So I spent some time making these ukuleles...

It's my first attempt with limited tools and experience. What can I do to improve on them?

These were both built following the Hana Lima construction manual. I had a problem with the tail blocks bulging out the sound boards (which were originally douglas fir) as the sides shrunk, but the tail blocks (long grain front to back) did not. I removed the fret boards and sound boards, chiseled out the tail blocks and replaced them with blocks with the grain running the other way. While I had the fret boards off, I added carbon fiber rods.

The maple ukulele is birds eye maple and pau rosa. The walnut is walnut, figured maple, pau rosa, and lutz spruce.

Finish is shellac, french polished, although I have to confess to cheating a bit with the final spiriting off part and using Meguiars mirror glaze.




Okay, New Guy, I just figured out the next post will have the pictures of the walnut one. I think.

Walnut...

Here are the walnut uke picks.


Thanks,

Yankulele

Props for taking apart your first uke.
There shouldn't have been any shrinkage anywhere if your wood was seasoned, unless the tail block swelled from the glue you used.
Looks good, does it play good?
Also, there is no cheating. There is only getting the results you were working toward. If you got'em, you did good.

Thanks for the kind words. As far as shrinkage, the wood was seasoned, but I glued it up in the fall, and did not keep a humidifier in the case. I believe the sides shrunk as the heat came on and the air dried out here in the northeast winter.

It plays well to me, but I have no idea really. My son and I started these last year when he said, "Dad, we should build a ukulele," as he was looking at his rather sad soprano he bought cheap with his own money at the mall. So we (mostly I) built two. I didn't know how to play an ukulele. I'm learning now.

The one with the spruce top is louder and perhaps a bit less trebly.

From the photos the ukes look great!
There is a difference between seasoned wood and wood that has been kept in a properly humidified shop, ready to work with. Swings in humidity and temperature are not good during the building process. Most of us like are building environment to be kept at about 45% RH. I live on an island that has a wet side and a dry side. I used to conduct workshops on one side of the island and by the time I got them home to the other side the geometry of the pieces would change radically, just within a few hours. So pay attention to your wood while you are building the instrument, not just how dry it was leading up to building. Hope this helps. Keep up the good work.

Very good work for your first go round. I'm also smiling about you and your son working on them together. He will get so much more out of that than 1500 hours playing Grand Theft Auto.

Lovely work with a well-developed sense of design!

As one beginner to another, from the photos you provided, I think that your workmanship is above standard. I'm not too sure about the "droopy" tuner pegs, though!

Bob

Great looking ukes, congratulations! I use something similar to rub out shellac finishes too, the magic of the glaze coats elude me still after many attempts.

Some nice elements there that are difficult to achieve, and if they sound 1/2 as good as they look, then it's a great effort. And getting your son involved is fantastic. Give kids something to develop their creative spirit.

As you asked about what to improve, then I'd suggest that on that head stock shape, those tuners be straightened up so the knob comes out at 90 degrees to the centre line of the fret board, or closer to it. Alternately change the headstock shape to one suited to geared tuners, or use a friction tuner or Peg Heads as that headstock shape is more suited to.

Thanks again for the kind words. I agree with all of you about the head stock shape. I chose that pattern of the two in the plans when I built it because I thought it looked cooler. In fitting the tuners I had to that shape, I found the only way to fit them was to angle them, which looked fine to me at the time. Having looked at pictures of many more ukuleles since (you people do beautiful work), I have a little better sense of what might seem right. I will do a different shape on the next ones.

In regard to movement, thanks for the advice about RH. I have a humidifier on order from Costco (I wish these things lasted more than a couple years), and will be sure to keep the wood stabilized during the build process.

But I still scratch my head about the topic. When I design furniture, I try to design it so that the joinery is unhindered by seasonal wood movement. The maple sides of my uke are going to move 1/32" to 3/64", I think, through the humidity swings we have here. With the tail block long grain front to back, and no dimensional change as a result, that turns into a pretty big bulge in the front and back in the winter. The bulge is gone with the reoriented tail block.

But then I think about the back and the sound board with their cross-grain bracing and I wonder when they will tear themselves apart. Is the RH during construction especially critical in regard to keeping those two pieces from cracking in the future? It makes sense to me that expansion against the cross bracing would be less destructive than shrinkage, which would cause the wood to split.

Thanks,

Yankulele

Laminate the block...

Ok. Thanks.

Yankulele

I like the angled tuners. Reminds me of the tuner orientation of Warwick basses. On a long scale instrument like an electric bass, the angle puts the tuners at a more ergonomically correct position. I'm not sure if it would make any difference on a short scale instrument, but I think it looks cool. Nice work all around.

I'm going to second that. I kinda like the angled tuners. It works. But why the curly-cue with the extra string length? Cut em' off flush I say. Not like you are going to need the extra. I used to do this twisty thing in the 70's on my guitars when it was all the rage. Why? I dunno. Probably because I didn't have wire cutters handy.

The curly-cues are because I don't know any better, and because I was never sure I had the action right and might need access to the nut again. But now I think I will cut them flush.

Thanks for the suggestion.

If you had a problem of swelling blocks, you might consider laminating them. They'll be much more stable that way.

Lovely work, by the way. Love the soundholes and the wood choices.

Thanks again for the kind words.
Strings have been clipped.
In regard to the tailblocks, they didn't swell. The maple and walnut sides moved with ambient rh as fall became winter and everything shrunk. By orienting the tail block with grain running the same direction as the sides and building it out of the same wood as the sides, it should, in theory, move the same amount as the sides as the ambient rh changes with the seasons. A laminated block should have the same effect as running the grain long grain front-back, I. e., no movement with the seasons. Now I know many of you professional luthiers use plywood tailblocks, and I know you are right and know exactly what you're doing. I am not trying to imply otherwise. This method seems to be working for me so far: no bulges no divots through three seasons.

Thank you for all the input.

Yankulele

It is important to remember that wood does not expand/contract in response to humidity evenly. It changes much more 'along' the grain (Tangential) than 'across' the grain (Radial). For bird-eye maple to show the maximum figure (like quilted maple) the wood needs to be flat-sawn as opposed to quarter-sawn. This means that the side is responding to humidity in a Tangential way, since the growth rings will be basically parallel to the side. Contrast this with a quarter-sawn board, where the growth rings run perpendicular to the side (or back) and thus the side changes dimension because of humility in a Radial way. With a quarter-sawn board, the larger Tangential change just makes the board slightly thicker/thinner.

There are lots of varieties of maple but from the Wood Database the shrinkage rates, which are closely related to how the wood changes in response to humidity, are:
Hard maple:
Radial: 4.8%, Tangential: 9.9%
Soft maple:
Radial: 4.0%, Tangential: 8.2%

You can see that the Tangential change is more than twice the radial change, so a birds-eye (or quilted) side/back will move more than twice as much as a quarter-sawn piece of wood. But if you quarter-saw birdseye maple, the figure disappears. Curly maple by contrast shows the maximum figure on a quarter-sawn face.

Yeah thanks, Jupiteruke. That's why I'm uneasy with the idea of using a laminated block. Running those numbers through the formula in Bruce Hoadley's "Understanding Wood," I come up with about 1/16" movement through the seasons for uke sides if they are flat sawn maple at 2 3/4" at the tail. When I replaced my tail blocks, I used the same wood oriented with the grain running the same way as I used for the sides. So far, it seems to be working: no bulge, no divot.

My next ukes will be walnut sides, which is more stable, but I still plan to use walnut for the tail block.

Yankulele