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Bamboo Guitar.......

Hi, over in Paul Craig's What's on Your Workbench thread, Paul mentioned building guitars out of bamboo, so I thought I would show this one I built some years ago.

Its actually a cigar box made of bamboo. It was too thick to build as an acoustic so it has no soundhole, it is pure hollow-body electric. One side, that was a drawer that held the cigars, is replaced by an access panel for getting inside if need be. The pickup is Gibson Les Paul. Its set up for slide.

Taff

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Permalink Reply by Rick Tish on August 15, 2019 at 3:57am

I appreciate the clean cuts and the tight fit of the parts. The arm rest is a great practical addition. Nice build.

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Permalink Reply by Taffy Evans on August 15, 2019 at 1:05pm

Thanks Rick, I like to palm [mute] the bass strings and the "rest" makes it easier. This box is the "year of the monkey", I'll have to see if I can get some more with different years.

Taff

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Permalink Reply by Taffy Evans on August 15, 2019 at 1:13pm

Hi, I just searched for this type of bamboo box and I found them. However there was a minimum purchase of 500 units........I don't think so. Ha ha.

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Permalink Reply by Southpaw on December 26, 2019 at 3:48am

my kmart sells a bamboo box for cutlery/storage that would be good for this, just needs a plywood top

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Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 26, 2019 at 7:19am

Wow, I didn't know that there was anymore K-Mart stores open.

I found them at Walmart too. They are adjustable so as to fit a kitchen drawer so you could make the body whatever size you wanted. If you get 2 boxes, you can invert one and glue them together making it all Bamboo.

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Permalink Reply by Southpaw on December 26, 2019 at 4:23pm

yeah we have Kmart in Australia but it's a pretty different animal, the original guy who started it sold out after about a year or 2, so it's really only the same logo as the US.

I might try it one day, already have a few that i need to build

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Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 26, 2019 at 7:24pm

Hey Taffy, I bought some Bamboo cutting boards and I'm going to glue them together for a guitar body some time soon(hopefully). Just not sure if I want it as a solid body or a hollow body yet, but it will resemble a Harmony Stratotone with 2 Firebird pickups. That much I know for sure.

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Permalink Reply by Taffy Evans on December 26, 2019 at 7:56pm

Hi Paul, you got your work cut out with wiring that model guitar, I'm sure you're up to it. Hollow body would save weight and give more depth to the body. Be good to see, I suggest you start tomorrow.
Taff

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Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 26, 2019 at 8:04pm

I'd love to start tomorrow, but the wife finally decided to start moving into her parents house this weekend. Unfortunately I have to move with her. Hahahaha

Anyway, all building and playing will be on hiatus for a few months. If I go the solid body build I'll probably do a little chamber routing and maybe a German Carve around the edge, been wanting to do that for some time.

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Permalink Reply by Taffy Evans on December 27, 2019 at 11:08am

Hey Paul, what is a German Carve? I haven't come across that before.

Taff

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Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 27, 2019 at 7:53pm

Basically using a Ogee bit in your router for the edge slope carve. Supro and Eastman guitars used it a lot and somehow became known as "The German Carve".

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Permalink Reply by Taffy Evans on December 27, 2019 at 10:28pm

Hi Paul, that's what I thought it would look like, in my books its called a Cove.

Here I used it on a guitar I built in 1992. It has solid Honduras mahogany body with Tasmanian Blackwood centre infill, ebony Fingerboard, and early 80's Gibson SG Custom pickups. I use it for slide now days.

The inlay markers I cut from Abalone Shells