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Securing flying bridge to a cookie-tin banjo?

Posted by Michael Hagen on September 23, 2015 at 10:30am in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion

I'm trying a stick-on-top banjo with a 7.5-inch non-Danish, non-gourmet, non-premium, non-butter cookie can. For the flying bridge, I have a wooden handle salvaged from a cabinet door, but it skates over the smooth surface of the can bottom.

Would it be heresy to drill two holes through the can and secure this with 1/2-inch round-head wood screws? Any counsel on washers on the underside? Am I better off with an adhesive instead?

I like the size and feel of the can, but the cookies were so horrible I wouldn't want to buy them again just to replace a destroyed container. 

Also: Any tips on placing a cheap piezo disc pickup? Or is that just crazy talk?

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Replies

  • BP - RabidSalad - October 11, 2015 at 3:21pm

    Looking at the date of the post I'm guessing you already done what needed to be done.

    I used a paint can for my canjo.  The stick didn't go thru the can but to the inside wall of the paint can.  I glued it and then fastened the string anchor using screws thru the can and into the neck stick on the other side.  You could probably do the same with a flying bridge and screw it thru the tin and into the neck.

    As for piezo's the skies the limit where you can put them.  I mount them on the bottom side of the neck or anywhere in the box, usually upper top corner.  Saddle piezo's I usually sandwich between the lid and the neck stick in the area the bridge is going... 

    Bottom line is experiment and then experiment some more...

  • JL October 5, 2015 at 9:16am

    An adjustable trapeze tailpiece so that the break angle over the bridge is even on both sides will stop the skating away

  • Ron "Oily" Sprague September 24, 2015 at 12:07am
    Normally, on traditional and commercial banjos, string pressure is all that's needed to keep a floating bridge held down. A wooden cabinet handle would be pretty high, so you should get decent string break over it. My only concern then would be extremely high strings above the fretboard, unless you compensated with some back angle to the neck, and a raised fretboard.
  • Metal hic September 23, 2015 at 5:31pm

    Maybe if you sand a little the can and the handle, just where they reach, it will stay in place.
    You can try with a drop of CA glue too.
    If you fix the bridge, you must be sure of the intonation, guitars have sometime screws in the bridge...

    You can put double face tape on the piezo and try the better place for your sound.

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