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What is it? - Deathburger III now complete


Stub Mandrel
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I got a neck and pre-fretted fingerboard for a 23" Ukelele off the 'bay. Still needs a lot of fettling. Might go with a danish oil finish.

Instrument.thumb.JPG.b911666c0a71aea34b861656361514e8.JPG

The scale length is 17", and I've adapted it (not yet glued in) to suit a body made out of three chunks of inch-thick mahogany from an old table.

I've got a piezo ukelele/mandolin bridge pickup but haven't quite decided what it is yet.

Tempted to fit (at very low tension) bass strings, dampers and tune it CDGA like a cello. Maybe fit a coil pickup as well.

Or silicone strings and bass tuning.

Or with lighter strings it could be DGBE for a tenor 4-string guitar, or mandolin tuning GDAE.

One thing it won't be is ukelele tuning because it hurts my brain.

Edited by Stub Mandrel
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I bought my brother a kit for Christmas, he's already got a couple of quantity Ukes and a bass.

He works in pottery and some craft at one of the Camphill Schools, and now he's using decorating and building ukes as one of his activities.

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The Headstock got an Gibson-Style open-book makeover 🙂

I've sorted some tuners and finished and stained the body too.

On the neck the stain has revealed a rather open grain with lots of white flecks on part of it. Might finish with Danish Oil or wax rather than varnish.

I've ordered a cheap 4-pole pickup that looks really 'vintage'. I can't make more progress until I get it and can rout the body for it.

If it's of interest I'm using Titebond Hide Glue  - it's the ready to use bottled stuff not the stinky heat up stuff, so not quite as strong. I've repaired a violin and a tbel with it before now so I think it will be strong enough - I've contrived a tongue and groove joint of sorts too.

instrument (2).jpg

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57 minutes ago, Stub Mandrel said:

I've ordered a cheap 4-pole pickup that looks really 'vintage'. I can't make more progress until I get it and can rout the body for it.

So steel strings and a double truss rod?  Heeheehee.  Are you going to string it through or top load it?

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21 minutes ago, SpondonBassed said:

So steel strings and a double truss rod?  Heeheehee.  Are you going to string it through or top load it?

The bridge will be quite close to the bottom of the body as my bits of table were a bit short, although it gives nice proportions (IMHO).

Was thinking of doing it like a Tele, even so, with some 'pretty' brass ferrules, but worried the angle might push the bridge forwards.

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Well I failed utterly to keep a build diary, but the 'Deathburger III' is now complete, strung with the four middle strings froma guitar and tuned ADGC for the time being as a sort of 'piccolo bass'.

Learnt a lot, chiefly don't trust spray varnish and don't fit your pickup to the scratchplate (or move its pole pieces) before you know where the strings will end up! Still it works, on both magnetic pickup and the piezo one in the bridge.

 

 

Deathburger_III.JPG

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2 hours ago, Stub Mandrel said:

Well I failed utterly to keep a build diary, but the 'Deathburger III' is now complete, strung with the four middle strings froma guitar and tuned ADGC for the time being as a sort of 'piccolo bass'.

Learnt a lot, chiefly don't trust spray varnish and don't fit your pickup to the scratchplate (or move its pole pieces) before you know where the strings will end up! Still it works, on both magnetic pickup and the piezo one in the bridge.

 

 

Deathburger_III.JPG

Wow!  What a transformation!

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