What's happening in your shed?

This little beauty is a nano 180mm scale length loosely based on a Martin Style 3. All Wood Tasmanian(?) Blackwood except spotted gum string through bridge and fretboard (blackened with vinegar and steel wool). Bwb done with fibre (~200gsm art board) my first try at bwb and I had to go thin in keeping with the downsizing of the instrument (600gsm looked too thick but I may use it later. Makes nice business cards anyway ).
The tail decoration done from a potato sack clip.
The bracing is minimal but based on the Grellier plans. Other Specs based on Andy's ukuleles including the 32mm nut width. You need at least that width so you can press one string at a time when you want to and have space for a little bit of manoeuvring. https://www.facebook.com/andysukuleles/

Strung with 40 60 50 30lb nylon fishing line.



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I’ve been wondering what happened to those ... there doesn’t seem to have been anything from Ken on eBay for quite some time?
I've been struggling this winter with the old arthritis and can't get as motivated as i'd like to....Also I'm considering another selling option other than ebay , but i do have quite a few nice sopranos in stock at the moment.... they just need stringing up.

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I've been struggling this winter with the old arthritis and can't get as motivated as i'd like to....Also I'm considering another selling option other than ebay , but i do have quite a few nice sopranos in stock at the moment.... they just need stringing up.

Thanks for the update.

Yeah, growing older ain’t much fun but it’s better than the alternative ...

You’ve done well on eBay but perhaps there’s a better way - or even a mix of ways - forward for you now. I wonder what methods your fellow builders use to sell their creations, and feel sure that if you ask on UU then you’ll get some helpful answers.
 
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Pegs. Got the Herdim shaper and matching reamer. The shaper blades need honing, but work great.IMG_27022022_091019_(2500_x_1406_pixel).jpg
 
I've been struggling this winter with the old arthritis and can't get as motivated as i'd like to....Also I'm considering another selling option other than ebay , but i do have quite a few nice sopranos in stock at the moment.... they just need stringing up.

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Sorry to hear about the arthritis. Try Aspercream. Works for me, or at least dulls the pain. I hope you'll let us know about the new selling venue if not eBay. I've been getting up EARLY every day for three months in hopes of finding one listed! :cry:
 
I've been struggling this winter with the old arthritis and can't get as motivated as i'd like to....Also I'm considering another selling option other than ebay , but i do have quite a few nice sopranos in stock at the moment.... they just need stringing up.

I imagine that you could start by posting here on the forum as well as over at Fleamarket Music Marketplace. It would let you sell direct and avoid the fees.
 
Things have been quiet in the lounge and this is more of a test than anything to see if things are working so I will post a picture of an ukulele I made some years ago with a big boo boo. I managed to cut into a side when I was cutting the top overhang off with a coping saw and it was deep too. You can see the repair on the lower right bout. I pointed it out to the person who bought the uke and they didn't care. I did... Rosette of ground turquoise stone in CA glue. Sides were Oregon myrtle.

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I did a shed clear out ...Got rid of most of the tools and equip that I haven't used in years...miter saw, palm sander, parrot vice, spare Router, loads of spanner's.. a Zyliss vice..and lots of all the other other stuff that lays about under benches for years and just gets in the way...I gave the lot to my Daughter with the instructions to sell the lot on Ebay and keep the money as a birthday present...I feel like a Nun that just got rid of all the clutter... what a relief :)
 
The latest set.
#93 - baritone in quilted maple and aromatic cedar top.
#94, #95 - matched set of tenor ukulele and parlor guitar as wedding presents for my niece and her guitar playing future husband. Caramel sycamore, Port Orford cedar top, poppy inlay to match the proposed wedding flowers.
#96 - The 'Florida' ukulele. Made from woods I got around the neighborhood. Cypress top from scraps a neighbor had from doing an up-scale panelling job [perfectly quarter-sawn], carrot wood (Cupaniopsis anacardioides) back & sides from an unusually large tree taken down by another neighbor [very stiff and dense, good stuff], neck is Cuban mahogany from a big tree taken down around the corner to put in a pool, spalted tamrind binding and headplate from tree planted and taken down by a mango grower in Boynton Beach.
 

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Fun with science. My latest ukulele projects have fretboards and bridges I cut from locally harvested Osage Orange. A tough, hard wood, it can take years for UV exposure and oxidation to change the wood from its bright puke yellow to a darker chocolate brown. In my hopes of finding a way to pre-age the wood, I stumbled across the work of another woodcrafter who claimed it was possible to darken Osage Orange in a manner of days using ammonia. Though unsure of the veracity of his claims, I figured it was worth a few $$$ at a nearby store to give it a try.

