, 6 string short scale (30"). Sort of a Bass VI but with decent string spacing for a bass player.

And while I was posting about shielding the faker, this shot through my head!
A few weeks ago I applied copper shielding to my Dano Longhorn, a large improvement, the pickups are producing a lot less hum now, it's not fully gone but that's in the nature of using single coils.

While I was busy working on this one I also changed the rotation direction for the knobs, now they work in the proper (right handed) direction.
What is it with most manufactures to assume that because us lefty's are left handed we do everything in reverse!!

[paulo]

To ME anything other than switching strings is considered a project

[fivebass52]

Harley Benton Kahuna CLU-Bass.

Fun little acoustic bass, not sure yet if I like these thick rubber strings.

I have a Kala U-bass, and living here in Hawaii I've had a problem with the humidity making the strings very sticky. Over the years I've tried different types of finger lubricants like Finger Ease etc., but found them all to feel too mechanical "oily" to the touch. Some years back I started using hand lotions, and have settled on Gold Bond Ultimate Healing Lotion. I by it at Walgreens in the 1oz size, usually ten-or-so at a time for $1.00US, and put them in all of my gig bags and carry cases. Surprisingly, it's not very greasy, and doesn't dry up on my hands in a short time, like some do. And all I have to do at times is rub my hands quickly together to generate friction/heat to reactivate it. Been using it on all my basses, and it doesn't seem to clog the strings up anywhere near what you'd think using a hand cream would. And it's especially good on those big/fat silicone strings!

It's all I use, and on the plus side, it falls under the 3-4 ounce limit that TSA imposes at airport check-ins... other than eating fried chicken before a gig ala Jaco, this is the best lube I've found... Just my two cents... and one ounce, of input!

[blablas]

Almost straight from the box.

And in full modified and tweaked glory (only thing still to do is the trussrod cover).


Most of what I did was fixing 'just off' things.
- Center aligned the pickups to the strings, the bridge pu was moved over by 3 millimeters, the neck pu by 1 millimeter.
- Due to the moving of the pickups I also had to move the pickguard.
- Reshaped the nut, they just put on a right handed one so this needed to be seriously modified, I'll probably make a new one in he future.
- Gave the tuner bushings a few knocks on their head, they were mounted crooked, tuners are also not up to my standard so will be replaced later on.
- The fingerboard had several less good looking and finished spots, re-finished these.
- Crowned the frets where needed and polished them, they were level but rough finished in a lot spots.
- Changed the rotation direction of the pots, they were wired lefty so nothing wrong there, I just can't and won't cope with this reversed crap!
- Done a full shielding of the controls cavity, there was none whatsoever.
- Made a thumb rest.
- Replaced the strap holders, what was on there was mounted with very thin and short screws, to leave those would have been waiting for an accident to happen.
- Checked if all the screws and bolts were tightened and if they weren't tightened them (more often than not they were loose!).
- Did a full and thorough setup.

Conclusion:
After all the things I did I mentioned above this bass has transformed into a very nice, good working and playing Rick 4005 interpretation.
Sound wise it has some settings that can resemble the Rick sound very closely, luckily it also has it's own sound, the pickups sound good enough for me, only minus is that the bridge pickup is slightly microphonic but I can live with that.
The lacquer and finish is not bad - there are some blemishes and rough spots, most blemishes are underneath the lacquer!

This is another AliExpress bass I would advise not to buy to most people. If you are in to tinkering it's perfect, if you are not you should stay away from these basses. It can be turned into a good player (and looker) without too much effort.

The build quality on this one was a lot better in comparison to the two Jazz V basses I bought through AliExpress before. These two needed some serious work to make them playable, straight from the box they were unusable.

[blablas]

The finishing touch

[tim]

Brilliant.

[paulo]

Very cool! Love how the letters match and the name too!

[blablas]

The full picture, finally with the truss rod cover on it.

[blablas]

Very cool! Love how the letters match and the name too!

Dymaxion true type font.

[rdavidson]

blablas - how do you take pictures of your instruments? Is that olive color a studio backdrop or do you do that post-processing? What about the lighting? And how do you position the bass? I don't see any stands, etc. Would love to know some of your tips and tricks as your photos are stunning and represent your instruments really well visually! Thanks!

[blablas]

The background is post processing, I edit out the stand and original background and fill this with a 'dirty' color to enhance the colors the instrument has.
There is a spot in my home (the hallway) that gives me perfect balanced natural lighting coming from two sides, I can control this lighting even further by making use of the window blinds.


This is roughly how the photo's look without edits.

[rdavidson]

The background is post processing, I edit out the stand and original background and fill this with a 'dirty' color to enhance the colors the instrument has.
There is a spot in my home (the hallway) that gives me perfect balanced natural lighting coming from two sides, I can control this lighting even further by making use of the window blinds.

Great work - and thanks for the info!

[paulo]

Yeah awesome pics!
I try hard but don't get even close! =)

[blablas]

Latest addition to the herd. Sire Marcus Miller V7 Alder-5 tobacco sunburst.

You get a lot of bass for a decent price, very well built with an extremely versatile preamp onboard. Tonight I will do a proper setup and more toying around with it.

[tim]

Nice! I'm enjoying mine, but haven't found strings I'm thrilled with yet.

I look forward to hearing what kind of improvements you make.

[pjmuck]

Very cool. Looks like a 5 string version of mine. What was the turnaround time on your order? I'm thinking about possibly ordering a maple/ash one.

[blablas]

It was in my hands two days after ordering, could/should have been one but UPS was slow!
After having decided I wanted this specific one it went out of stock at Thomann.de for almost two months, immediately ordered it when they had it again.

[tim]

I ordered from Thomann as well. It was in stock, and took 15 days to reach Massachusetts. Not bad as orders from Sire-USA had a lead time of several months at that time.

[Jeroen]

I'm tempted to get one as well. I really like the white/maple version. Thomann is also expecting a model with swamp ash body and maple fingerboard, priced at 519 euros. Very nice.