I've always really liked Stingray basses ever since I bought my first two (a fretted and a fretless) in 1976. The first couple of years they had very small frets and I preferred them to the later larger ones since they helped to calm its inherent brightness and 'clackiness'. I regretfully sold those two basses back in 1986, so in 2001 I bought a new one. The new ones have a contoured body with an arm relief and tummy cut, whereas the vintage ones had a slab body. But one thing that both versions never seemed to address was that they are very heavy basses, weighing, on average 10-11lbs, and sometimes even more. The weight was the reason that I sold my early ones and the new one might be a tad lighter, but it's still 10lbs 6 oz., and I'm not comfortable with anything over 9 1/2, and for me, 8-8 1/2 lbs is ideal.
The originals had gloss finished necks, which is what I prefer, and when I bought my 2001, the first thing that I did was to clean & strip the neck's oiled finish and shoot it with nitro. This alone, made it feel and sound much more like my vintage ones. Vintage Stingrays came with a two band eq (treble and bass) and they had no center dtents to let you know where 'flat' was, so I'd generally run mine with the tone pots centered and make adjustments from there. The newer Ernie Ball basses have a three-band eq (treble/middle/bass) with center detents, and while alot of people think the old one was better, I like the new preamp just as much and am able to get very close to the same sound as the originals.
My Stingray's heavy weight issue lead me to not use it on live gigs anywhere as much as I would've liked to, so the next 'modification' for me, was to either sell it, and find a lightweight one, or build a new swamp ash body for it. I chose the latter.
Building a lightweight Stingray body:
The first thing that I had to do was find the lightest piece of swamp ash that I could. It took a while, but I ended up finding a piece that only weighed 1.69lbs per board foot.. This one is basically one piece, with a 1 1/2" piece glued along the side to make it 14" wide. I disassembled my black bass and transferred its outline to the new piece of wood.
I wanted to make absolutely sure that the new body used the exact same six neck mounting screw hole locations so that no doweling/redrilling would have to be done to the neck (I never do it that if it's at all avoidable), so I made a template that fit the old body's neck pocket very snugly. this template is exactly the same shape as the heel of the neck, and just a little longer than the neck pocket. While it was in the original body, I drew a line with a pencil on the back of the template where the body ends, so I could determine and mark the length of the neck pocket. then i drilled the six holes (+ the other two centerline ones) into the template, from the rear of the body.
The next step was to cut it out on a band saw and then shape it on my oscillating drum sander:
Then I laid the template on the new body and traced it onto the new body blank:
I then routed the neck pocket to the same depth as the MM body. Once it was the correct shape/size, and depth, I screwed the snugly fitting template in the new body's neck pocket to secure it, and drilled the 6 neck mounting screw holes on a drill press:
I then routed the neck pocket to the same depth as the MM body. Once it was the correct shape/size, and depth, I screwed the snugly fitting template in the new body's neck pocket to secure it, and drilled the 6 neck mounting screw holes on a drill press:
Next, I bolted the neck to the new body, and it aligned perfectly (with no lateral neck play):
I then mounted the bridge and played it acoustically. It didn't even need ANY action adjustment and is playing exactly like it did on the original body, but it's TONS more lively and resonant, where the same old strings on it sounded really dead on the heavier body, they sound much fuller and much newer on the featherweight one. It even has more sustain and I can already tell that it's going to sound great.
Finished routing the bridge pickup,' vintage style' battery compartment, the output jack hole and roundover on the body's edges. With the exception of the 6 screw mounting holes, it looks like a vintage stingray right now instead of a plank of wood. the bare body weight is now 3lbs 7.4 oz).
The arm relief and tummy cuts were then done on a drum sander. Next, I and sanded the whole body first with 220 grit, followed with 320. Then I baked to prepare it for a couple of coats of sealer.
It weighed 3lbs 4.7 oz at this point, and i expect it to at least lose .7 oz after its baked/dried).so i'm extremely happy with the way that it's turning out and its super lightweight.
