Xtra-Dry winter = freaked-out fretlessessesss

[BeenDown139]

now that the polar vortex is grazing the front range, the humidity has dropped to sub-zero dew points.  wasn't that bad last year.  this year, all my fingertips are starting to dry out and split.  i lay in a supply of gel lock-tite (old construction worker trick) for that. 
i have 2 fretlessesses: a 5-string essence and a series II body shop night bass (affectionately known as hte A-bass at the ranch) with what i believe are walnut neck lams.  the essence just flat freaks out every time the seasons change. hadn't played it for a coupla day, go to tune it and the whole bass is almost a step flat.  the neck shows noticible bow and i can almost slip my left fingers under the strings. the A-bass has a much stiffer neck, it was only about 1/4 step flat across the strings.  it's got a pinched wire or some such mechanical issue under the fingerboard that prevents the upper part of the neck LEDs from lighting under normal circumstances.  however, when it gets hot & dry here in the summer, it dries the fingerboard out enuff so that it stops pinching whatever it's pinching, and so i get a full complement of neck LEDs when it's dry as a bone.  i like the violet LEDs on my other basses, but this particular blue floats my boat.  gotta take the good with the bad i suppose.  gettin out the wrenches now...

[BeenDown139]

oops - forgot the other attachment.

my fretted basses don't have near this many problems with changing weather.  is this a fretless thing?  anybody else see this?

[cozmik_cowboy]

On the splitting fingers thing:  I have trouble with that every winter; for years I'd super-glue them, but last year I discovered O'Keefe's Working Hands.  Just a dab'll do ya, to coin a phrase; touch the fingertips into the can, rub in, and Bob's yer uncle.  Great stuff!

Peter

[pauldo]

My wife has some stuff made with bear tallow.  Works great on the splits.
We also run a humidifier in our house, turned it up for the polar vortex… helps keeps things ‘not so dry’.

[BeenDown139]

We also run a humidifier in our house,

one of the challanges in living in a reduced footprint house (my dog and i share a 500 ft² house) is stablizing the intererior environment  i don't have a lot of thermal mass, just opening the door to let the dog out cools it enough to kick the furnace on.  keeping the basses humidified without turning the whole house into a sweat box is not possible.  it's 75 year old double-brick wall construction insulated by the plaster over the intererior wall.  so no insulation to speak of, but i did take great pains to seal all the air leaks so keeping the interior at 68 degrees is relatively easy.  it's tight, it's cheep and it's mine so i gotta work with what i got. even running a hot tub, my utility bills are less than my neighbors.

rub in, and Bob's yer uncle.  Great stuff!

bob's yer uncle.  haven't heard thatone in a while.  gonna go buy some, try it.

[adriaan]

My wife recommends hemp handcream from the Body Shop.

[StephenR]

My mother used to use "Bag Balm" for dry hands, farm product used for cow's udders. My wife and I use a Lavender salve from Los Poblanos Organic Farm in New Mexico, works well and smells nice. For some reason my thumb has not "cracked" yet this year which is nice, the cracks can be really painful.

As far as basses go my 2016 Series bass has the most unstable neck of the basses I own. It is getting a bit better as the wood ages and settles in but generally in winter I have to take all of the tension off the truss rods. Luckily my Alembics are the easiest basses to adjust of the ones I own.

[kilowatt]

Been using the O'keefe's Working Hands for years. Really great product. Use it after your shower to help keep your hands moist. Dry winter can be really painful on my hands.

Regards,
Pete

[garyhead]

We got above 32 degrees this afternoon and the “water features” came to life in our cul-du-sac!  Got my water meter shutoff wrench out and shut off 3 neighbors water.  Burst hose bibs.  The local ACE Hardware to the rescue!  Everybody back online by 3PM and we’re back down to freezing at sunset.

[cozmik_cowboy]

We got above 32 degrees this afternoon....

We made it all the way up to -9°!  Way warmer than yesterday; tonight's wind chill is supposed to be -37°.

Peter (who has camped in -15° - but doesn't do that anymore.......)

[BeenDown139]

back when i was a youngster and there were actual live DJs on denver radio, the FM jocks would call a brass monkey alert on days like these.

those of youse that own brass monkeys should already know it's no laughing matter

[edwardofhuncote]

I've posted this here before somewhere... at this point, I've posted everything here somewhere and probably shouda' kept half of it to myself.


It ain't near as cold or dry here in Virginia as it is out where you're at, but it starts naturally approaching 30% in my house about this time of year, and even the humidifier cant keep up. So here's a really easy, cheap workaround for bass necks that go berserk in the cold/dry season, or even when the air conditioner messes with things. I've got one, a Gibson, with a mahogany set-neck, that turns into a ski at anything below 45% RH. Acoustic guitars... they really hate getting dry, and not just the neck. The underlying principle is the same... the wood will draw the moisture in naturally if it's available.


Plastic snack boxes. Travel soap boxes are more expensive, but they work well too. (I've got something like 30 guitar cases here with geetars to keep happy in 'em, so cheaper is better in bulk...) Put holes in the top, and fill them with dish sponges, I mean the kind that nobody uses to actually wash dishes with, but they do a nice job of holding water. Put one in the case with your bassesssess. Or put your bassesssses in the case with one. Rotate as necessary.

[pauldo]

Great tip. 


Doesn’t a lemon oil treatment also help in dry conditions?

[hammer]

Sound advice from Greg.


Always did that with my acoustics but with Minnesota winters (we’ve had highs of below zero and single digits since Monday) it’s become a rite of winter here for my basses too. In order to keep track of when the sponges need re-wetting (I would always forget) Ive got an alarm in my office/studio set to go off every 5 days.


BTW… after coaching my high school cross country ski teams at 600 pm practices in frigid temps over the past week (we’ve got NO snow here in central Minnesota and its the end of January so we are limited to evening practices in the few locations that have machine made snow) they predict temps in the high 30s low 40s next week.

[BeenDown139]

thanx for the tips, folks.

i was working out on the MKDeluxe the other day when my right ring finger (the non-playing one) suddenly began to hurt like the dickens.  rather than do the sensible thing and stop then, i finished the set.  after two days of agony, i went to the hand doctor, he popped the knuckle (hadn't been popped in probably 50 years), shot it up with steroids and i'm back in action.

turns out his wife is a dermatoligist.  gonna have her look at my 3-month-old spider bite and get her take on the splitting fingertips.  i've been doing an hourly hand  treatment with foot genius and that seems to keep them moisturized enuff to get me by.  guess ill go in next week and see.  pretty sure medicare covers it.

Doesn’t a lemon oil treatment also help in dry conditions?

indeed it does. i do it every time i change strings or the fingerboard starts looking dry.  gotta take the strings off.  might as well boil 'em while we're at it.

Plastic snack boxes....

my bassses all free range.  i have no storage room so the cases all live in the garage overhead.  my bass room has 2 outside walls with windows.  at least the heater vent isn't over there.  it would be real tuff to keep this area humidified.