Bridge

 

I made the bridge out of an offcut of walnut. I found this video from Beau Hannam Guitars and Ukuleles very useful...

Gluing the back on

 The obligatory photo of lots of clamps. Before this went on I stuck on a label and  sprayed a couple of coast of clear shellac on the insides to seal them.

Back

 

A quick update - I have now added the three braces to the back - I went with walnut in the end - I didn't feel it needed the stiffness of spruce. The walnut dots are glued into the fretboard too.

I shaved down the belly braces a bit as part of my attempt at tap tuning. It sounds a bit brighter to me, but who knows!

Slotting the Fretboard

 

For all my previous instruments I have hand cut the fret slots with this little thing, using a fretting saw with a depth guide. I have found this a bit awkward, so I decided to make a slightly more sophisticated jig. It was based loosely on the one that StewMac sell.

The saw rides along the little oak cross beams (height adjusted via four bolts). The first test was disappointing as the saw was binding in the slot but the fix was to give it a sharpen (I found some useful tips in a video by crimson guitars). After this it cut nicely and I made the slots for the fretboard.

Dots

I was thinking about how a make some walnut dots for the fretboard. My first attempt on my lathe was not good enough, so I tried out using a leather punch in my drill press. This worked really well. I punched through almost all the thickness of the walnut and then sanded the back off on my belt sander, ending up with a little pile of dots. The test fitting in a piece of scrap wood looked fine, so these are good to go for the fretboard.

Fretboard

 

I had originally decided to use a piece of macassar ebony for the fretboard (second from the left), but I didn't like the colour against all the walnut. Likewise, I rejected the ebony (left) and cocobolo (third from the left). In the end, I am going for a simple piece of sycamore (right), I hope to jazz it up a bit with some dot markers to be made on the lathe from the same piece of walnut used for the peghead veneer (and planned for the bridge). 

Neck

 

The neck was made from a sandwich of walnut, dyed constructional veneer and a sycamore core. The idea was to generate some stiffness as walnut alone may have been a bit too flexible. Someday I will try out a carbon fibre reinforcing rod instead... For a peghead veneer, I have made a little bookmatched piece from some interesting walnut, thicknessed down to about 3mm.

Ready to glue on the belly

 

Here is the belly 'dry-fitted' into the body. I've added the second sets of kerfed linings and also cut the slot for the neck. I plan to glue the belly on with Titebond Original (my favourite glue) with the sides still in the mould to keep everything square. I have left plenty of material on the braces and I may try to tap-tune the belly by thinning these once the belly and neck are on.

A body

 

The sides (viewed from the top)

I have been making steady progress with the uke. I bent the sides - it's been a few years since I last did this and the cracking noise from the figured walnut was not encouraging. Too aggressive! Still, I pressed on and fixed the crack with some Araldite. This will need some more attention later on. I added an inlay where the sides join at the end, which will match the bindings. I'm reasonably happy with this. Finally, I made and fitted some kerfed linings (from some white pine).  Next up will be fitting the belly to the body.

An ugly crack

End joint inlay

Belly

 

So, I used my new DIY dremel jig and it all went very smoothly. I took a couple of passes with a 1mm spiral upcut bit and then widened the channel by adjusting the jig. I glued in the rosette with zap-a-gap super glue and scraped it flat. I have found that sandpaper can drive dust (in this case walnut and dyed maple) into the pale belly wood and make it look a bit messy.

Finally, I used the jig again to cut out the soundhole. Next for the belly will be fitting some braces - I am winging it on the placement for these, so we will have to see how it goes...

Saving eighty seven quid

 I have a little Dremel jig I bought from Stewmac ages ago and its great for routing the cavities for inlays. I decided to use it for the rosette inlay and needed an adaptor for cutting circles. The commercial product was a bit too expensive for my tastes, so I made one out of some bits of aluminium I had 'lying around'. 

Not as neat, but hopefully it will work the same...

Making a template for the rosette

 I was thinking about the binding and the rosette that will go around the sound hole, and I decided to use walnut with an extra black stripe. I needed to make a circular channel in some scrap wood to allow the bent rosette wood to 'set', and I wondered about making a router jig (base turning about a fixed point). Then  I remember I had made a CNC router specifically for this sort of thing (doh).

All it took was to draw a circle of the correct size in Inkscape, generate the g-code in ESTLcam and press 'print' in Repetier. I was very happy with the outcome, and I think I will try and do the neck and fretboard shaping this way (a bit more of a challenge than just a circle in a piece of oak!). 

Re-sawing

 It took about 40 minutes to change the blade on the bandsaw, most of it setting up the tension and alignment. Still, I think it was time well spent as I was able to re-saw a nice piece of walnut which will make the back and sides on the 'pineapple'.

I'll thickness these next.

