Hippie's Banjo

[antares]

Well I was given this no-name asean banjo for my fiftieth birthday by a neighbour's stepson. I reckon he thought it'd surprise me which it did, but I made the mistake of picking it up and tearing into it, which of course told him that I probably already had a 'jo. The fact was that it played so much better than my Aria Mastertone knock-off did at the time! I have since had the Aria looked at, and although it plays sweet now, it's hellishly loud whether the resonator is attached or not, and SWMBO complains about it. This no-name 'jo is nowhere near as loud but as I said it played really well, and not being so loud allowed the sound to take front stage over the volume.

One tiny bugaboo though- it sported a hideous non open book Gibson layout with guitar type sideways guitar tuners. I had upgraded the tuners on the Aria to Gotoh nickel plated, and I immediately earmarked the existing ones for this 'jo. And there it ceased. 15-odd years sitting in the corner of my wardrobe niggling me to make some dust.

I went to a mates' guitar get together down on the south coast last Saturday, and I picked up one guy from the next town along the coast. We took the seaside route and he sat there in my VW microbus pickin' away at his admittedly very nice gentle sounding banjo. It was a neat experience, and I resolved to get on with the banjo project.

I sanded off all the black paint and marked out the profile in pencil using various round implements like rattle can caps and rolls of masking tape until I was happy. I used a junior hacksaw to trim the top curve and sanded it smooth with 120 grit emery cloth! I then chain drilled freehand around the middle curves and the curves next to the nut and used an Abrafile™ in a hacksaw frame to hog the wood out. Then I sanded out the rough hack marks and even used 4" engineer's files and the same 120 grit emery cloth to get it to where you can see in the picture. The fifth string tuner hole in the neck had to be VERY carefully relieved using rotary files in a pistol drill to accept the larger Aria tuner, but even though the string tension should hold it on, I think I shall use a little adhesive too. I am really sorry but I didn't take any pictures of it before, but I don't believe that they would in any way augment a reasonably fertile imagination.

What you can't see from that angle is that the rice bowl guys must have bored the tuner holes very slightly freehand! I had no desire to plug and re-drill, so I lightly drifted the holes into slightly more accommodating positions as I increased their diameters to accept the Aria tuners. I can live with it easily- it's really very slight, but anyone with "the eye for it" can see. It just wasn't worth the effort to me for such a cheapo banjo, and anyway I no longer have access to a pillar drill to bore the holes.

I'm not sure how successful my attempt to post a picture will be at the first try because my tried and tested routine with the Proboards App is of course defunct now, but I'll edit the post if it doesn't display properly or at all.



Anyway, there's always the eye candy on the wall to look at!

"Go make some dust!" (Nichols)

[Deleted]

Now that's a fun thing! See you can do things. Now you need to make us all a guitar from scratch! LOL!

 I don't see the photo until I sign in. But there is one there. HA!

 It's cool to get a gift. 

I have had a few banjos in my time. I had one that I bought back in the 70s. I sold it like 7 years ago. Got more for it than what I paid for it back then.

 I then had a real nice one I bought in FL. I don't remember the brand, but it was an upscale banjo with a lot of inlays. I wound up giving it to my granddaughter. Thinking of getting another one. I like them for an added sound to the blues. I like to record banjo with lots of reverb. LOL!

 I even like to use a slide on a banjo. Lots and lots of fun!

[antares]

Hey thanks Dusty.

I don't have a "shop"- I work sitting cross-legged on the floor in the position from where that photo was taken. It gets mighty uncomfortable pretty quickly because at 66 I get cramps in the feet from sitting in a position that wouldn't have bothered me even five years ago. In any event, I don't/ can't "work with wood" because I come from a metal working background, and working with wood is like a constant damage limitation exercise for me- no "finesse". This is why I marvel at what you guys can do.

I've just found the truss rod cover and screws. I have filed down the narrow end of the tapering fluted body of the fifth string tuner by one millimeter because it was bottoming out against the truss rod box section. I think I'll still use a dab or two of adhesive on it though. At the moment I haven't come across the saddle but that's not a biggie really. It would be nice to find it to save buying several saddles of the wrong height, but if I could find it I wouldn't need to buy another one! The armrest doesn't fit- I ground out additional half holes to match the banjo's tension bolts. I NOW remember that it is the armrest off my Aria. The guy who did the work replaced it because one of the Tee nut threads was stripped. I could easily make new nuts but anyway I can live without an armrest and I can always buy one if not.

I'd like to inlay something simple (round!) into the headstock. Maybe a Quarter with Ol' Flapper? We'll see.

This is going to be a short thread!

[Deleted]

Don't forget, I used to build "Kustom cars" Long before I go into making guitars and working with wood. I do think that metal is so much more forgiving than wood. LOL!

 There is a guy I have been watching on YT that makes guitars out of metals. He just finished up an all copper body one. Now he is starting on two resonator guitars using brass. The bodies being brass. Pretty cool to see him working with metals. I want his cooper Tele so bad!

 Can hardly wait to see your banjo up and going!

[antares]

I've figured out the off-site hosting for images to be displayed on the Proboards website, so I've edited the post accordingly. At first I gave up trying all the options and uploaded it to Proboards directly, which I guess is why you had to log in to view it?

Actually, off-site hosting has turned out to be easier via a web browser than it was with Proboards' Android app; I used to go through a rigmarole of deleting certain (but not all of the) square brackets and their contents, and also the "WWW". Now I can just drop in the hotlink and it works.

