So, I finally finished my first complete build of an instrument: a six-string bass guitar. I built this as a graduation gift for my nephew, an excellent bassist who’ll be graduating from Oberlin next semester. I gave it to him over the holidays, and then had the pleasure of seeing and hearing him play it a few days later at a pub gig with his jazz trio.
I’ll post a few pics then list some specs.
As for wood specs:
The body top is spalted maple, sourced from a seller in the Great White North! Go Canada! Glorious and Free! And your wood is the freaking best, second only to your people!
The body core is good ol’ swamp ash, sourced locally.
The neck is a three-piece laminate, with hard rock maple wings (sourced from Canada-adjacent Michigan) and zebra wood (sourced locally).
As for hardware:
Bridge: Ibanez Accu-Cast
Pickups: Delano JC-6 (neck) and MC-6 (bridge)
Electronics: Glockenklang 2-band, with active/passive push-pull knob, balance, bass, and treble (“tone” in passive mode, like on a standard Fender J-Bass). Plus a 3-way mini-switch on the bridge pickup to put it in series, single coil, and parallel modes.
Tuners: Hipshot Ultralite.
As for process:
The body was actually carved on my Longmill 30 x 30. I managed to carve a decent prototype neck on the Longmill, but it was arduous, mainly because I was operating outside the machine’s parameters and asking it to do more than it was suited for. (For example, a bass neck requires a workpiece around 36”; my Longmill has a carving area of about 34”, so I was forced to do a bunch of complicated flips and rotations, and to carve the headstock separately from the rest of the neck.)
Hence, my decision to upgrade to the AltMill 2x4, which is absolutely the BEST platform for carving guitars and basses. The AltMill 2x4 is perfect in terms of size, power, and rigidity, and its footprint is just right for my workspace, while still being capable of carving very large neck-through designs for guitars and basses. It is truly the perfect rig for instrument building; 2x4 can accommodate virtually any conceivable build.
I often hear debate about “CNC vs. Traditional” or “Hand-Built” when it comes to instruments. Well, I’m here to tell you: an instrument built using CNC will still require a ton of hand work. There’s no escaping it. What CNC gives you is an amazingly precise starting point, but you will still be busting out the sandpaper, files, finishing tools, etc.
My bottom line, after this first reasonably successful build, is this: the CNC will get you the kind of precision and accuracy that otherwise would take years to develop as a personal skill. For example, carving fret slots. They have to be machine-precise, accurate to within hundredths of a millimeter, etc. The CNC can do that in its sleep, whereas I would have to spend years building a technique to achieve the same results. Every neck and fretboard I’ve finished so far (and that’s only two) has been dead on in terms of the accuracy of the fret slots.
Now, of course, it’s true that I have to then install the frets by hand and do a whole bunch of other hand work. But so far the CNC-dictated position of the fret slots has been dead on. All I have to do is get the hand work reasonably decent, and the instrument is perfect in terms of intonation (i.e., being in tune).
Same is true for carving recesses or cavities for components like pickups or carving a pocket for the neck. The machine nails it every time (and I’ve done three bodies now where that has been the case: straight off the machine, the body and neck fit together perfectly).
Anyhow, sorry for the long post. This has been an amazing experience learning to build instruments, even though I’m a total newbie and still have a long way to go. But I’m totally sold on using CNC to build basses and guitars. My AltMill is so robust and powerful and smooth and logical and effortless and, frankly, mesmerizing to watch, that I will never get tired of using it. And everything it has produced for me so far has dramatically exceeded my expectations, to the extent that sometimes I have a hard time believing that I actually “built this.”
(PS. I also posted a couple of videos about the bass to my lo-fi YouTube channel, in case anyone is interested: https://youtu.be/1GdrF-4Iw-Q?si=9t_9eFeqHCoCw02l .)
