How Do You Store Your Instruments?

tnfishdaddy

tnfishdaddy

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We have an ever growing collection of instruments at my house. Instruments stay down stairs in our man cave.This past summer my son started playing the guitar. My other son, not to be left out, decided he wanted to play the mandolin. I bought them stands for their instruments and all was good. Not to be left out, I bought my first ukulele. It sat on a shelf when not in use. No problems so far. Fast forward to Christmas break. My wife's uncle found a guy that needed some money so my boys ended up with a violin, electric guitar and a big amp. My father also gave me his old baritone ukulele. There are two mandolin cases (one hard, one soft), three guitar cases ( all hard), one hard violin case and soon to be one hard ukulele case. My dilemma is this, I have instruments and cases laying everywhere. I need some sort of organization. I don't want to keep the instruments in their cases because my thinking is if they are out of site, the boys are less likely to play. Nobody plays the violin so it will sit in it's case but I want to keep everything else out. Just wondering how everybody stores their instruments. I would love to see some pictures but a simple description will work. I don't know whether to order some more stands (don't have a lot of floor space left) or start hanging things on the wall.
 
Mine stay in their cases in a closet - safer with animals and kids. They still get played - easy to take out of the closet and open the case. Helps regulate the humidity as well.
 
Mandarb said:
Mine stay in their cases in a closet - safer... They still get played - easy to take out of the closet and open the case. Helps regulate the humidity as well.
Click to expand...

Same here!!!
 
My Eleuke is in the back, leaning up against the amp (I rarely play it) The acoustic uke that I play most of the time is hanging on the wall next to my desk (I work from home) where I can grab it and pluck around quickly.

We are in a similar spot (headed that way) though. Wife has a guitar, in a case, son has a flute and stand with music on it that he plays daily, and his ukulele (Dolphin) is due in teh4 mail any day. Most of our instruments are piled around/leaning against the upright piano no one plays.

:)
 
I forgot to mention the music stand the boys share. I really need another music stand so they don't have to share. They keep their music in a 3 ring notebook and one is always moving the others music and things tend to get misplaced.
 
I keep everything in my "office"... nicer instruments are kept in their cases, less nice (or more frequently played) instruments on the wall or stands. fyi, i started running a room humidifier a few weeks ago to keep them all happy - i also run a whole house humidifier, but that's not enough on its own.

here's a photo of my setup:
2012-01-05_10-22-22_171.jpg
note ukes in cases leaning against wall and evaporative humidifier in foreground.
 
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They sit on my shelves in front of my books & dvd's; the units have the uprights on the front so the body under the saddle keeps the uke from falling over. The weirder-shaped ukes (banjo, sceptre) have stands on the floor.

I used to keep all of mine in their cases, but I found I wasn't playing as much as it meant I had to get up and open the case. Now they're on show I pick them up all the time.
 
Since I only have two, it's pretty easy. Both of my 'ukuleles are kept in their cases, with humidifiers (the Oasis units that hang inside the body) until they are needed. The two are kept downstairs, in the family room, tucked nicely and quietly into a corner. Thankfully my dogs have outgrown their need to chew on everything they see, so they mostly ignore the cases now as just something else that is there.
 
I have mine hanging on the wall so I see and play them regularly. Ok, not all of them are on the wall (too many) but several. The others are in their cases in a cool storage room in the attic.

I may be changing this method soon though. I just added central heating to my old house so it may be drier than it used to. I have to get a doodad to measure the humidity now to see if I need to add a humidifier. Hope not! I've spent enough this month.
 
I have an old gibson dove leaning up against a wall in my den - I really aught to bolt up my guitar-hanger.....

My fluke ukulele gets played as much by my 2 year old as by me, so it finds itself stored in various places - on the floor, the counter top, the kitchen sink, the toybox, the couch.

Amazingly, it's held up to all this abuse. I could probably use that thing as a baseball bat without any worries.

