Cigar Box Style Reso Uke

About a year ago I was given a cone and
cover from a reso uke.A friend has one,and
as he had upgraded the cone in his to a 'better'
brand,I got the 'old one' for nothing.
I considered modifying an existing concert scale
uke and fitting the cone,but realised that the
internal structure and bracing would need to be
totally different,to work as a reso.So I started
hunting around for a large cigar box.Failed to get
one but I found a wooden box in my posession
that had previously held a set of steel Boulle!
So I built a cbu style reso.Link to see pics and
hear a couple of sound samples is given below.
The box was very light coloured when I sanded it
down,so I later stained it and waxed it,as in the
two different pics at my link.
The sound samples were done straight into my PC
using a dirt cheap swan neck desktop mic,and
recorded on nothing fancier than Windows Sound
Recorder.No 'post production' of any kind was done,
what you hear is more or less how it sounds.
Except,in real life,it seems to be a whole lot louder!
Which is what a reso is for,right?
Anyway I enjoyed making this,and have enjoyed
playing it a lot more! In fact,have hardly touched
my other ukes since,but hey,life is for the good
stuff too,yes?

Cigar Box Reso Sound samples and Image:
https://www.box.com/s/gqy9bg5yo97x70oi95qt

Nice! I'm thinking about making a CBU myself. Did you make the neck, or salvage it from another uke?

I was going to make the neck,have made a few
before...but a friend had just made a batch of
concert scale necks,so I got one from him!
A straigh CBU build (with no reso cone to cater
for) is quite straightforward and lots of fun to do.
I made one after I had been playing uke for only
a few weeks! Let us know how your build goes
and post some pics! Good luck with it.

Sounds great

Looks and sounds great. Nice work.

Nice job! Looks good and sounds great.

Thanks! I got the greatest pleasure from actually
making the thing,to begin with.But then,I have
barely laid the thing down since the build!
My other instruments sit forlornly and only get
used now and again,at the moment.
Maybe because I spent forty odd years as a
blues guitarist,something about this little beast
is calling to me,on a basic level?
Seriously,I still play the others and have worked
out which uke 'suits' which song(s) the best.And
this one suits the blues!

timebug said:

Thanks! I got the greatest pleasure from actually
making the thing,to begin with.But then,I have
barely laid the thing down since the build!
My other instruments sit forlornly and only get
used now and again,at the moment.
Maybe because I spent forty odd years as a
blues guitarist,something about this little beast
is calling to me,on a basic level?
Seriously,I still play the others and have worked
out which uke 'suits' which song(s) the best.And
this one suits the blues!

Click to expand...

I have also found great pleasure in playing a uke that I have built. Mind you the uke must sound good (and yours does). But playing a self-made instrument is a real pleasure.