"Short-Scale-Bass to Bass VI" conversion project

[Benny]

hello, i'm new here.. been reading for a while here, perhaps i didn't found a thread just like this one and maybe this has been talked already so oh well..
also, excuse my mediocre english 

i just bought a univox hi-flyer bass, mosrite copy, in very bad shape and just finished restored it. it looks a bit like this, but in red:



need to put it together, but i thought that it could be pretty simple to convert it into a bass vi - type instrument. it's 30 inch scale, width at nut of 40mm. it uses two pickups that are the exact same size as guitar humbuckers, so it's a piece of cake to put something nice there.
so, what i should do is:
- adding 2 more tuners
- new nut
- guitar pickups
- the bridge
- bass vi strings.

and that's it? or i'm missing something?
i have my biggest doubts about the bridge. will any strat-type bridge work or i need something special or custom-made? anybody did proyects like this one? how it turned it out?
thanks!

[theworkoffire]

Hey - welcome.

Looks like a great project. I can't see any major difficulties. Will you plug the end two tuner holes and drill four new ones, or just squeeze two extra ones on there?
You might need to go for something taller than a strat bridge, and you need to watch out for the intonation travel - the Bass VI has a wider-than-usual bridge with about 3/4" of adjustment on it:

[Benny]

yes, my idea is to move two tuners and drill four new ones. will i need the bass tuners or just standard fender tuners do the trick with bass vi string gauges?
the detail of the bridge is interesting. any choices of what i can buy to make this? i will have a luthier that will do most of the mods (like the nut and change in the headstock), so maybe he can custom-made a bridge for me.

[theworkoffire]

This one comes from Chris Huort in France: http://pagesperso-orange.fr/atelkof/Ate ... ameset.htm. I have one waiting to go in a Bass VI project when I get round to it. This one, though, is a floating assembly, same as a Jazzmaster, so it would need a stop-tail after it on yours. You might be able to find a more appropriate 6 string bass bridge elsewhere. As for the tuners - normal guitar tuners are fine for Bass VI strings, but I guess that will mean plugging and re-drilling all four of your existing holes, since bass tuner holes are wider than you'll need.

There's an Ibanez bridge towards the bottom of this page that would be ok: http://www.ibanez.com/parts/2001_PARTS/ ... Bridge.htm

Actually, you're going to run into problems with the standard BassVI strings because the length is designed for the Jazzmaster style bridge and trem assembly, with 4" extra length behind the bridge. This means that the wound part of the string just extends over the nut and then gets thinner to allow you to use standard tuners. Without that extra length behind the bridge you'll find that you'll need bass tuners.