Things With Strings

Things are moving a little quicker now due to being able to square-up the stock faster due primarily to a jig I made for that purpose, hence I managed to get two layers done for the banjolele this weekend. I'd planned to work on the banjo rim, but avoiding nail holes, knots etc. left me with insufficient pieces for an 11" rim, but plenty for an 8" rim. Each layer is quite different in density and cloud, but I'm hoping it will hold together and look decent. The layers were 1" deep, as opposed to the 3/4" of the first one I made. The first one was quite yellow in colour, and I think I'll use that as the middle layer. It will probably end up looking like a cheese sandwich. Two layers glued and clamped I'm now quite looking forward to the next steps which will involve ensuring each layer is flat and then gluing them together. I'm not sure yet whether I'll sand the layers flat or try to use the router, I'll have to sleep on it. Part 3

I'm only a beginner at Sketchup modelling, but have found it really helps to visualise what parts are going to look like, and to ensure everything is going to fit together correctly. I designed a bracket band which I intent to make from a 3/4" x 1/8" brass bar and 1/2" x 1/2" x 1/8" brass angle stock. My skills in Sketchup don't run to  rounding-off corners yet which I plan to do on the actual build, but the picture gives good idea of what I'm aiming for. Sketchup model of bracket band I've calculated that evenly spacing 14 shoes will just about allow for the neck to fit between two of them. Edit : I re-modelled this  Bracket band Sketchup model #2

When ripping thin slices of wood, it's a lot safer to have a zero-clearance insert in the table saw as it prevents the thin slices from getting sucked down inside the saw an possibly jamming the blade. Whilst out running around Christmas time, I spotted a piece of UPVC cladding that had obviously blown of the back of a truck and was littering the countryside. I thought at the time that it might be useful for making a table saw insert and made a mental note to go back for it which I did a few days later. Clean up the countryside and do a bit of recycling, how's that for a bit of good citizenship? It had suffered a bit of damage as it had bounced off the road, and it was pretty filthy, but it still had the protective plastic on it in places, and it was a fair sized chunk. UPVC cladding Here is the insert I made (white) by tracing around the original one (yellow). You can see the difference in the width of the slot that the saw blade comes through. UPVC zero-clearance

Despite taking an unprecedented amount of care squaring the stock material and getting the angle on the mitre saw correct, the joints turned out pretty poor although it's difficult to see from the picture. banjo rim layer 1 However when driving home tonight I had a eureka moment and have gotten myself a solution. When it's dry, I will take a slice through a joint and insert a saw-blades thickness shim. Then I will let that dry and repeat the process for every joint. I may even use a darker colour to make it something of a feature. Sorted!

After a few practice attempts (aka false starts) at making rim segments last year, this weekend I had my first proper crack at it. The problems I'd run into previously were mainly due to starting off with non-squared stock material. This time I picked a ropey log from the pile of pallet wood I have (allegedly Mango, but could be anything) and squared it up. This particular piece was not the best, mainly consisting of knots, nail holes and worm holes and a little bit of wood holding everything together. I don't want to screw up on something that was too nice, but what started off as a fairly substantial piece only yielded enough wood to make one 12-segment layer for the banjolele. Anyway, once I'd squared up the stock, I needed to cut the segments at 15 degrees on the mitre saw. The calculation to get the correct angle to set the mitre saw for segmented is (360 / #segments) / 2 which is where the 15 degrees comes from in this case. First problem! My mitre saw had fix

Before I get onto anything banjo related, I have to say how sad it was to hear of the death of David Bowie this morning. One of life's true originals, the world has lost one of it's most colourful characters. In part 1 I said I'd made a big mistake that would be revealed when I took the clamps off. When I cut the scarf joint, I somehow (goodness knows how) made a mis-calculation on where to start the cut. I think it's because I was trying to build in a margin for error, so didn't follow my drawing, and instead of a margin for error I just got an error. Pretty embarrassing for a guy with a degree in mathematics eh? Anyway, here is the unclamped piece, prior to clean-up. clamps removed Did you spot it? The headstock is too short (aaarrrggghhhh). Here is a close-up. the stubby headstock However, I realised after a few minutes of cursing, that it's actually not too bad at all, because correspondingly, the neck part is too long, and the headstoc

Buoyed up by yesterdays scarf joint jig success and the cutting of the banjolele neck , I decided to start on the banjo neck. First off, I made an "improvement" to the scarf joint jig. A problem with the previous one was that because the part that was cut off was unclamped, there was a bit of tear out. So I adapted the jig in order that I could clamp the workpiece in two places. Like this... adapted scarf joint jig Yeah, I know what you are thinking, "he's going to cut his clamps in half". There is clearance though. clearance for the blade? However, I made two downright stupid errors! The first, and most stupid error was that I placed the clamp nearest the blade the wrong side of the cut. Duh! And the second was that I shouldn't have cut all the way through the fence, because I ended up having to place a wedge in it to prevent the clamp squeezing it shut. Anyway I did spot the second error before making the cut, but not the first one,

Continuing the banjolele neck I started yesterday (link here ) I couldn't wait 24 hours, so after 23 hours I took the clamps off. Actually, the reason was that I needed the clamps for my banjo neck, and I figured 24 hours was just an arbitrary number anyway and that if days were 23 hours instead of 24 it would have said 23. Anyway I digress. I hadn't got the clamping 100% right, because although the joint was good, the head was very slightly askew, so I cleaned it up on the table saw. I will sand the top level though before fixing the fingerboard. Here how it looks now. The scarf joint is very hard to see, it starts somewhere close to the fold on the cloth that the neck is laid on. I have to say that I'm fairly happy with it at this point. the neck after gluing the scarf joint

Delayed first by bird table, and then by the flu (not bird flu), I wanted to get back to some building. I took some measurements from one of my son's ukulele's and drew up some sketches for the banjolele in order to get the dimensions for the neck, and got to work on the build. First off, I cut off and cleaned up a piece of mahogany that I had. It's probably not real mahogany, just something in the same family. The piece I cut off was about 19" x 2.5" x 1.5" cleaned up neck blank Next, I made a jig for the table saw that would allow me to cut a scarf joint at a 15 degree angle for the headstock. I wanted this cut to be clean, so I put a decent Freud blade in the table saw. It actually turned out pretty good. 15 degree scarf joint jig Then it was time for the glue-up. This was a bit tricker than it looked, as it really wanted to move around when it was clamped, but I managed it in the end. neck and head clamped together Another 24