I put a lid from a jar in the bottom of a plastic storage container, and put a few ml of ammonia in it. Then I attached my wood pieces to the lid with carpet tape, and sealed the container with the instrument pieces suspended over the ammonia. A few pieces of scrap wood were placed around the bottom of the container to keep the pieces from falling into the ammonia in case the tape came loose.

After just a few days, I was already beginning to see a difference. Much more so than the many days I had the pieces laying in direct sunlight last Summer. The image shows the pieces after several weeks of being sealed in the fuming box. An unexposed control piece is shown for comparison. Mission accomplished. For those inclined, here's a scientific discussion of the concept: bioresources.cnr.ncsu.edu/resources/wood-color-changes-by-ammonia-fuming/

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Lol, very nice, but I love the rich orange/yellow and don't want it to age! Recognized it as soon as I saw it, I have one that's osage orange back and sides I'm working on and I haven't determined what I'll make the fingerboard out of yet. I have some desert iron wood that I might use.
 
This fancy little pink tele inspired minx has a Tasmanian oak neck laminated with merbau and a kari fretboard with abalone fret dots. The body is chambered meranti painted in pink. Unfortunately not any louder than a solid body but the f hole looks fancy anyway. The pickups are a pair of pbass clone pickups split and operating in parallel with separate volume controls and a single tone. Binding is white ABS, at least it will be white when I finish cleaning it. The tuning pegs are one side of a cheap set of mandolin tuners. Strung with the lightest electric guitar strings I could find.

Not particularly happy with binding and paint combo. Multiple retouches required as paint chipped around edge of binding.. I think I will be limiting myself to paint or binding on natural from now on. I probably didn't need to make the neck as wide at the body as I did but I forgot how narrow these hard tail bridges are.20220323_164456_copy_527x1142.jpg20220325_153739_copy_521x1130.jpg
 
The latest set.
#93 - baritone in quilted maple and aromatic cedar top.
#94, #95 - matched set of tenor ukulele and parlor guitar as wedding presents for my niece and her guitar playing future husband. Caramel sycamore, Port Orford cedar top, poppy inlay to match the proposed wedding flowers.
#96 - The 'Florida' ukulele. Made from woods I got around the neighborhood. Cypress top from scraps a neighbor had from doing an up-scale panelling job [perfectly quarter-sawn], carrot wood (Cupaniopsis anacardioides) back & sides from an unusually large tree taken down by another neighbor [very stiff and dense, good stuff], neck is Cuban mahogany from a big tree taken down around the corner to put in a pool, spalted tamrind binding and headplate from tree planted and taken down by a mango grower in Boynton Beach.
That Carrot Wood is beautiful stuff. I'm assuming it doesn't get very big which would explain it's absence in lutherie? I really appreciate the way you think outside the box when it comes to tonewoods.
 
That Carrot Wood is beautiful stuff. I'm assuming it doesn't get very big which would explain it's absence in lutherie? I really appreciate the way you think outside the box when it comes to tonewoods.
Yes, carrot wood does not get very big (at least here in south Florida) as it is usually planted as a yard tree. There is certainly no commercial lumber cut here. It is native to Australia so maybe some is cut into lumber over there. Nice hard stuff though.
 
Always busy here in tropical north Queensland. Been a very hot and humid wet season and I'm pretty much done in the workshop by noon as it's well into the high 30's C by then. The latest batch of commisions are 3 tenors and 2 concerts..
 

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This fish uke was requested as a make what the spirit leads you request.
I loosely based the work on this Portuguese Rajão from the late 19th Century made by Augusto Merciano da Costa.
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/503738
Ever since I first saw it I've fancied making my own version.

The body is Meranti using a bandsawn bowl technique. The fretboard is spotted gum and the fret dots are recycled from leftover ABS guitar binding. The bridge is Tasmanian blackwood. The fish on the 5th fret is just engraved in with a usb rotary tool back filled with a white filler.
 
This fish uke was requested as a make what the spirit leads you request.
I loosely based the work on this Portuguese Rajão from the late 19th Century made by Augusto Merciano da Costa.
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/503738

Thanks for the link Ian. This might be what the first Hawaiian ukuleles were inspired by. I think this is a very historical instrument if you are into ukuleles. 19th Century. In the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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