Four String Bass Converted Into A Five 

Cheers. I've always thought the lopsided 5 string Ps looked daft, you can always trust in Bartolini to do things with a bit more class.

The Nordstrand NP5 is another one that uses equal sized covers!

They use 6 things on ones side a 4 on the other… why not just do 5 and 5? In makes no difference when it’s in series and parallel 😹

​@@fanbladeinstruments still have the maple body?

That's really interesting, thank you for that. I've spend a little bit of time in the back of a tonewheel Hammond and I can only imagine that those mechanisms would get very messed up indeed. Cheers.

Wow, an 8-string 34" guitar - that's rad!

4 n 2 is cool I have that setup on my ernie ball O,L,P MUSIC MAN guitar

Interesting... I would take the tuners off, fill the holes with dowel, then veneer the headstock front and back so you could put the tuners where they need to be to maintain direct pull over the nut. Assuming you'll have a new nut with the strings crammed closer together then they'll be pulling sideways over the nut to get to the tuners in their current location, then you're at risk of tuning problems. Might I also suggest using a precision neck if you can find one, I feel like a jazz neck would get very cramped and the extra width will definitely help. Good luck, and please film it, I'd love to see how it goes. Cheers.

Jauce.com. Be aware that they'll sting you badly for shipping and a whole heap of other banking fees and other things, but the basses are so cheap that it still works out.

Jauce.com Bear in mind that the ¥1000 is super low even by their standards, I actually bought it expecting the translation to be wrong and all I was buying was the stand it was on, but no, I got a bass. Looking on there now the really good deals on well made budget basses are sitting around ¥4000, not including shipping and other fees, and there are a lot of them - Jauce ain't working for free here!. All tolled, I've just bought 2 cheap and cheerful basses for a total purchase price of NZD$80, plus fees and shipping to my door the total will be closer to NZD$450 (USD$280), which is still pretty freaking good for what I've bought: a 'Selder' branded P-bass with an amazing flame maple neck and a very tasty looking 'K-Garage' branded Jazz copy. If you've got the $1000 to spend though then there's everything you could want in vintage Japanese guitars and basses, I've never seen so many Tokai and Greco basses in one place before. It's amazing, happy shopping.

Great question, looking at the effect of a bass guitar on a human body it really becomes a question of weight vs balance. More weight = bad for your shoulders, Bad balance (neck dive) = not very good for your posture. With some designs that are naturally neck-heavy there is a tendency for cheaper instruments to try and correct the balance by adding weight, it becomes a tradeoff but there is a sweet spot that differs for every person just as it differs for every bass. For myself personally, with 20+ years of neck and shoulder problems, any bass heavier than 3.8kg instantly qualifies for the wide padded strap, anything over 4.8kg just never gets used. My favorite basses are all 3.6 - 4.4 except the violin basses which are barely 3.2 but have definite balance issues. Hope that helps, thanks.

@@fanbladeinstruments It helped a lot! Thanks for the quick answer!

I use Jauce.com but there are a few others, be aware that they clip the ticket coming and going, transaction fees, auction fees, storage, packing, shipping, insurance, and a couple of others for good measure. I say $12 for that one bass, which is technically true, but all up to buy and ship both instruments to me was almost $600NZD - Which is still a whole lot cheaper than buying the same instruments on TradeMe and the selection is endless. I've only scratched the surface of the weird and wonderful basses they've got.

So... turn it into an Ibanez Gio then?😜