Epoxied fingerboard

[penguin]

I just got back my MIJ Jazz bass w/ fretless ebony Warmoth neck after having it epoxied. It looks and plays fantastic! It's hard to keep the glossy shine clean from fingerprints, sort of like an iPad.

[Matt R.]

Man that is beautiful

[belinmad]

Amazing! Who did it for you?

[fivebass52]

That is indeed a great-looking bass! How much did it cost to have the neck done?

[penguin]

Thanks for the compliments!

The epoxy was done by Lewis Bass & Guitar of Chandler, Arizona.

http://www.lewisbassguitar.com/

If you search 'Lewis Bass & Guitar' on Facebook he has a 5 part video series showing him epoxying the neck. Interesting stuff. Brian Lewis says its not rocket science, but it does require certain tools to do it right.

Cost was $200 which I think is reasonable. I had looked into HG Thor, but his 5 year waiting list was a little too long. I am quite happy with the results on my bass, but the lint and fingerprints are like moths to the flame.

[Matt R.]

What was the turnaround time on it?

[penguin]

What was the turnaround time on it?

I would say around 14 days or so. The main time consumer is waiting 7-10 days for the epoxy to cure after a day or two of setup. After that things should go pretty quick if he doesn't have other jobs going on at the same time. He actually had my bass for quite a while because he was doing some other things to it.

[Stingray5]

Beautiful - looks amazing!

[pjmuck]

Fantastic. I am making a note now to remember lewisbassguitar.com.

I had thought about getting in touch with HG Thor as well. Didn't realize he was so swamped. $200 for a pro epoxy job is very reasonable. So how does it sound? What noticeable differences can you hear?

[Matt R.]

I think I may have this done on the bass I bought from Addison. Very cool.

[AzWhoFan]

Chandler Az is about a 1/2 hour drive from where i live. Methinks a trip to his shop may occur in the near future.

[penguin]

Fantastic. I am making a note now to remember lewisbassguitar.com.

I had thought about getting in touch with HG Thor as well. Didn't realize he was so swamped. $200 for a pro epoxy job is very reasonable. So how does it sound? What noticeable differences can you hear?

I am definitely able to get a better mwah. He set up the action slightly high as he was unsure about how the different humidity in Arizona vs California coast would affect the neck. Even with the bridge saddles bottomed out the action was slightly high so I put a shim in the neck pocket and raised the saddles a little and now the action is perfectly low with just the right amount of buzz (this is my poor man's Pedulla). I really like the 'full contact' feel of the flat tapewounds against the epoxy, yet there is no string scratch noise at all when I move my fingers. Very fun to play with.

If you've been able to watch the FB videos you can see Brian is very meticulous, using levels, precision straightedges and jigs to ensure everything is precise and even. I want to have him do some of my other basses, but they present much more of a challenge since they are neck thrus with synthetic fingerboards and thus will probably cost more to epoxy. I'll ask him about it later.

[fivebass52]

I watched all of his videos, and was impressed by his thoroughness, and attention to detail. With all of that, I'm even more impressed that he only charged you $200! Anyone thinking of having him epoxy your neck; do it now before he realizes how low his price is!

[markcv]

Wow! That looks great Penguin. I remember talking to you about this before. Fascinating videos. I really enjoyed watching them and learned a lot. He definitely is cheap though, considering the amount of labor involved. The fellow in Ft. Lauderdale that did my old Roscoe LG3000 charged me $300. I believe he used a very similar technique. Of course, he apparently used to work on Jaco's bass, that has to be worth at least an extra $100.

Seriously though, these guys must do it for the love of the job cause they sure ain't making very many cents per hour.