Sunday, May 17, 2009

June StrumMn meeting

Let's meet on Sunday June 7th, 2-5pm.

We'll meet at the Como Pavillion but we'll plan to stay outside.
Hopefully it will be nice enough to meet at a picnic table near the waterfall, otherwise we'll find space under the Pavillion roof on the lake side.

Brian

Luthierie

Two projects in the works. I've got another harp frame in clamps now being glued up, the top and bottom have been jointed and thickness sanded.

Then there is this Airline ukulele. It belongs to a co-worker and needs some TLC. The top and back have some seam separation and will get reglued but it was also missing the saddle/bridge. I've built one from scratch and glued it on, here are some pictures.



First I scraped off the old glue.


Here is the new bridge.


Here it's just sitting in place.



Taped off and ready to glue.



In the clamp.


The clamp is off now and I added some Danish oil finish before removing the tape.
Now I need to glue the body separation.
You may have noticed the fretboard, we're not going to mess with it for now.
Brian

Sunday, May 10, 2009

M-day project - and then back to uke stuff

Pounding in the tuning pegs an then stringing it up.
Metal strings tune a lot easier than those nylon uke strings!
But 22 of them?!?!



Delivered to my mom on mothers day. It's a hit!



A close up.



Ignore the hiccups in this sound sample...


Monday, May 04, 2009

Pics of the Mothers day project

Here is what I'm building. The top is mahogany, the back is some kind of ply with a cherry back. The sides are solid cherry. I've traced everything so I have patterns to build another one.
The place I bought it from is ok with this kind of thing and even sold me the second set of hardware. They sell plans for many of their instruments but this is new for them and plans aren't available yet. They sell plans/kits/complete - harps/guitars/banjos/dulcimers etc.



Here I'm gluing up the frame. It's just 4 pieces and the plans say to just tape the joints but I added the one clamp too. The joints were pretty good but I did sweeten up a couple of them.



I glued/clamped the top/back by simply placing a board on top of it and piling weight on it.
About 150 pounds to get the joints tight. I hate using a bunch of clamps, it's so much harder to keep things lined up.



Here it is with the edges trimmed. I then used a lot of elbow grease and some 40 grit to clean up the edges, followed by 100/150/220/400 grit.



Here it is hung up after the edges have been rounded over by router and sanding block. It also has a couple applications of danish oil.



It has to dry for 3 days and then I'll do 3 coats of wipe-on poly. After that I can install hardware and strings. Hopefully it will be complete by the weekend!


Sunday, May 03, 2009

Woodworking season

Well it's finally warm enough to work out in the garage so I'm starting to pull out my tools.
I hope to build a couple ukes this summer with the goal to be complete before the Milwaukee Uke Fest in September. Okay, it's a long way off but I've got a busy summer ahead with a graduation party to prepare for, etc.

I'm planning to build another soprano with the forms I have on hand. I also have plans drawn up for a tenor so if I can build a new side bender form then that will be in the mix too.

I bought plans for a Regal style tenor guitar last year too, so if I have time and feel real ambitious then who knows what may come out of my garage.

As a starter I'm working on something a bit different as a mothers day gift for my mom. It's called a Reverie Harp and I'm building from a kit supplied by Musicmakers Kits in Stillwater, Mn.
The kit is built and I'm working on the finish now, I'll have build pictures up soon. It only took 2 days and would be an easy one for just about anybody.

I also bought a second set of hardware and plan to built a second harp for myself completely from scratch. The mahogany has already been resawn and glued up in a bookmatch for the top/back. Need to thickness sand and built up the side pieces. More when I get going on that.

Off to a StrumMn meeting now!
Brian