25” scale four string tenor

Spider Bridge

Body is 15” diameter

Total weight is 7.5 lbs

The headstock is made up with five layers:
1. The face is book matched ribbon grain Koa veneer
2. The layer behind the face is a sheet of copper which I used to embellish the edge of the headstock and the rim of the hole for the truss rod
3. The main core is red oak
4. Fourth layer is another sheet of copper which helps to further embellish the edge of the headstock
5. The back is book matched birds eye maple veneer

The neck is red oak (with a layer of Brazilian gumm wood) filled with black tinted polyfilla.

Heel cap and fretboard are both ebony.

Gold fret wire.

Aluminum and brass fret markers.

Tuners are chrome Gotoh.

My son-in-law makes the brass nuts in his machine shop for me.

The body is a plywood donut laminated with book/sequence matched Koa veneer. Both the front and back of the body were laid up using a 12-piece book/sequence matched veneer “V” sunburst pattern. In the right light the body looks like it is “spinning”.

The side of the body is also laminated with book matched Koa veneer.

Aniline dye stain on the body.

The pup is a passive Schatten RG-03 Dobro Style Spider Bridge Pickup. Volume, tone and EQ are done at the amp. I didn’t want to take away from the front sunburst pattern with control knobs.

Finally, the gitty was finished using Emtech 6000 water born gloss lacquer. I sprayed on over half a Canadian gallon of that gorp before I got the build-up I was looking for. Took me the better part of a day and 6 beers to complete the hand rubbing!