So I guess what I'm saying here is, I'm extremely bad at storing my instruments :).
 
I store four of them on Hawaiian themed wall hangers. The Kamaka is kept in a case with humidifiers because of its seam issues. I find even when I take it out to play it starts to reopen up so I keep it in the case now.
 
I have soft rope loops on the wall each loop is held up by a small nail I have 5 ukes hanging this way it looks great and they are all in view and in mind easy to put up easy to take down and they are not taking up any storage space
 
tnfishdaddy said:
We have an ever growing collection of instruments at my house. Instruments stay down stairs in our man cave.
Click to expand...
What's the temp & humidity in the cave? If I had enough solid wood instruments, I'd probably find a way to maintain proper humidity levels and keep temps at a comfortable range 24/7. I don't know what a safe temperature differential (50-70ºF?) is for the various instruments, but I'm pretty sure it's a drastic & sudden change in temps that is most harmful. So you'd want to keep them away from the heating/AC source.
 
Let me stress as an instrument builder, that anyone who owns solid wood instruments needs to have a fairly accurate hygrometer and know what the rH (relative humidity) is were they store their instruments. Unlike temperature, which we can feel, rH is only apparent to us in its extremes. At 90 degrees F and 95% rH we feel sticky because our sweat does not evaporate and at 10 degrees outdoors in a heated home where the rH may be 14% our skin cracks because the air is sucking up moisture from everything. Hygrometers are not very expensive and are necessary to protect your instruments.

Brad
 
Bradford said:
Let me stress as an instrument builder, that anyone who owns solid wood instruments needs to have a fairly accurate hygrometer and know what the rH (relative humidity) is were they store their instruments. Unlike temperature, which we can feel, rH is only apparent to us in its extremes. At 90 degrees F and 95% rH we feel sticky because our sweat does not evaporate and at 10 degrees outdoors in a heated home where the rH may be 14% our skin cracks because the air is sucking up moisture from everything. Hygrometers are not very expensive and are necessary to protect your instruments.

Brad
Click to expand...

Just ordered a hygrometer for the room where my ukes are hanging. Will know soon if it's safe!
 
Bradford said:
Let me stress as an instrument builder, that anyone who owns solid wood instruments needs to have a fairly accurate hygrometer and know what the rH (relative humidity) is were they store their instruments. Unlike temperature, which we can feel, rH is only apparent to us in its extremes. At 90 degrees F and 95% rH we feel sticky because our sweat does not evaporate and at 10 degrees outdoors in a heated home where the rH may be 14% our skin cracks because the air is sucking up moisture from everything. Hygrometers are not very expensive and are necessary to protect your instruments.

Brad
Click to expand...

Because I worry about the effects of relative humidity (I live in a temperate climate -- San Francisco -- but it's drier than people think and drier still in the winter when the heat's on), I keep each of my solid wood ukuleles in a case with a hygrometer and an Oasis humidifier. At first, I tended to play my Kala travel ukulele a lot because it was the one I left out, but now I take the extra trouble of taking the ukulele I want to play out of its case. For me, it's just a matter of peace of mind. I'd hate to find a crack one day in a $1,000+ Kamaka because I didn't keep it adequately humidified. If I had the space (I rent a small apartment) I'd probably dedicate a humidifed room to my ukes and leave them out.
 
I invested in a room humidifier which maintains the humidity at 60% and hang all my instruments (ukes and guitars) on the wall. you can see them in the albums on my profile page.

I've had this setup for 2 years now and never had a problem.The Humidifer was $100 at home depot and works great.
 
Basement is finished and stays cool year round. There is central heat and air but heat doesn't really heat it up well during winter months. I would guess that year round temps are 60-70. Living in TN, the summers are muggy. Not sure of humidity during winters. Guess I need to consider a humidifier if I am going to start accumulating these things. :)
 
I keep my ukes in gigbags in my room, pretty much just balanced against the wall - always on top of something soft, of course. Very easy to get, and they're safe!
 
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