Custom Harvester Eightball Shortscale 2017

Exploring my love of the Chicago factory guitars and basses of the 60s yet again ...

This bass has a 30.5" scale and string tension that is juuuuust right for fingerstyle playing and/or palm muted picking.

It features my handmade hardware with a brass and padauk floating bridge and brass tailpiece - giving you some of the feel and warmth of the Harmony and Kay basses of yore with a little more 'modern' sustain and mass. I was thinking about Ronnie 'Plonk' Lane ( as usual ) from the Faces and threw the ivory acrylic boomerang pickguard into the mix.

The neck is made from limed New Guinea Rosewood with a Koa overlay on the big ol' gumby headstock. The fretboard is padauk which gives a familiar rickenbacker-ish firmness to the neck-feel.

The pushbutton selects a baritone filter circuit - inspired by the Harmony H22 circuit - it allows for a vintage Nashville 'tic tac' recording sound or to filter out the 'boom' from a stage rig which includes lots of effects pedals. You can cut it in and out for effect.

Setup with Daddario Chromes, the feel is very familiar - for lovers/collectors of vintage bass gear - although I've kept a close eye on the neck, bridge and headstock angles to prevent any short scale droop on the strings, the idea was to tighten up the feel that I've been using on my 32" scale, offset 'Goldthwait' basses to make for a firm, funky feel for the right hand.

The pickups are a hand wound custom set of TV Jones Thunderblades - a reinvention of the Super'tron as found in Gretsch basses of the 60s/70s - here they are mounted in nickelplated T-armond surrounds. They are mounted in recesses with rubber suspension to allow for height adjustment.

*30.5" scale
*12" fretboard radius

*Hoop pine body ( remilled from 1930s sugar warehouse, Mackay QLD. ) finished with aged Black Rose burst Lacquer to allow some of the original character of this vintage, stable timber to show thru.
 
* New Guinea Rosweod neck - 'limed' with maple stain and finished in nitro lacquer.
* Sperzel Bass Trimloks.
* TV Jones T-armond mount Thunderblade bass pickups.
* CTS, Switchcraft etc parts

This bass guitar ships in a moulded ABS hard-case.

It is currently strung with Daddario Chrome Flatwound strings which seem just right for this scale and have a great feel.


Any questions about this bass design ? Please message me here, I love discussing vintage basses and their idiosyncrasies .

AUSTRALIAN BUYERS send me an offer in $AU and come to my shop in inner Melbourne to visit and plug this one in for a try-out.

International buyers contact me for an accurate shipping quote.

Thanks, AP


*Harvester Guitars are made by hand in my little workshop in Melbourne, Australia.
The majority of my work is built to order but each year I get to spend some time on some unique guitars for shop stock and to follow my own tangents. Enjoy

Product Specs

Condition:Brand New Make:Harvester Model:Eightball Shortscale Finish:Black Rose Burst Year:2017 Made In:Australia