What is considered low action on a bass?

[rspst14]

I've wanted to get myself a bass for a while now, so I recently picked up an old Peavey T-40.  It's in great shape, and it seems to be one of the lighter ones.  These things are usually like boat anchors.  It's been refretted with jumbo frets, and it sounds great. 

I've been setting up guitars for years, but I'm not really sure what constsitutes reasonably low action for finger-style bass playing.  I haven't found a lot of guidance on the web either, most of what I find relates to guitars.  The action feels a little high to me, but it could just be that I'm not used to it after years of playing guitar. 

I know there are some bass players on this forum, do you guys have any string height measurments you can share?  Specifically, higher up on the neck, around the 12th fret?  I'm using 45-105 strings.  Thanks.

 

[line6man]

Set it as low or high as it needs to be until you feel comfortable with it.

 

[Super Turbo Deluxe Custom]

If you take it to a tech, they will ask what specs you want it set it at.  Apparently, there's a published list somewhere they can go by.  However, I once took my car to have a front end alignment and they looked up the factory specs, adjusted accordingly, and it was still off.  My point being that they knew how to use a machine and adjust with tools, but couldn't peform the task.  It doesn't matter what the specs are if it feels too high.  There's nothing more frustrating than someone that can only read instruments and ignore an end result.  "My alignment is off, but you did set it to factory specs?  Well I guess it isn't off."

It's a combination of 3 things before you even get to intonation (however intonation does effect scale length and string tension, but for my initial setup, intonation is approximate). Nut height, truss rod, and saddle height.  Simply lowering the nut and ignoring the other 2 does no good, and if the frets aren't leveled to start with, it's futile, as you can only go as low as the tallest fret.

I usually start with the feel of a fretted F, 1st fret bass string.  With all strings in tune, I lower the nut a bit, retune, lower the saddle, hold the instrument like a violin and glance at the straight edge of the string compared to the neck relief.  I repeat this process on the other strings, then repeat the process starting with the bass string.  At this point I start rechecking intonation and going from approximate to accurate.  My goal is to have the same action on the open strings to first fret as I would have between any fretted notes and next fretted half step.  This process usually reveals any high frets relative to neck relief.  The end result is low action.

 

[Strat Avenger]

3/32" of an inch @ the 12th fret is pretty standard. On a 5-string, I usually set the low-B to 1/8" and the rest of the strings @ 3/32".