I found the saddle, it was in my Aria banjo's case (where else really!) but not before I'd searched through all my repositories of "junk". I am going to make some new "Tee" nuts to attach the arm rest, so all it has cost me is a packet of strings!

To avoid spending even so much as a dime, I'm tempted to try staining the bare wood with some cold tea before I lacquer it! This is a tight-wad project after all ;<D

One thing I really did enjoy was re-profiling the blend in from the nut position to the back of the headstock. I can see why you guys like carving the necks.

[Deleted]

Dec 3, 2023 7:42:22 GMT -6 antares said:

I've figured out the off-site hosting for images to be displayed on the Proboards website, so I've edited the post accordingly. At first I gave up trying all the options and uploaded it to Proboards directly, which I guess is why you had to log in to view it?

Actually, off-site hosting has turned out to be easier via a web browser than it was with Proboards' Android app; I used to go through a rigmarole of deleting certain (but not all of the) square brackets and their contents, and also the "WWW". Now I can just drop in the hotlink and it works.

I found the saddle, it was in my Aria banjo's case (where else really!) but not before I'd searched through all my repositories of "junk". I am going to make some new "Tee" nuts to attach the arm rest, so all it has cost me is a packet of strings!

To avoid spending even so much as a dime, I'm tempted to try staining the bare wood with some cold tea before I lacquer it! This is a tight-wad project after all ;<D

One thing I really did enjoy was re-profiling the blend in from the nut position to the back of the headstock. I can see why you guys like carving the necks.

I use the ad image button here on Guitar Attack to post pictures. It works great for me.

 Yes, for me, there is nothing like carving necks. I so enjoyed doing them. I even like to take production necks and re carve them to give them a better feel.

 I had to start using Google for a browser for YT. YT has blocked me on Fire Fox because I was using Ad Blocker. I turned off Ad blocker, but they still have me blocked! So now I am having to use two web browsers. NOT FUN! One to watch YT Fire Fox for everything else. LOL!

Sure gets frustrating to get things to work.

[dnic]

Thanks to the off angle camera shot I can see nothing to be critical of Steve. It looks great! And since I got here late to the party the picture was already posted, yeah.

Sounds like you had a fun trip Steve. And it gave you a push in the right direction.

At 67 with my "new" knee and my old other knee and my old herniated discs I don't get on the floor unless there's just no other way. Like new plumbing under the sink or a new floor install in the entire house. Speaking of neck carving I have found that sometimes the best final sanding position is just sitting with it in my lap and going for it. Makes me into a huge dust ball but if it works is it bad idea?

I'm quite found of being called Nichols, my brother in-law has been calling me that for more than the 47 years I've been married. And I make dust almost everyday I'm allowed too by SWMBO.

Justin I also watch that guy that builds those metal guitars. He texted me prolly six months ago or more. He was going to visit his mom up in Oregon and that head out to the coast to have a guy play and demo his first resonator. Long story short we got together for dinner and talked for three hours. It was great visit for a couple O guitar nerds. Later in the parking lot I played his resonator and he played my Route 66 and my #1 the pauduk top. Anyone not familiar with this guy should check him out. 92 guitars on YT. His name is James and he's top notch.

Once more Steve, the jo looks really sharp. I think you could be a great builder in the right kind of space. Meaning it's hard to get good at something that makes an endless amount of mess and dust in your living room!

[antares]

A long overdue update caused by the receipt of counterfeit D'Addario strings from eBay together with a nine day wait for a replacement set. On top of which my 6.5 years old Lenovo 'phone went pear-shaped taking (at the moment ...) all my photos with it. Sigh.

Although I didn't take a photo of it before my hack surgery, I did draw around it on some card to start playing around with ideas and I hadn't winged it, so here you can see pretty much 1:1 scale what it was like:



Ad you can see, I started out with the idea to round off the top and then plug and rebore the tuning peg positions, but I'm glad that I didn't looking at how it turned out.

I think it was well worth doing. The fifteen years wait was due to the fact that a friend at work (on night shift) promised to make me two templates that would pick up on the tuning peg holes- one to the front and one to the back, around which I could cut, but he never came up with the goods. Strictly speaking, once I'd moved to quality assurance, I wasn't allowed to use hand tools or machinery any longer. This was a bitter blow for me because making things is in my claret stream.

Here's the reworked headstock:



You can just see where the wings had been bonded on prior to the black all concealing finish?

And here she is:



She was buzzing everywhere when I strung her up, but having lain fallow in the corner of my wardrobe for in excess of fifteen years, I resisted the temptation to adjust and sure enough she has settled back to equilibrium. She plays nicely and sounds reasonable enough for a beater. Santa has been notified and will be bringing some ear defenders for SWMBO for Christmas!

Back to 'phone hacking then. A silver lining is that whilst not exactly iPhone camera standard, this ancient recommissioned HTC 'phone takes way better video than my expired Lenovo, so there's an admittedly slender chance of an audio / visual demonstration, just don't hold your collective breath!

[Deleted]

Cool stuff! Next up, a scratch build? LOL!

 Sure would be cool to hear and see a video!

[dnic]

Cool Steve, looks very good. Video can be challenging but give it a whirl and see what happens.

[GuitarAttack Forum]

Very cool...thanks for sharing.

And I love the Firebird and Pentax camera sign.

John