How to set up an upright bass: I recently saw where a music store was charging $600 to set up a new string bass. That's nuts! There is absolutely nothing magical or difficult about setting up an upright. It's all very straightforward and logical, if approached with care and thought and common sense. It need not take more than a few hours - even for those with no instrument building or adjusting experience. Only simple tools are required.

Most setups basically involve simply adjusting the grooves in the nut, then adjusting, locating and positioning the bridge. Good advice (that is THE key to success here): Whatever you do, do SLOWLY - with ample forethought. For example, when you have to remove wood, do so in very small increments -- just a tiny bit at a time. It's obviously far better to take off too little than to take off too much! Don't be afraid to repeatedly retune the bass to check the progress regularly as you remove wood. I understand the urge to "get it done and get on with playing" but you must consciously squash such urges. It's highly recommended to play the bass for a couple of days after each adjustment to much better assess how successful the changes were. Often things that are not noticed immediately become very apparent after a day or two. I know it's often difficult but try not to be in a big hurry. ADJUSTING THE NUT GROOVES: A badly adjusted (high) nut is very often the main cause of high playing action. The nut should be checked and adjusted first. If a regular business card (slid between the strings and the fingerboard, at the point where the string leaves the nut) just nicely fits, with no play -- not too loosely or tightly, this string's nut groove is most likely ok. To lower a high groove, use hobby-store small files to carefully deepen the groove to "business-card thickness". Go slow and check often. Here's a tip: Even after following the above instructions it's sometimes difficult to really know if the nut grooves are lowered enough. I've found that if you take an elastic-type guitar capo (one with a double strap is best) and affix it upside-down (the elastic fabric side facing the fingerboard) an inch or so from the nut --- and then play the bass --- you can get a better idea if the nut grooves are low enough. If it's noticeably easier to play with this inverted capo on, this is a good sign that the nut grooves need some slight deepening. Go carefully and slow though. LOCATING THE BRIDGE: Orient the center line of the bridge directly on a line between the two inner notches of the F-holes. Also make sure the bridge is centered right and left by measuring or looking down the fingerboard. The bridge must be as straight up & down as possible. Keep as especially sharp eye out for this when installing strings and tuning -- it's easy to get wrapped up in the mechanics then and have a bridge fall over. If this happens to you once, it won't happen again - believe me, I've been there! ADJUSTING THE FEET: This is often ok from the factory, but if not, it's a simple matter to lay a piece of sandpaper on the surface of the bass, where the bridge feet will go and then just work the bridge back and forth gently until the proper contour is created. Be very careful not to allow the sandpaper to scratch the bass' surface. I masking-tape down a sheet of white paper first - before taping down the sandpaper. Even at that, it's possible to mar the finsih or wood if you're not careful --- my suggestion is to not use very heavy pressure when sanding. Use many lighter strokes instead of a lesser number of heavy strokes. ADJUSTING THE BRIDGE HEIGHT: Action too high. If the action (the height of the strings above the fingerboard) is too high, the instrument will be difficult to play. To correct this, an "arc" of wood (paralleling the bridge's top curve) must be taken off the bridge's top and then the string grooves re-cut. Make four small wooden gauge-blocks, corresponding to the height you want each string to be off the bottom end of the fingerboard. Weakly glue (glue-stick works fine) these blocks in place under each string, on the fingerboard surface, at the fingerboard's bottom. Have someone hold the bridge in proper position. Using a long straight-edge with one end resting in the E string groove in the nut, rest the straight-edge on the E string gauge-block. Then carefully mark the points where the straight-edge meets the face of the bridge. This marks represents the desired bottom of the bridge's E string groove. Repeat this process for the A, D and G strings. Now lay the bridge flat and make a 2nd set of marks on the bridge's face about 3/32" closer to the top of the bridge from the marks made with the straight-edge. Then (following the same curvature as the existing bridge top) draw an arc through the 2nd set of marks. Carefully cut, file or sand the bridge top down to this new arc line and slightly round off both edges. Note: before you start cutting, lay a strip of paper along the bridge top curve and carefully mark the location of each string, along with the ends of the bridge-top. You can transfer this information to the new curvature. Because the bridge is tapered, bottom to top, and you have just shortened the bridge some, this new curvature's surface may make for a bridge-top that is too fat/wide (ideally, the bridge-top should be from 1/8" to 5/64" wide). If it is too wide, lay the bridge on it's angled face on a sheet of sandpaper and carefully sand it until a thinner bridge-top is achieved. If done with a belt sander, use caution and go slow. The final step is to file the string grooves into the bridge-top. Use a small hobby-store type round file. Make the depth of the grooves 1/3 to 1/2 the diameter of the strings - NO deeper, and certainly no lower than the original lines made with the straight-edge. If you goof up and lower the action too much, so the thing buzzes, take heart! Small wooden spacers/shims placed under the bridge's feet are used all the time in correcting such mistakes. Concerning action --- I have not given any dimension recommendations here because action is such a personal thing, varying from one player to the next, from one style of music to the next etc. Personally I set my action fairly low, just before the point where the strings start buzzing if plucked hard. The action of the bass I'm currently playing is just about 7mm for each string (measured between the bottom of the string and the fingerboard's surface at the board's bottom end). This action works very nicely for me. An alternative method to the above is to use a small round file and, one string at a time, simply file the string grooves deeper, a little at a time, until you get the action where you want it. After each round of filing, file off the