The home stretch...

Tuesday evening Lonnie worked on re-fitting the sound post and nut. The original sound post is in good condition but poorly fit, barely making full contact with the top and back of the bass. Fitting a sound post through the FF holes either goes really smooth or really slows…some what like building a ship in a bottle.



This one wasn’t too bad; Lonnie needed to sand off the top and bottom of the sound post to make it more flat. The previous fit was too tight and the sound post was wedged in at an angle. Though he has the sound post fits well right now, the bass will get a final tweak once the strings and bridge are in place. We take great effort to move the sound post around to find the “sweet spot” where the bass comes alive and sounds the best (at least to our ears). The nut is in good condition and is the standard factory original two piece rosewood nut used by Epiphone during its 20 years of production. It had to be reshaped for the new steel strings which require smaller grooves then the red gut strings (possibly Red-O-Rays) that were previously on the bass.



Last evening I was in the kitchen making dinner when Lonnie came up from the workshop and said, “Come down and pick out a bridge for this bass”. Whoo-hoo! Sweet music to my ears only followed a few minutes later by another request, “pick out the strings you want too” (I get all the really important jobs!). Double whoo-hoo…we are coming down the home stretch. What a great feeling.



After dinner Lonnie went down to the workshop for another three hours (this was after a 10 hour workday at his real job in a 100 degree warehouse) to begin to fit the bridge. He get’s into a zone when he can see light at the end of the tunnel and doesn’t want to stop. He can’t wait to hear the bass make a sound for the first time…something you have worked on for so long finally speaks to you. It is a very exciting and rewarding feeling.

I think I’ll need to make a video just for posterity.

Epiphone final set up...

The neck is securely reset and the glue has rested (as if it was tired) for a few days. Lonnie’s moving on to the final set up. Right now he is working on scraping the factory original rosewood fingerboard. It has some dips and humps so he is working them out to a nice smooth surface with just the right amount of scoop (relief) in the fingerboard.



The process is all hand, eye and a feel for what is just the right amount of recess in the fingerboard. Once the bass is set up with a new bridge and strings he will check the fingerboard again for buzzing and the easy of playing.



Lonnie and I will work together on the final set up and approval.



That is the fun part…where I get to test drive the bass.

As of yesterday the neck is now glued in place. This is a HUGE step forward in the completion of this bass.



The color touch up work is completed at the scroll and neck joint. The hide glue is set but we will let the bass rest for a few days. Once Lonnie is satisfied with all the repairs he will move on to the set up, another huge step forward. This bass will soon be swinging again.

Epiphone update...

We are making progress a little bit at a time. The repairs are beginning to disappear under the artist color tinted to match the bass.



Lonnie’s first attempt looked good but was a bit too yellow/orange. So he tried again…this time it was too solid looking. He wiped the color off and started again, looking for the right shade.



My years in art school and hours of color theory I mentioned to Lonnie to add a little pure blue to the orange to tone it down. Orange and blue are opposite colors on the primary color wheel. Blending the right amounts of pure color will result in a dark grey black. I only mention this is passing to Lonnie on my way down stairs to start another load of laundry.



When I went back down stairs he was grinning from ear to ear. I looked at the bass *dang* that is the right color…what did you do? He just smiled and said you were right…just a touch of blue did the trick. He said how do I know that shit? Many, many hours of working with paint to make a 288 step color wheel in art school that I got a 3.8 grade. Color theory is burned into my brain.



The bass is really starting to take shape. Once all the touch up work is completed next is gluing in the neck. We have a plan to gig this bass several times before it heads back to the west coast and its rightful owner.



Stay tuned....

What is that?…I hear the sound of progress coming from the workshop!

Someone please tell me, it is not possible four months has flown by. My Nana used to shake her crooked finger at me when she was 80 years old and I was 20 to tell me…you just wait until you get old, you will understand. Time flies by the older you get. She was right! It seems there is always something going on that distracts our attention from the bass family. Festivals, weekly jams and keeping up with a house and full time jobs. Life is good and we are not complaining!

This Epiphone B-4 bass is resting comfortably and a little progress has been made with fitting and shimming the neck joint. Lonnie has been carefully repairing the edge flaws and making sure there is no visual trace to his repairs. The neck has been completely repaired in to one strong, original, intact Epiphone factory neck. The process of fitting the neck requires small paper thin shims be sanded and fit so there is no wobble or movement between the neck and the neck block. Once Lonnie is satisfied with the fit of the neck it will be glued up with a fresh batch of hide glue and allowed to rest until the set up work can be started. When Lonnie moves onto the set up things usually move pretty fast because he gets excited and wants to hear the bass. We have a new set of Thomastik Spirocore Weich planned for this bass. The light tension should be gentle to the neck while still producing a good full sound. This bass is destine to be a home studio bass so the quality of the sound is more important then volume. We have discovered loud acoustic jamming basses are not always the best sounding basses in the studio. Case in point, Barry Bales has a German made Meisel bass that he uses regularly on stage with Allison Krauss. This bass through a pick up from stage sounds great but it does not have the loudest voice un-amped.

Hopefully we can soon report on the quality and volume of this bass…the workshop is getting too full. I have Lonnie drowning in basses to be repaired and set up. If he retired today he has enough work for ten years or more (and still have a life). We know we have lots to look forward to in the future.

Stay tuned and I promise it will not be another four months until I post again.

Progress on the Epi

Lonnie is making good progress on the neck. After 3’ of snow, working on this bass and long days at his real job…we are ready for some spring weather and festivals.



The filler to cover the biscuits under the pegbox

This has been all cut free hand at 7,000 RPM. There is no room for error!

Bottom up repairs

The repairs are a bit unconventional but if they prove to be strong and make this bass playable with the original neck still in tact it will be worth the hours and hours of work.

The bass is coming together and Lonnie hopes to be fitting the neck to the body in the next few weeks. The new ULSA end pin has been fit, the edges have been repaired, and color matched. The over all cosmetic condition of the bass is looking good. We hope to have this bass thumping by the time the spring flowers emerge. Stay tuned…Lonnie’s working hard!

Old man winter...

Howdy from Snowy southern PA!

Lonnie has not had too much time in the workshop because all we (he) has been doing is digging out from two back to back snow storms. The first storm packed a wallop on Saturday with 27” and then today another 24” with blizzard conditions. Spring must soon be on its way.

Saturday 2/6/10...

Today, Wednesday 2/10/10...

Earlier this week I came home to the sound of the banjo playing in the workshop. This is how Lonnie serenades the basses…or maybe it is torture. Either way I thought it was an interesting moment.

The Epiphone neck is being worked on bit by bit. Lonnie is happy with the way the repairs are coming together. If and when the snow stops he hopes to get back on track with the repairs. These two snow storms are history making events for us. We have never had two storms dump this much snow in four days.