Sustain block material

[KR]

A machinist offered to make aluminum sustain blocks for my two Series 1 basses. Even though the lighter weight would be nice, I'm not going to have them made. The main reason is my issue with the tone of the aluminum bridges; I've used on them some Fender style basses in the past. I'm now back doing fly gigs again, and encounter small overhead bins sometimes. So I dug into my parts box and found an old Hipshot quick release aluminum bridge with the stock brass saddles, and installed it on my fly bass which is a Fender. This allows me, if needed, to quickly pull the strings off, unscrew the neck, tuck it behind the bass body, and then fold over the gig bag making it shorter and fitting in the bin. We fly into large airports mostly, but occasionally connect into regional airports; sometimes requiring going from a jet to prop planes. Some players have even started using shorter scale basses because of the carry on problems. On the job the tone of the Hipshot didn't work for me. The tone really changed going from steel to aluminum, becoming open sounding and lacking the focused punch typical of my Fender Bass I fly with. I had hoped that the brass saddles that come on the Hipshot would help the aluminum work but it didn't. I really like the tone of my Series basses, so I'm going to stay with the stock block material. I'm glad I tried the aluminum again before having the blocks made. I know Jimmy J like his setup, and that got me interested, but I'm used to the brass tone. BTW, I don't fly with my Alembics.

[cozmik_cowboy]

Put your old bridge back on for the tone you like.  When you need to fold the bass, don't remove the strings; just loosen them & put a capo at the 1st fret to keep them in place.  Put a piece of cloth or something between & fold it forward.

And, if this going to be a regular thing, threaded inserts & machine screws to hold it on (the great Bill Kirchen does this with his Teles).

Peter

[lbpesq]

And, if this going to be a regular thing, threaded inserts & machine screws to hold it on (the great Bill Kirchen does this with his Teles).

Peter

+1 on the threaded inserts/machine screws.  I use these on all my builds.

Bill, tgo

[JimmyJ]

Hey Keith,

The aluminum block thing was kind of an accident on my first 5-string but it was not done to try to reduce weight. 

Because the low string was odd at that time, and my choice of string gauges was what it was, I couldn't quite move the bridge saddles to where they needed to be for correct intonation.  So I had to move the whole bridge by a small amount. 

My dad wasn't a machinist but a piano technician with a shop full of tools. He didn't have any big chunks of brass but had one of aluminum so he shaped that into what we needed.

Now, the tone of that original 5-string bass was clearly something I fell in love with.  I don't know if any part of that sound can be attributed to the bridge block material. but when I had more basses made in later years I requested the same thing. 

As a result, I have 3 fretted Series basses which all have identical woods and aluminum blocks ... and they all sound quite different - at least to me. 

But I think the main lesson from your experience is, never sacrifice tone for something like ease of transportation.  The sound of your instrument when you plug it in needs to be inspiring!

Jimmy J

[edwardofhuncote]

I'm going to put those threaded inserts in SuperTele's neck joint one day. I meant to do it during the original rebuilding and kept forgetting.


Re: sustain blocks... I lost the motivation for messing with perfection. During the construction of my Custom, I went back-and-forth on whether or not to even have one. My Persuader 5-string (which was the original inspiration for that instrument) has none, and does not suffer for lack of sustain or anything else. So Mica suggested that I try some wood sustain blocks. I would after all, have the brass original to model them on, so I could try a couple different densities. If it didn't produce the desired effect, just swap it back.


I played a couple tunes on that bass, and forgot about that nonsense. Hadn't thought about again it until today.

[KR]

It comes down to what you get used to, at least on my part. When I try something new on a bass I've played a lot, whatever the mod is, it has to improve the tone. I get very set in my ways once I set up an instrument, so if the mod doesn't  float my boat I always change back. With an Alembic there are many factors that create the tone, and the block material might only be a small part of that. I'm just going to hang with what I have. It might be the type/grade of aluminum Hipshot uses that just doesn't work for me. I put the steel bridge back on my fly bass as soon as I got back this week. On this last trip I transferred to a smaller plane into Jacksonville with a bin that -barely- fit my bass, so no need to quickly pull the neck off. The threaded inserts are a good idea; we'll see how many times I need to pop the neck off. When I work locally I almost always use my Alembics, and the reason for changing the block material was for lowering the weight a little, not for a tone change--I love the way the stock parts sound.