Building the Hofner "Beatle Bass"

[Alan Peterson]

This is truly worth the entire 16+ minutes it takes to watch this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCOycca1ezo

[Steve Senseney]

Nice!

Some of the open blade machines look like they are close to some of the clamps.

Sure used lots of white glue.

[Andy Birko]

Two most interesting things to me were that for the first part of the build, it was just one guy doing all the steps and second, they guy who did the fretboard pretty much by eye, though you could see some marks on the fretboard he was using to align his slot cuts.

Having never played one of those, I am curious if the fretboards have tuning issues .

[Nelson Palen]

Gotta get me one of them there glueboxes.
Seriously, it is an interesting video.

[Karl Hoyt]

I love those kind of videos. That one, the late 50's Fender tour , really any other builder's 'shop tour' videos. I find it fascinating to see how different builders/factories figure out how to attack the various steps involved in making a quality instrument. The hofner fretting guy, the guy who stood at the bandsaw and eyeballed all the belly bowls and arm ramps on the early Fenders (with surprising accuracy and consistency). The person winding pickups or shooting sunbursts....... just fascinating!

on my 'to do' list is to build a carved, solid wood version of the Hofner..... with my own wierd twists.

kfh

[Alan Peterson]

I see where the Beatle Bass top has a face laminate of spruce. The Hofner folks have their own wood shop and stockpile, so locating spruce veneer is only a stroll across the courtyard.
I'm somewhat inspired by this posting and the steamed-top-&-sides thread elsewhere in the Forum. Does anyone here know a good domestic source of spruce veneer? Since laminated tops are all over the industry, someone's gotta be resawing the stuff...

[Greg Robinson]

Wow, finally got around to watching this.

All that ridiculous custom industrial machinery, and they still slot the fretboard by hand! Also, they had so many precision jigs, but the necks are carved by a guy with a violin makers knife, and I saw many a drill bit with tape on it! Makes me feel a lot better about some of my techniques.
Was nice to see they still use hot hide glue for the neck joint.

Thanks for sharing Alan!

[Neal Carey]

Thanks for posting this. Love this video, had watched it 3 times before finding this thread, so I just watched it again! It is rather hard to believe they still do all that fretboard work by hand. Makes me wonder if it is because they're building the '63 vintage replicas?

[Arnt Rian]

No cnc there! Funny mix with those little "Blitz" saws for some tasks and huge industrial machinery for others; I wonder how many hands-on man hours they have in each instrument. I read in "the History of Ovation"-book (I borrowed it, ok...), that they never got lower than 18, while Martin at the time (1976 or so), had 14, iirc.

[Chris Flynn]

interesting, something that struck me was the lack of safety equipment when using the power tools. sure can tell that OSHA is not around, Also if you go the Hofner site, they now have a Plant in Bejing China, Just sayin.

[Keith Ambridge]

I've just acquired a 1965 one of these in a very sad state, the neck has to come off so this video has been very helpful!



Wish me luck!

Keith.

[Beate Ritzert]

Just read the old thread. To my surprise almost nobody seems to have noticed that this was an old film "from the archive", rather from the 60s as from the 70s.

[Keith Ambridge]

I think the date on the label is 84, This is a 65 re-issue being built, cross head screws on the control panel also give it away!

Keith.

[Beate Ritzert]

The cross head screws are not necessarily an indicator. Cross head screws must have been in general use in the German guitar industry of at least the 70s.
My first DIY guitar has been built around the neck of a Framus Texan acoustic guitar from about '71. At least Framus did use cross head screws throughout at that time (neck screws, screws of the tuners, the bridge, the "saitenniederhalter" and the trussrod cover.
So despite the actual date of this video the factory equipment seems to be mostly the old one.

[Keith Ambridge]

Perhaps they used all that lovely old gear to build the re-issues.
I agree that cross head screws were used in the 70's, but certainly not in 65 by Hofner.