Shortly before Christmas, David, the son of a teacher-friend of mine, after seeing and playing one of my paddle-box dulcimers, said he'd like a "Flying V" dulcimer (a flaming red one). So, from this suggestion came idea for this project.
So, this fir
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I have been thinking of making a mountain dulcimer. My first idea was to do a long rectangular box or a long trapezoidal box, with the box tapering inward toward the headstock. But, with my experience with dry bendi
Latest from the Blue Haze Cigar Box Guitar shop. This one is a resonator style. Four strings for ‘slide’ playing only. The resonator is a chicken watering pan that normally screws on a mason jar to supply chicks with water. Two pickups are in this on
Read more…Hi All.
I've decided I wanted to try my hand at wet bending wood, so I'm planning to build a teardrop shaped bodied instrument (most likely a stick dulcimer) by soaking the wood for the sides until pliable, then forcing the wood into a jig/form that
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Hi All,
There seems to be some interest in the question "What's the best way to attach the neck to the box?" and it is a natural follow-on discussion as attaching the neck is probably the next thing you'll do once you have your box built and your
Read more…bought a small block of it yesterday for this purpose. Just wondering it it's too soft. I know it's relatively hard, but only half as hard as some of the stuff like ebony.
Read more…I've currently got a hardboard cigar box git that I'm playing, and sustain is not that great, and highs are not that great either, but when I run it through an effects processor, not that bad.
I've started on a hand built wooden box, 1/4" birch pl
Read more…I've got a box I'm constructing, and put 1/8" birch play on the back, and 1/8" mahogany ply on the front (because I only had the birch when I started). The mahogany has some nice deep tone, and the birch has more highs.
I'm contemplating putting a
Read more…[Originally Posted: Nov 29, 2010]
[By Mark Bliss]
Hopefully we will get Lowe and others to participate here.
I'll kick off a question. Recently I saw 8" cymbals on sale and wondered how they would work as a resonator. Anyone done this and have an
Hi All.
Back in 1862, the renowned Spanish luthier Antonio Torres Jurado ("Torres") built an experimental paper mache guitar to prove that it is the top (soundboard), and not the back and sides of the guitar that gave the instrument its sound. Si
Here is a diagram that shows how I built my first box which is about 9" long by 7.5" wide and 4" deep. I am still in the process of building a CBG around the box, but I wanted to get a discussion going on how to be
[Original Post: Jun 4, 2011]
Alan Roberts has a great set of construction photos in his photo collection on his CBN personal page. But the problem is that they are intermixed with other photos and are not in any particular order (well, maybe they
Read more…Hi All,
I'm working on a CBG with a white plywood veneer sound board and a white poplar wood neck and head stock. The white wood doesn't suit my tastes, so I was thinking of staining it. Since B&Q (my local hardware supplier in China) does not sell sm
[Original Post: Mar 17, 2011]
This is a summary of the thread started by John Maw regarding optimal bridge placement. Click here to read the original thread.
1.) It seems each cigar box has a unique "sweet spot" and this is the best place to put the
I have made a couple of boxes that are approximately 8" wide, and found it was difficult to find wood suppliers who offer thin woods (preferably 1/4" thick) in that width. I did buy a couple of pieces from The Lumber Store on ebay that I was pleased
Read more…Hi All.
I was trying to install a home-made resonator in a cigar box, but was unable to successfully cut a round hole in the box for the resonator. So, I thought I'd open this topic up as an area of discussion. I know there are a variety of techniq
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Hi All.
I recently came across the following photo that illustrates how one might make an octagonal box, perhaps for a banjo or similar instrument. This series of photos was taken by David Beede to document how he bu
In March of 2011, I built two more wooden sound boxes. The first is an 8" x 8" square box about 2¼" deep while the second "box" is an equilateral triangular shaped box with 11" sides and about 2¼" deep. Both boxes
