I found this lovely piece of Brazilian rosewood, 1/4” x 1 1/2”, that would be lovely for a fretboard I’m building for a friend BUT it’s got what looks like a little bit of tear out from the planer. It’s very shallow, but would I have to sand down to
Read more…I see some people embed piezo discs in the tail end of the neck under the bridge. Other folks attach them to the vibrating sound board. The bridge makes sense to me on one side, but it’s usually then butted right against the neck and not free to vibr
Read more…I bought a bunch of boxes the other day and it was only when I was using a spade bit to cut a sound hole in the top of one that I realized it was pressboard and not the plywood I expected. The hole came out a little wonky but no matter, the guitar p
Read more…In my reading, I've seen that many luthiers prefer to install their frets with a press instead of a hammer. They go in more evenly, seat better, and are less prone to coming loose later.
I've seen a few presses people use in some videos. Some look
Read more…I'm building a ukulele for a friend out of a Johnny Walker box. It originally held 10 mini bottle of liquor but it's basically a cigar box.
So I see two ways to go about the build:
1) Get the Gitty kit and use all those parts
-OR-
2) Build a neck th
Read more…I'm building a ukulele for a friend. I found this great little souvenir teaspoon. I want to cut off and discard the bowl of the spoon, flatten what's left, and stick it to the middle of the headstock between the tuner posts. It's pretty small so I
Read more…I've been considering using a notched piece of bone or plywood for a string guide on my guitars. I like to use a zero fret, so I don't need a real bone nut, just a notched piece to hold the strings at the right spots.
I was thinking I could use eith
Read more…I just installed a Strat style bridge on a guitar I made and I got lucky, it worked out perfectly! Not knowing exactly how to place it for height relative to the finger board and scale length, this is how I did it.
The wood of the fingerboard was 1/
Read more…I've got this great little slide top box that I want to use to make an electric guitar. The obvious problem is that if I mount pots and pickups, I can't slide the top back on.
My plan is to just shave off the lip at one end of the top and then just
Read more…Hey again everyone. I was looking on a few different guitar sites trying to get an answer to this question.
I do know that you want to have the tuning gear toward the nut/bridge and the threaded shaft for the tuning key above it toward the top of t
Read more…I rough cut the headstock for my next license plate guitar. It’s a surprise gift for a good friend.
Read more…I built a CBG that I was going to send from Oregon to my brother in New York. I had a box that was a little big but would do, all told it weighed a little over 8 pounds.
I went down to FedEx and it was going to cost $88US to send it. Yikes! I chec
Read more…I popped into Rockler the other day, they’re a tool and supplies store for woodworking. I found and bought a few 1/8”x2”x24” pieces of exotic hardwood. I figured these would be really nice for fretboards and only 1/2 the thickness of the 1/4” stock t
Read more…I've bought a few different inexpensive pre-wired pickups with volume and tone controls pre-installed. It's amazing what you can get for under $10!
I'm no trained musician, and I'm just playing a home built guitar through cheap pickup on a battery p
Read more…Since I built my older son Tor a three string license plate guitar, it only seemed to make sense to build a smaller version for my seventeen month old Haakon. https://photos.app.goo.gl/Uukbwyl5R5EQTUOi2 This one is all poplar with a plywood back, f
Read more…I posted about this guitar and a pic or two elsewhere, but here is the gallery of the whole build process.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/2cIBsbJzTL1Yd83K2
I built this with my son Tor, it's our first build. I have a few more in mind already :)
Scott
Read more…https://photos.app.goo.gl/ee6fSgX1XhUhs7Fa2 This one had several incarnations before it was right. It started as a fretless acoustic slide I built to play along with my son. I added a piezo which fed back terribly. I put in a single coil with volume
Read more…Hi, I'm Scott. I've half heartedly tried learning to play a few instruments over the year, most recently a ukulele. I figured with four strings, one per finger, I'd finally get it. I learned a few chords but never really got the hang of it.
I ran
Read more…