Mango bouzouki......

binding on





neck shaped, fretted and set in place for a pic.....



tuner holes drilled,glued onto the body, heel cap glued on, ready for final shaping

Back again!! blogspot hasn't been letting me in for a week, so a little catching up to do......

fretless bass.....

I was at a loss about what to do with the fingerboard. Unfinished? tru-oil? danish oil? then I got a stewmac "trades secrets" email which suggested using superglue as a fingerboard finish.

huh?

well I researched a bit and it seems that there are folks who do this......

so, 10 tubes for £1 from poundland, so why not? worst cae scenario, I can sand it all off again!!



wet sanded and then polished up, it's looking pretty nice!



then a few coats of Tru oil on the neck and body



and tuner holes drilled...



the pots I'm going to use haven't arrived yet so I'm not drilling holes for them till I see them, so I decided to make a back coverplate next....



and then the strings arrived, so I had to get them on and try it out! nut cut and a temporary jack soldered straight onto the pickup wires....

it works!!

bouzouki top on, and binding channel routed



ears glued onto head, truss rod slot cut and fretboard glued on

fretless bass body amnd mango top glued....



then cut out, neck pocket routed, front edge rounded



neck in place, pickup route still to be done.

fretless bass.... fingerboard sanded....



internal circuitry

there will be a regular humbucker pickup and a piezo bridge. I have a number of guitars with piezo bridges and there is always a problem linking the two signals together for a single cable run.. so, to try to get around that, the plan is to have a seperate preamp for each of the pups then blend them afterwards. from what I've been able to glean on the net, the opamp circuit I'm using SHOULD do the job nicely with only one resistor to be changed between the teo pup types.

here's my first one, for the magnetic pick up. I haven't tried it with strings, but all connected up with a pup, when a screwdriver is scraped across the pole pieces it makes all the right noises!!

bouzouki back braced.....



neck block and linings...



back glued to sides

Mango bouzouki...

soundhole support patch glued on....



rosette made.....



soundhole cut



neck laminated. walnut, cherry, maple, cherry, walnut.

fretless.....

but with markers where the frets WOULD be.....

slots sawn...



glue...



maple strips inserted and taped down...



then flipped over and clamped to the tabletop to make sure the tape doesn't loosen and let then rise...

work done on the fretless neck.

maple blank cut out and marked roughly what goes where.....



truss rod slot cut and truss rod fitted



so, I'm going to have inlay strips where the frets would be if there were any. I'm also not going to fork out an extra £30 for a bass sized fingerboard when teo guitar sized ones can be had for £6...... so, after some careful measuring and cutting, the join between the two pieces will be under a fret line.......



and the back piece glued on.....



rough cut and the head recessed.

a couple of new builds started. a mango bouzouki and a fretless bass.

the zouk?

back & sides cut & planed



and sides bent



and the bass....

two piece beech body joined



and carying on the mango theme, it will have a mango cap.