{"id":7935,"date":"2015-10-21T11:54:46","date_gmt":"2015-10-21T16:54:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/?p=7935"},"modified":"2017-04-28T16:18:42","modified_gmt":"2017-04-28T21:18:42","slug":"bass-of-the-week-dave-johnson-spirit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/bass-of-the-week\/bass-of-the-week-dave-johnson-spirit.html","title":{"rendered":"[Bass of the Week] Dave Johnson Spirit"},"content":{"rendered":"

See the business listing for this bass builder here<\/a><\/p>\n

Dave Johnson, who gave us many thank-yous as you’ll see below (to which we say thank you right back, and that we were happy to assist,) built quite the exotic for his bass build.<\/p>\n

Dave writes:<\/p>\n

\n

I began building this bass in July, 2014, after realizing that my 1978 Gibson was getting along in years. As I searched for a replacement, it became clear that what I wanted would be amazingly expensive. I decided to explore building my own, with my wife telling me to “spare no expense, as it had to be cheaper than buying one”. I drew the design, made a mock-up out of Styrofoam, until it just felt right. In addition to being a musician, I am an avid woodworker. I chose Bubinga for the body, neck through-spline, and head overlay. Bird’s Eye Maple provides the remainder of the neck, with a Wenge fingerboard. A think stripe of Maple and Wenge wrap around the body. Carbon Fiber splines run the length, from head to tail. Using a stress modeling computer, I have figured that about 800 pounds could be placed on the 12th fret with .005″ of flex. The inlays are Prism Abalone and Blue Pa’ua. The finish is 8 coats of West Systems 105\/207 Special Clear Epoxy, with 12 coats of Mohawk Piano Lacquer. The body and head are gloss, the neck is satin. <\/p>\n

(Shout out the BBG guys – Max and everyone else) – I didn’t have a clue what electronics to order – only that I wanted the bass to have the flexibility to sound like whatever I want it to sound like at that moment. They suggested a Michael Pope 2stk.1 preamp<\/a>, with Bartolini P25CBC pickups<\/a>. The pickups are wired with switchable series\/parallel\/single coils. A Babicz Full-Contact Bridge<\/a>, Gotoh Tuners<\/a>, and Optima Unique Strings (all gold-plated) round out the build. <\/p>\n

What does it sound like? Whatever I want it to sound like. Which is exactly what I wanted it to sound like. Other than being a very heavy instrument, I am very happy with how this came out. I’m so appreciative of the BBG guys for their help. And one note – I scratched my head for a week trying to figure out how to shape the fingerboard. I invented a jig which mills a perfect fingerboard with any radius (including compound – bigger radius at the body than the head) and any thickness (including tapered – thicker at the body than the head), on any fingerboard for any instrument from a mandolin to a 35″ bass, and will be readily accessible to anyone who wants it, either as a built jig or through a set of plans. It does away with radius block sanders, CNC machining, or expensive belt-sander jigs. Works perfectly every time. I have not yet received confirmation of my provisional patent, so I can’t release it yet, but I will do my best to give BBG first option when it rolls out. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\"04756_02_HeadShot1\"<\/p>\n

\"04756_03_Neck<\/p>\n

\"04756_04_Lower<\/p>\n

\"04756_05_LowerBack\"<\/p>\n

\"04756_01_Full<\/p>\n

Well done, Dave! Glad to see it completed!<\/p>\n

Want YOUR<\/i> bass to be featured for Bass of the Week?
<\/strong>Submit yours now using our easy web form<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

See the business listing for this bass builder here Dave Johnson, who gave us many thank-yous as you’ll see below (to which we say thank you right back, and that we were happy to assist,) built quite the exotic for his bass build. Dave writes: I began building this bass in July, 2014, after realizing … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":7929,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[19],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7935"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7935\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7929"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}