Wow, you never know what roads you will wander when you start up a thread, right?
This CNC thing was not even something I would have imagined in my wildest dreams when I decided to share my journey on here.
I am learning many new things to consider along this journey of mine.
I think you missed the point completely and if you read my reply to Howard youâd know I personally donât care. How is the manufacturing of cars and planes even comparable to something that is more of an art form than a safety standard. My point was to outline what arguments players discuss to validate their choice when really it all comes down to the individual.
@earlfo The CNC thing is an argument I had once read on another forum which really does not matter in the grand scheme of things. I was just pointing out some of the points players bring up to state what they believe is the best bass. My criteria for a great bass is different from the next person and it changes as I gain experience.
In the end the only thing that matters is what your hands, ears and to a certain extent your eyes tell you (no matter how good a bass is I canât get into anything painted green, lol).
Take the points that people, with experience with a brand or model, talk about and apply it to your âlikes and dislikesâ list. Even after you have considered all that it still comes down to what your experience is once you place that bass in your hands.
Oh and if you do have the money and want something customized and handmade check out these guys.
For the record I know nothing about them but they do have some interesting builds on their site.
Good luck with your search but most of all, have fun.
The Aerodyne Jazz bass for the US market (as sold at GC, Sweetwater, etc.) is made in Japan. As you say, quality is on a par with the US Fenders, yet it is priced similar to the Mexican Fenders. The only downside is that it only comes in black.
I like mine a lot. 
Comes in any color you like, so long as the color you like is black.
âAny customer can have a car an Aerodyne painted any colour that he wants so long as it is black.â - Henry Ford Fender.
So then, âbetterâ than people⌠and if a person does manage to do a similarly good job, theyâll be significantly slower than the machine.
Yes and even if. youâre only making one of something, itâll still likely be better and faster than a human making something by hand. Unless itâs the first one youâve ever made on CNC, thereâs not a lot of dialling in to do.
âDead tree carcassesâ are extremely predictable, thatâs why weâre able to engineer buildings, bridges and boats out of wood. If your wood is not predictable, youâve chosen the wrong material from which to make a guitar (or anything else).
If you think variation and humans touching your stuff more makes it better and you donât mind paying more money for it, thatâs great.
making guitars and bagging groceries: people like to have other people touch their stuff
CNC machines have taken over the sax industry, esp in Japan (Yamaha, Yanagisawa). They create very precise horns that play a lot better in pitch, and, to many (including myself) sound âtoo cleanâ - almost no soul.
All of my saxes are about 90-100 years old and built by hand and I think (as do many others) have more complex sound/soul - closer to the complexity of human voice vs. perfect pitches.
These are generally accepted things in the sax world, and make sense (at least to me).
When I think about basses though, I do not think this phenomena transfers.
YMMY
My Stream 1004 and 204
One is Ash with Flame Maple top, Hipshot tuners, Maple Neck with Rosewood Fretboard, the other is Mahogany, generic tuners, maple neck with Jatoba fretboard. Both have EMG P4X/JX pickups, EMG BTC EQ.
The black Stream plays great, sounds great, is a heck of a lot cheaper. The only thing I would like is string through body; the 1004 has it, 204 doesnât.
I for one am really glad we live in an age where good sounding instruments are available at an affordable price. I donât care if itâs CNC drones or Keebler elves. My cheap used Stream sounds just as good.
Well, not exactly. Wood is a great material for certain applications. In fact I love it as a building material, and wouldnât have anything else for a lot of things around the house. However, itâs inherent variability necessitates the selection of the type, processing techniques, right down to selection of individual pieces. Yes, the selection process is super important, but overall when engineering things from dead tree carcasses, you are often engineering to correct for this variablity.
Nowhere did I say this. In fact, itâs CNC technology which has made it possible for us to have high quality basses at affordable prices. What I was trying to say is that CNC technology is not magic, and it too can be used to produce some godawful crap. SISO is the watchword, and QC afterwards, of course.
As much as I wouldnât turn away a fully, 100% hand-crafted instrument from start to finish, CNCing the body and neck is fine with me, as long as itâs put together well at the end, and skilled hands work the frets over well 
To me it doesnât matter if its machined or hand crafted. How does it play, how does it feel? Thatâs the bottom line.
When I was in school, inexpensive basses were all crap. Thatâs not the case anymore, and thatâs a good thing.
Thatâs the money quote, and in large measure we have CNC machining to thank for it.
In this day and age, even the project guitar kits are CNC machined and if you build them right they sound as good as any expensive guitar on the market. Iâve built 2 from kits and both are just as good if not better than my more expensive onesâŚand the cheaper guitars like my Mikro are as well.
well technically you could program ârandomâ variability into the CNC programming, somewhat similar to âhumanizeâ in midi programming 
but it will never have the romance of an old one.
Metal also changes as it ages so youâll never have a new instrument that sounds quite like an old one.
You could probably even install a DSP inside the instrument to alter the tone that come out similar to what Yamaha has done with an acoustic guitar. 
Yamaha already does this on their preamps to normalize the tone differences due to different tonewoods. The TRBX504 and 604 have preamps with slightly different voicing to compensate for the difference in tonewood. Can hear it in passive mode but active the two basses sound more similar.
The Yamaha transacoustic guitar actually has an actuator in it which physically alters the acoustic characteristics.
Thatâs pretty sweet. Cool idea.
