Custom short scale Fender P bass project
Posted: Fri Feb 10, 2012 6:16 pm
Hey hey all, thought I'd share my latest and greatest bass with all you fellow short scalers...
I'm a short scale fanatic and have exclusively played shorties for the past few years. I'm a small guy and full scale basses look ridiculous on me (my old jazz bass made me look like a little kid, haha), and are often uncomfortably heavy. I don't have too much of a problem playing them, they're what I learned on, but I love how I can really rip on a short scale, they're just more compatible with my body and hands.
I've owned more than my share of shorties: Fender Mustang RI, Gretsch Electromatic Jet, Ibanez Mikro, Hammer Slammer SB4. All where either too neck heavy, had necks I wasn't terribly satisfied with, or just weren't the right fit for me. That is, until I got a Fender P-Bass Junior:
28.6" scale neck with a satin finish, by far the smoothest, easiest to play bass neck I've ever had my hands on. It's like a guitar neck with a 1.5" nut width profile. Built rock solid and sounds great too, but sadly the body is juuuuust a bit too small and looks like a children's instrument. It's downsized to the point of looking awkward, definitely not something I'd play on stage.
So instead of selling it like the rest I set to build the ultimate bass body for it. The neck pocket is just a wee bit wider than a strat neck pocket so a strat body was the most logical way to go. Of course the fact that it's smaller/lighter than most bass bodies was also a plus. Here are the specs:
Hardtail Warmoth strat body (routed for a bridge humbucker, single volume knob, and side jack)
Babicz full contact bridge
CTS 250K volume pot
SGD Lutherie Sidewinder SW4-HB passive bass pickup (guitar humbucker-sized bass pickup, specially wound hotter for a more ballsy p-bass sound)
The proper move would've been to buy an unfinished body, route the neck pocket to size, then have it finished. Warmoth won't finish anything once it leaves their facility so I bought it finished and set out to find someone talented/patient enough to marry these two pieces and install all the hardware. I live in the NYC area and read a lot of great things on here about Norio at Imai Guitars. He really is the best in the city (maybe the world?!?!) and his precision shows in the pictures below. The price was high but very fair considering the amount of work and patience required for a kind of ass-backwards project of this nature. FYI don't ask him to do any similar neck routing, he said he'd had enough with this one, haha. Great guy and I recommend him fully, how can you not love a guy who has a picture of himself with Keith Richards right when you walk into his workshop?!
Here's the finished product, check it out.
dead-on neck pocket routing...
the original P bass Jr. body for size comparison...
Please excuse the less-than-shiek outfit, it was house cleaning day...
Soundwise it's close to a p-bass, even with the pickup so close to the bridge. David at SGD suggested winding the pickup hotter to compensate for the trebly placement. It also has a bit of a Gibsony EB3 neck pickup/Tbird pickup tone to it, that bit of tight thud. I dig it. No problem at all getting rumbly low end (running a Hartke 3500 [don't laugh, it's awesome...for gigantic low-end] into an Ampeg 8x10). I'm happy in every way and don't really need to own another bass as long as this is going strong, I'm looking forward to breaking it in. Ironically, I was playing a borrowed Musicman Stingray during the 2 weeks this was in the shop and kind of have a hankering for one now, haha, it never ends... Also been thinking of designing a 24 3/4" scale Les Paul bass with Warmoth parts and having Norio put it together... Only thing left now is to find a good hardshell case for the Fender. Any recommendations? It just barely fits in a guitar gig bag (it's about the length of a Mustang bass) so I may have to go with something designed for a baritone guitar or shortscale bass...
I'm a short scale fanatic and have exclusively played shorties for the past few years. I'm a small guy and full scale basses look ridiculous on me (my old jazz bass made me look like a little kid, haha), and are often uncomfortably heavy. I don't have too much of a problem playing them, they're what I learned on, but I love how I can really rip on a short scale, they're just more compatible with my body and hands.
I've owned more than my share of shorties: Fender Mustang RI, Gretsch Electromatic Jet, Ibanez Mikro, Hammer Slammer SB4. All where either too neck heavy, had necks I wasn't terribly satisfied with, or just weren't the right fit for me. That is, until I got a Fender P-Bass Junior:
28.6" scale neck with a satin finish, by far the smoothest, easiest to play bass neck I've ever had my hands on. It's like a guitar neck with a 1.5" nut width profile. Built rock solid and sounds great too, but sadly the body is juuuuust a bit too small and looks like a children's instrument. It's downsized to the point of looking awkward, definitely not something I'd play on stage.
So instead of selling it like the rest I set to build the ultimate bass body for it. The neck pocket is just a wee bit wider than a strat neck pocket so a strat body was the most logical way to go. Of course the fact that it's smaller/lighter than most bass bodies was also a plus. Here are the specs:
Hardtail Warmoth strat body (routed for a bridge humbucker, single volume knob, and side jack)
Babicz full contact bridge
CTS 250K volume pot
SGD Lutherie Sidewinder SW4-HB passive bass pickup (guitar humbucker-sized bass pickup, specially wound hotter for a more ballsy p-bass sound)
The proper move would've been to buy an unfinished body, route the neck pocket to size, then have it finished. Warmoth won't finish anything once it leaves their facility so I bought it finished and set out to find someone talented/patient enough to marry these two pieces and install all the hardware. I live in the NYC area and read a lot of great things on here about Norio at Imai Guitars. He really is the best in the city (maybe the world?!?!) and his precision shows in the pictures below. The price was high but very fair considering the amount of work and patience required for a kind of ass-backwards project of this nature. FYI don't ask him to do any similar neck routing, he said he'd had enough with this one, haha. Great guy and I recommend him fully, how can you not love a guy who has a picture of himself with Keith Richards right when you walk into his workshop?!
Here's the finished product, check it out.
dead-on neck pocket routing...
the original P bass Jr. body for size comparison...
Please excuse the less-than-shiek outfit, it was house cleaning day...
Soundwise it's close to a p-bass, even with the pickup so close to the bridge. David at SGD suggested winding the pickup hotter to compensate for the trebly placement. It also has a bit of a Gibsony EB3 neck pickup/Tbird pickup tone to it, that bit of tight thud. I dig it. No problem at all getting rumbly low end (running a Hartke 3500 [don't laugh, it's awesome...for gigantic low-end] into an Ampeg 8x10). I'm happy in every way and don't really need to own another bass as long as this is going strong, I'm looking forward to breaking it in. Ironically, I was playing a borrowed Musicman Stingray during the 2 weeks this was in the shop and kind of have a hankering for one now, haha, it never ends... Also been thinking of designing a 24 3/4" scale Les Paul bass with Warmoth parts and having Norio put it together... Only thing left now is to find a good hardshell case for the Fender. Any recommendations? It just barely fits in a guitar gig bag (it's about the length of a Mustang bass) so I may have to go with something designed for a baritone guitar or shortscale bass...
How do you like the Babicz bridge? Been thinking 'bout getting one.