short-scale acoustic bass plans.

[John LaTorre]

I have it in my head to build a short-scale (30") electric bass guitar using a hollow-body or partial-hollow body, somewhat on the lines of the Hofner bass, although the violin cutouts don't seem to be necessary. It would have the usual four strings. Can anybody steer me to plans for this or to recommendations for the required electronics? I would like to use off-the-shelf short-scale flatwound strings available from Strings by Mail.

It isn't necessary for the body to be very big, since I intend to be playing it solely through an amp. But I would like to have the nice "woody" sound that I got when I converted a dreadnaught to an electric bass some years back.

[John LaTorre]

I got a kit on sale from BargainMusicians, since the price of the kit equalled what I would have paid for the neck alone, so I basically got the body and electronics for free. The assembly instructions were pretty bad, since they applied to all the kits they sold. They did send me, via email, a picture showing how the pickups were to be wired into the soundboard.

The kit was basically what you'd expect from Grizzly... a neck with fretboard and frets installed, a pre-made body, and a bag of parts. The body seemed well made, although I eased the edges of the binding to make it a little more comfortable. I also had to trim parts of the binding that were sticking out. I finished the neck with Tru-Oil and the body with ten coats of rattle-can lacquer from Behlen/Mohawk.

I''ve played the completed bass and it doesn't sound bad. I may replace the control panel with one made using the actual schematic of a Hofner bass if I become dissatisfied with what I have. I was happy to note that it had much of the "woody" sound that my previous bass had, being a hollow-body guitar in the area where the pickups were.