Hi all,
In between guitar projects, I also have a plan to build an electric ukelele.
Currently working out the plan, based on a electricherald plan for a Gibson Melody maker.
I need to double check the dimensions but for now just getting an idea of how it might look.
It will be a Concerto ukelele ( 15" scale length )
For now, I am considering making this a neck trough for no particular reason.
I do wonder if I need to make a trussrod for this, I dont think I do, but perhaps others have another opinion?
Any advice on this little journey is greatly appreciated!
I do wonder if I need to make a trussrod for this, I dont think I do
I’ve made cigar box guitars with no trussrod. It was fine. IIRC, the neck was Maple, so good & strong.
(It wasn’t *actually* a cigar box - the body was a hollowed out piece of scrap Ash).
Online guitar making courses – guitarmaking.co.uk
Baritone Uke 19inch scale lenght. Steel strings used. Carbon Fiber Rod installed.
Bass Ukulele 20 inch scale lenght. Kamoa uke bass steel wound strings. Carbon fiber rod installed.
Anything 19 inch(Baritone Uke) or more, adviseable to install a carbon fiber rod.
Although cigar box guitars are made without truss rods. Works but prone to warping.
After my first acoustic build, I've been quite busy trying to cleanout our garden shed to turn it into a decent work and storage place.
Yesterday it was finally time to remove everything and cleanup the place a bit.
Now I am awaiting delivery of my woodworking bench and a dust collecting setup ( Vacuum cleaner + dust collector ), they all should arrive next week 🍾
I also started working on my electric ukulele build
Im jealous of the amount of space you have, looks like it will be a great workshop.
What do you plan to use as a pick up on the electric.
Some people call me a tool, others are less complimentary. Tools being useful things.
Im jealous of the amount of space you have, looks like it will be a great workshop.
It is not all mine unfortunately, I do have to share it with my girlfriend , also it will house our big parasol, BBQ equipement and party tents.
I am going to shield off the woodworking corner with some of those heavy plastic duranet curtains. No idea how they are called in english, dont even know the proper dutch word 🤣
Hopefully , together with the dust collection system , it will be enough to keep the rest relatively clean.
What do you plan to use as a pick up on the electric.
I bought a cheap sigarbox guitar pickup assembly from aliexpress for this. I am not planning on keeping the tonepot, however. Just one volume pot , that s it.
Great space to have @koendb...... even a fridge for your beer. 😂🍻
Yes , and that 's the only thing in that fridge for now, oh and some wodka and white wine 🙂
I am also planning to move my PA system there., makes it real easy to move that stuff outside when we are having parties in the garden 😉
🍻 😎
Today I made some progress on the ukulele.
Oh and I also received my new workbench on friday.
I was happely routing the control cavity.. until I noticed I made a mistake..
Arggh I made the control cavity on the right side ! Oh well It now became my first lefty 🤣
And yeah I changed my mind, I ll just add the tone control anyway.
I can probably sell this uke to a lefty (already have a candidate), so I decided to leave in the tone control.
next is fretboard and placing the bridge
Measuring and scoring the fretslots.
First time I had to do this manually.
For guitars and basses I do have templates, but not for an ukulele 🙂
I was always reluctant to do this, because I am usually very sloppy when it comes to measuring, but it looks like it went pretty smooth. We'll have to wait and see if I made a good assessment of the situation. 😀
@koendb you’ll never guess what I am making right this very minute!! Yup, ukulele scale templates! It’s taken me a while to get around to it and you do get a new pin with it to fit in the 3mm holes but apart from that it works in exactly the same way as the others with the the main fret slotting jig. More details in the next few days.
Cheers
Darren
@darrenking Nice:-) I still haven't used your neck pocket jig ( Its a bit too big for my ukulele neck unfortunately ).
That will be for one of my next projects.