Northern JCD-2 (Tribute) ukulele

I am really intrigued by the "Northern ukulele" design, so I decided to try to make one for myself.

I've made a half a dozen solid-body electric ukes, But I'd never tried my hand at an all wood, fully acoustic instrument. Every bit of this ukulele is made from walnut (except for the rosewood bridge). I thought it would be cool to make a uke all from the same wood. It has a soprano scale length.

I made the body with some minimal bracing and not-quite-enough kerfing.




One of the most unique things about this ukulele is the way the strings are threaded through the headstock. The headstock isn't angled, so something is needed to keep the strings on the nut.




After everything was assembled, I put a Tru-oil finish on it. I finished it off with a "Gun Stock Wax" (another product from Birchwood Casey) polish. These two products really made the walnut sing.

I opted to make the sound holes bigger than the original design. Doing this should help with the volume.



It has a fun, bright sound. I'll post a video soon that has a sound sample.

The completed picture of this ukulele wasn't that great. Here is a better representation of what it looks like.

Looks fun, although I have never been intrigued by those. I like the concept of single species ukes, I've tried that but usually use something else for the fretboard.

DanielHulbert said:

I opted to make the sound holes bigger than the original design. Doing this should help with the volume.

Click to expand...

Are you sure? My guess would be that it wouldn't. But that's a guess.

I tried to make the total area of the three sound holes close to the area of a regular sound hole. The three sound holes were one inch in diameter. A regular soprano ukulele has a 1.75 inch sound hole.

Three, 1 inch holes: (pi*.5^2)*3 = 2.356 square inches.
One, 1.75 inch hole: pi*.875^2) = 2.405 square inches.

In the end, it's pretty close.

DanielHulbert said:

Three, 1 inch holes: (pi*.5^2)*3 = 2.356 square inches.
One, 1.75 inch hole: pi*.875^2) = 2.405 square inches.

Click to expand...

If I were that smart I wouldn't be building ukes!
Nice work.

Neat calculating, and it sort of makes sense. What I was thinking though was about an increase in soundhole area, does that by itself give a louder uke? My experience is that hole size influences the sound by enhancing / decreasing frequencies but not necessarily volume. Drums and banjos have no holes at all in the top, and some drums have a skin at the bottom. Sound is waves, not a stream of air gushing out of the soundhole (not being snarky Daniel, but a lot of people see sound as air actually going places).

Sven

Sven said:

Neat calculating, and it sort of makes sense. What I was thinking though was about an increase in soundhole area, does that by itself give a louder uke? My experience is that hole size influences the sound by enhancing / decreasing frequencies but not necessarily volume. Drums and banjos have no holes at all in the top, and some drums have a skin at the bottom. Sound is waves, not a stream of air gushing out of the soundhole (not being snarky Daniel, but a lot of people see sound as air actually going places).Sven

Click to expand...

Correct Sven :agree:..Hole size affects tone not volume..small hole=deeper tone..A simple way to demonstrate this is to purse your lips and smack yourself in the mouth or on the cheek with the flat of your open hand to make a popping sound ... you'll notice that the wider you open your mouth the higher the tone will be..(dont forget to smack real hard just for me)

Fanx Ken, now my face hurts..!

Those are some interesting things to think about. Thanks everybody.

Video!