Cold snap turns cherry into rosewood

greenscoe

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A couple of weeks ago, the cold weather forced me into the kitchen to apply the purfling and binding to my cherry tenor

A few drops of a sauce containing Turmeric left unnoticed on the worksurface produced some nasty stains on the uke back. My attempts to remove the stains using various household cleaning products made matters worse: the solution was to use a wood dye. The result is that my tenor uke now looks rather more like rosewood. However I think it looks fine.

The neck is laminated/builtup with Tulipwood (Yellow Poplar in USA). The decoration is spalted beech trimmed with walnut and the purfling is maple.

Moral of the story: in cold weather take care with heat/hot sources/sauces!


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looks very beautiful!

hmmm... turmeric + cherry = curried-fruit-uke!
 
What dye did you use? Looks wonderful.

Coltron wood dye (Indian Rosewood) Its a tin thats been in my garage a few years so I dont know whether its still available.

Google tells me that Cherry is not a good wood to dye. It has areas of cross grain: some parts therefore absorb a lot of dye, others a little, so it often looks patchy. My attempts to bleach resulted in black mottling rather than bleaching. I am sure others on the forum who regularly use stains/dyes know which woods to use and those to avoid.
 
Doesn't look patchy to me. Good save!

You're going about this all wrong though. Your announcement should gone something like this:

I've always loved the look of rosewood, but it's expensive and with the new CITES restrictions, is getting almost unusable anyway. So I decided to make my own with a nice piece of cherry. Even though cherry can sometimes have cross grain that makes dye look patchy, my carefully selected piece had no such problems, and well, the results speak for themselves. The look of a deep Indian rosewood for a fraction of the cost and no worries about export restrictions.

:D ;) :rolleyes: :cool:
 
I've always loved the look of rosewood, but it's expensive and with the new CITES restrictions, is getting almost unusable anyway. So I decided to make my own with a nice piece of cherry. Even though cherry can sometimes have cross grain that makes dye look patchy, my carefully selected piece had no such problems, and well, the results speak for themselves. The look of a deep Indian rosewood for a fraction of the cost and no worries about export restrictions.

...and after much experimentation I achieved just the right shade of rosewood by adding a few drops of turmeric! Who knew?
 
I think it looks great!
 
A couple of weeks ago, the cold weather forced me into the kitchen to apply the purfling and binding to my cherry tenor

A few drops of a sauce containing Turmeric left unnoticed on the worksurface produced some nasty stains on the uke back. My attempts to remove the stains using various household cleaning products made matters worse: the solution was to use a wood dye. The result is that my tenor uke now looks rather more like rosewood. However I think it looks fine.

The neck is laminated/builtup with Tulipwood (Yellow Poplar in USA). The decoration is spalted beech trimmed with walnut and the purfling is maple.

Moral of the story: in cold weather take care with heat/hot sources/sauces!


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Me thinks ye protest too much. The thang is killer good looking uke. Thanks for the look under the hood. Interesting bracing system.
 
Thanks for the look under the hood. Interesting bracing system.

I saw a photo of a bracing system by Tom Rodriguez and decided to try it on a donor instrument. Subsequently I tried variants of this on 2 Ammoon kits (replacing the tops with Engelmann spruce).


http://forum.ukuleleunderground.com...sing-a-donor-instrument&p=2010959#post2010959


This uke is my attempt at making a great looking and sounding uke based on this experimentation ( also incorporating laminated top linings and top brace tied to endblock).

I'm not disappointed with the way it sounds and though I would have preferred the cherry look, I have to agree it's not a bad looking uke!
 
also incorporating laminated top linings and top brace tied to endblock).

Not sure why you are thinking of using laminated linings, but I suppose it would work just fine. Seems like more work than just using solid wood kerfed linings... Personally I would not tie anything off to the endblock. Could really deaden the top and what is really to be gained? Might decrease telegraphing in that area and it is structurally stronger theorectically, but at what price? The price might be a dead top. In my non-professional opinion (and I just go by my gut sometimes), any brace tied off could potentially have a damping effect by absorbing string energy. Damping: Not good when it comes to volume.
 
Not sure why you are thinking of using laminated linings, but I suppose it would work just fine. Seems like more work than just using solid wood kerfed linings... Personally I would not tie anything off to the endblock. Could really deaden the top and what is really to be gained? Might decrease telegraphing in that area and it is structurally stronger theorectically, but at what price? The price might be a dead top. In my non-professional opinion (and I just go by my gut sometimes), any brace tied off could potentially have a damping effect by absorbing string energy. Damping: Not good when it comes to volume.

In the guitar world using solid or laminated top linings and side reinforcement is to stiffen the sides thereby preventing any energy being dissipated-all the energy stays in the soundboard. Many (including Allen) would say its not necessary in a uke. David Dart is a big fan, heres a quote from him:

"I've been a custom maker for 50 + years and solid lining is the way to go on almost any stringed instrument. Much more rigid rim and better sustain overall."

I have started tying the upper transverse brace to the neck block. Again this makes the transition from box to neck strong and stiff and keeps the energy in the top. I think Beau Hamman mentioned on the forum a while ago that he does this. Many would consider that its the area below the soundhole that's important for sound generation not the upper bout

I too am just an amateur maker and I progress by making small steps based on my experience and that of others.
 
I have started tying the upper transverse brace to the neck block. Again this makes the transition from box to neck strong and stiff and keeps the energy in the top.
I too am just an amateur maker and I progress by making small steps based on my experience and that of others.

This is an area that still puzzles me. Theory would tell me that not tying off the upper top brace to the neck block should free up the top more creating more volume, but gosh darnit, my experiments with gluing the brace to the block has yielded great sounding instruments. I really don't get it sometimes. One of my biggest things against tying off the brace to the block is that over the years as the instrument expands and contracts, the glue joint could fail and buzzing could start. Not good. The more I do this stuff the more puzzled I become. Tis a mystery.
 
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