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Bama Jelley CBG#2 Plan A

Posted by Bama Jelley on May 24, 2011 at 8:16pm in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion

I have been assembling materials and a few proper tools and am about ready to begin my second build.

 

I learned alot from my first build (literally a science experiment with my daughter) and am excited about building a proper CBG this time around. I have taken the advice given to me by some of the more experienced builders and will take my time with this one.

As a first step, I have tried to more carefully plan and think some thing through before starting to cut wood. I have even gone as far as drawing up a diagram of my plan. I have posted it here for your consideration. I would love to hear your opinions on it.

And before any other noobs take this diagram and start to build from it, go look at my pics of my CBG#1 and consider the source. I am not exactly a master builder (yet). Look for updates on this build under my profile in the album "Bama Jelley CBG#2 - Build Progress".

 

 

 

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Replies

  • Rand Moore July 23, 2011 at 12:22am

    I think you CBG project turned out great! Nice simple lines. It looks well crafted to me and I bet it will sound great. Doing your own fret work on just your second build is quite an accomplishment! If there is not enough break angle over the nut, you can try what I have done: use a medium thickness electrician's tie-wrap over the headstock just above the nut. Pull it tight and it will bend the strings over the nut better. This may cure your buzz problem.

    -Rand.

  • Hip Bone Bellaire July 15, 2011 at 6:19pm

    Come on just wing it..... and then there 5...

     

  • Bama Jelley July 15, 2011 at 6:03pm
    Thanks William. It did take much longer than I thought it would. I did go on vacation for a bit and also took a break from working on it for a couple of weeks at one point. My wife told me that if I kept staying out in the garage all the time, I could just put a bed out there. I prefer sleeping in our bedroom and she is much prettier than the guitar, so I now limit my garage time to an hour or so per day. Thanks for taking an interest in my build and I have appreciated the comments along the way.
  • William McCauley July 14, 2011 at 9:20am

    Very nice job. Clean and simple, the best way. Isn't it funny how the simplest projects can take the  longest to finish.

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • Bama Jelley July 14, 2011 at 4:17am

    Well, I finally got this one done. It is an improvement over my first one both in looks and sound, but I still made plenty of mistakes on it. I took Mark's advice and glued some blocks to the inside front and rear walls. I then drilled some holes in the neck and screwed the neck directly into these blocks. This lets both the top and bottom panels vibrate freely. The sound is very good. Have it tuned to low open G for now. Here are some pics...

     

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    I still have plenty of room for improvement for the next one. Some of my mistakes were...

    Headstock design is too narrow and does not provide quite enough break over the nut.

    Even with all of Mark's warnings about headstock thickness, I ended up getting it too thin and had to glue a 1/8in thick piece of wood on to the back.

    Need to improve my fret dressing skills. Specifically need to learn to trim the tang from underneath the edge before trimming to length and shaping.

    Also, I will probably replace the current bridge with something else. The one pictured is not glued down and is just held in place by the tension of the strings.

    Also, need to work on getting the string action a bit lower. I may need to tilt the neck back by a couple of degrees to do this. The action near the nut is good and low, but there is a slight buzz on the first fret from the high g string. The action closer to the body is way too high for my taste.

    I still suck at playing the thing, but will practice and get better. I took it to work today and showed some friends.I also took a cigar box to one of my friends who is interested in building his own. I also took it to one of the cigar shops where I get boxes and showed it to the guy there. Several other people were in there and everybody thought it looked really cool and sounded great.

    I also stopped into a music shop this afternoon and showed it to one of the guys who worked there. This kid can't be more than 16 years old, but when I handed it to him, he made it come alive with some awesome blues licks. He loved it and took it around the store and showed several other people. They all seemed impressed.

    Well, I am already working on my next build and am excited about starting the process all over again. Thanks for all the comments and help you guys have given me on this thread.

  • Bama Jelley July 8, 2011 at 3:18am
    Bruce, did you ever get a pic of that router jig? This CBG is pretty much finished. Pics coming soon. Thanks for all the comments. Already working on my next builds.
  • Bruce MacMahon June 11, 2011 at 8:37am
    Echoing what William said, I made a real simple router jig for the lid and headstock recess. I'll put up a pic later. Works great with my plunge router, which has a real quick and easy depth of cut adjustment, I round the edges of the neck with my Bosch palm grip router.
  • MichaelS Country Boy Guitars June 10, 2011 at 7:57am

    I know you are not using the angled head design but, if you did cut it off like in your drawing you could use the scrap flipped over and glued to the back and have a nice strong angled head. Angled heads work fine and are not any harder than the flat headstock, its all just cutting and shaping wood.

     

  • Jimbo Cawthron June 10, 2011 at 6:42am
    It's looking good Bama, Just don't get discouraged , I am sure this one is gonna be sweet.
  • Brian "Pork Pie" Anderson June 9, 2011 at 3:57pm
    just my two cents, hundreds of years for stringed instrument builders experience comes before mine but I still think its best to stick to traditional tone woods for the best sound
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