groove's sharp edges, then "color" the groove with pencil lead for lubrication. Once all four grooves are as deep as you want them, carefully trim off the top of the bridge so that only about 1/3 to 1/2 of the string's diameter will be sitting in the grooves. To finish things off, process the rest of the bridge following pertinent instructions in the paragraph above. Yet another way: Another method of determining proper bridge height is a very useful temporary "trial bridge" which is easily adjustable up & down and greatly simplifies the bridge setup process. It takes out much of the guesswork and can eliminate the possibility of turning your expensive maple bridge into firewood. It takes about an hour to make, the only components being some 3/8" plywood scraps & two small (1") C-clamps. See drawing accompanying this article for construction details. Using a sharp pencil, very accurately trace the top 2/3 of your maple bridge's shape onto a piece of the 3/8" plywood. Then trace the bottom 2/3 of your maple bredge's shape onto another piece of 3/8" plywood. Carefully saw out the two patterns so they overlap like shown in the illustration. Smooth it out a tiny bit, file in the string grooves, glue on the simple feet (which are offset and braced -- see illustration), slap the two pieces together with the two C-clamps and that's it. To use this "trial bridge": - Tighten down the two C-clamps at the bridge height you're sure will cause buzzing when played hard. Make sure the two halves are aligned right & left. Note: after tighten the C-clamps, wind masking tape around each of the clamp's handles to prevent the handles from vibrating/buzzing mercilessly. - Tune up the bass and play each string hard, both down and up the neck. Make sure that all strings buzz. - Loosen the strings and then raise the bridge a small amount. - Tune the bass up again and check for buzzes when played hard. - If no buzzes, you've got your bridge measurement. - If there are buzzes, repeat this process until no buzzes occur. - The E string side might buzz while the G string side doesn't (or visa versa). In this case, only adjust the G string side C-clamp. - For me, the ideal bridge height is just a tiny bit higher than the point where the bridge buzzes when played as hard as I ever play. - Once you're totally satisfied with the action and lack of buzz, lay the "trial bridge" on top of the maple bridge and as carefully as you can transfer the top curvature and string spacing to the real maple bridge with a sharp pencil. - Carefully modify your maple bridge accordingly. It should be a carbon copy of the "trial bridge's" measurements. Even with the glued-on feet this thing will tip over more easily than a real, maple bridge. if this happens, the heavy C-clamps can do some hefty gouging or scratching. Just keep a close eye on this at all times - especially when tightening up strings and tuning. It couldn't hurt to masking tape on a couple of doubled-up towels in case the bridge does fall over. Action too low. If the strings buzz against the fingerboard, this tells you the bridge is too low. To correct this, first determine approximately how much you want to raise the strings, then fashion hardwood spacer blocks of the appropriate thickness (add a tiny bit to the thickness to be safe) to increase the bridge height. Make sure these blocks cover the full area of each foot's bottom. Also make sure they conform to the contours of both the bottom surface of the bridge and to the bass' surface where the bridge will rest. Lightly glue the spacer blocks only to the bridge -- not to the bass' body. If only one string is too low, you can file out a triangular-shaped notch at the offending groove, then fit/glue in a similariily shaped piece of maple. File/sand everything smooth, then re-groove. SOUNDPOST ADJUSTMENT: This can get complicated and is really is beyond the scope of this article, as the soundpost position so dramatically alters the tone of the instrument -- but if you're not happy with the sound of your bass, there's no reason that you can't knock the soundpost about (very carefully) a small bit in VERY small increments and with the strings loosened somewhat. Always note where the post was originally so it can be put back there if need be. Proper soundpost position is in line with the center of the foot on the bridge's G string side and in the neighborhood of 1/2" to 3/4" lower (towards endpin). Maintain "verticalness" -- ie: if you move the top 1/8", move the bottom 1/8" in the same direction. The very last thing you want is for the soundpost to fall over, which necessitates a rather tricky resetting. Use much care and pad any tools entering through the F-holes lest the instrument get scratched or dinged. STRAIGHTENING A CURVED FINGERBOARD: This likewise may be beyond the scope of this article, but nonetheless is not that difficult. Many are of the opinion that for certain types of music the fingerboard SHOULD have a slight concave bow. I am not of this school. Straight is good as far as I am concerned. When a fingerboard is too curved to allow for proper action, a method I have used is to procure a VERY straight length of hardwood (2" x2" or thereabouts), then glue sandpaper along one entire side. With the nut removed, slowly and carefully work the sanding stick on the fingerboard, taking great care to avoid creating flats-spots, by constantly moving the stick around the radius. Also, work carefully to preserve the E-string flat & associated "line" between the flat and the curved part of the fingerboard. Reworking the fingerboard by this method means you'll have to lower the nut grooves and likely the bridge grooves. Occasionally it seems just the downstring end of the fingerboard is bowed a bit upwards (the end nearest the bridge). What I have done in the past to straighten this out is to apply sandpaper to just the last 1/4 to 1/2 of the stick's length and proceed as above. Reworking the fingerboard by this second method usually necessitates lowering the strings by regrooving the bridge. This stick-sanding takes quite a bit of time, but if done carefully is well worth the effort. MISC: Graphite from a sharp #2 pencil when applied liberally to each bridge and nut groove decreases the friction and lengthens string life. This article is not intended to be comprehensive, but contains enough information to allow anybody to setup his/her new bass or get an old timer back in shape. I hope this doesn't all sound to complex -- it is not. To use a worn cliche, "This isn't rocket science". Anyone can set up an upright bass if just a small amount of common sense and care is used. It's certainly better than forking over up to $600 to have someone else do it!

Dennis Havlena - northern Michigan