Using my new CNC router on the uke mould.

Last year I made myself a MPCNC router, and it has sat idle ever since. I have now used it 'in anger' for the first time to surface the back of the uke mould. It was a bit terrifying, but it worked as expected and didn't crash! 

My toolchain is to start with a drawing in Inkscape and export as a .svg file. This is imported into ESTLCAM to work out the toolpath (Gcode), and then Repetier Host is used to control the MPCNC on a RAMPs board. 

I hope to use this setup to prepare moulds and templates, and maybe to try and carve backs and fronts.

Back in the workshop.

 So, after a long absence, I finally have some time to get back to some luthiery. I have tidied up the garage a bit (and made myself a new workbench) and uploaded a more honest profile photo so there should no excuses. The next instrument on the list is a baritone ukulele (in the pineapple style).

Finally

 I finally finished off the lute today. I decided that the previous bridge issues were down to a bad glue joint, so I took extra care this time!

The sound is nice at the proper pitch but the strings are still stretching so it won't stay in tune for long at the moment. I'll wait a bit before making a soundfile.

I have learnt a few things with this project. It has been a bit of a battle with this instrument, especially with the tricky yew wood ribs and the troublesome bridge, and I don't think I'll be making any more lutes.  However, I really like the style of the peg box, and making my own pegs, and also working with such a light instrument, so I may have a go at a renaissance guitar sometime.

Bang again!

The bridge has parted company from the belly again!

I had re-glued it with Araldite, and I thought this would be sufficient. Everything else is finished on the lute (frets all done, including the ebony ones of the body), so I strung it up again and tuned it to pitch. It was OK for a few minutes and then there was an ominous creaking followed by the familiar 'bang'. This time part of the bridge (the scroll at the end) did break, but this is a simple fix.

Maybe my glue joint wasn't good enough, or maybe the tension (i.e. my choice of strings) is too great. I am going with the first option, and so I will try again with Araldite - unless anyone out there has any better suggestions! .

Bang!

I finished the nut,  polished up the pegs with wax and fitted the tied frets. I then tied on the strings and started to tension them. All was well for a while (most of the strings a tone or so below their final pitch), and the tone sounded quite nice. Then there was a creaking sound, followed by a 'bang', and off came the bridge - the hide glue joint had failed!

There is no damage to the belly, so it should be a straightforward job to clean up and glue it back on, but I think I and going to go with a more forgiving adhesive. Probably Araldite (but don't tell anyone!).

Wax on, Wax off

The finish is now , ...er, finished! The belly got three coats of my home made wax, and then I finished the whole instrument with Renaissance Micro Crystalline Wax. This leaves a very nice silky finish, and it is claimed to provide excellent protection from fingerprints etc.

I am going to use Aquila nylgut strings for all the seven courses, as shown below. There seems to be a million different ways to string up a lute, so this is just a guess as to what might work.

1	g'	0.42 Nylgut
2	d'	0.54 Nylgut
2	d'	0.54 Nylgut
3	a	0.68 Nylgut
3	a	0.68 Nylgut
4	f	0.85 Nylgut
4	f	0.85 Nylgut
5	c	1.12D Nylgut wound with copper wire
5	c	1.12D Nylgut wound with copper wire
6	g	0.73 Nylgut
6	G	1.45D Nylgut wound with copper wire
7	d	0.85 Nylgut
7	D	1.65D Nylgut wound with copper wire

The rest of the work will be 'setting up' the strings, nut and gut frets.

Still at it

It's been a few months since I last posted anything. I've been busy with other things, and the instrument making has taken a back seat. I had a minor 'incident' with the lute - my workshop (garage) had become so untidy that I knocked the lute off its hanging hook and it fell onto the concrete floor. The neck joint and one of the ribs needed repairing, but I'm glad it wasn't worse - my resolution this year is to get a bit more order into the workshop.

Anyway, I have been making slow but steady progress since then. I finished making the pegs, and I have fitted the pegbox. I have also completed the 'half-binding'. This is a little different to guitar bindings as is doesn't go all the way through the thickness of the belly. This allows the belly to be removed by some future lute repair man without making too much of a mess! My binding material was narrow strips of ebony, and it looks quite neat (but more like 7/8 of the belly thickness). It's all been done with hide glue which I am getting to enjoy using - having an old iron on hand (on a cool setting) helps to make a neat joint.

With the woodwork now completed, I am starting the finishing process. The bowl will be French polished, and the neck and pegbox will be finished with walnut oil (I've bought a finish made for gun stocks). The belly will be waxed, and this evening I prepared the wax - a mixture of beeswax, carnauba wax and turpentine, which was fun to make. The whole thing will be given a protective wax coat to finish it off. I think that this sounds like a lot of different finishes, but it is what Robert Lundberg suggests in his book, and he should know!