Official Luthiers Forum!

Thought it would be interesting to post a thread up here for the latest build I've done, even if there's danger of being shunned...

Posted here in 2011 about my first build and enjoyed the feedback, but this is something entirely different. Could have probably gone into the electric guitar and bass forum, but my interest was definitely more mandolin than electric...

The whole story, with a bunch of pics of progress along the way, was blogged here:
https://jimbrosseau.wordpress.com/2015/ ... ost-there/
https://jimbrosseau.wordpress.com/2015/ ... close-now/
https://jimbrosseau.wordpress.com/2015/ ... ned-thing/

And the final result (I was looking for the same scale length and contact points of a regular mandolin, in the smallest size I could get) is here:


I could probably add a fake headstock and scroll, maybe a fern inlay, but you close your eyes and you don't need any of these things

Interested in your thoughts on this one...still a few things to tweak, but it's already got good sound, and plug it into a guitar effects processor and it's just crazy!

_________________
Jim Brosseau

Three builds under my belt now...
I'll always be an amateur builder - don't want to turn a joy into a job!

Show us the tuning machines. I have been trying to figure that one out for a travel guitar for friends.
Your ideas sound good but I would prefer to buy electronics that will (probably) work.
Did you consider a piezo pickup?

Bob

...here's a picture of the tuning machines, pulled one side off for clarity. They're just standard StewMac machines, it's pretty cosy in there and it was easier to string 'er up with the sides removed (they just pull off - magnets), but tweaking is just fine with the sides where they are. You can see the cover for the 9v battery compartment as well.

Winding the pickups was a pretty steep curve, but the two single coils that are on there now sound just fine, and I can easily throw a new one together in an afternoon. I'll probably build one with shorter poles on the e side so I can lower the action on that side, and I've got a humbucker and P90 in the works as well. Never really thought of a piezo, but it's a floating bridge, so...

_________________
Jim Brosseau

Three builds under my belt now...
I'll always be an amateur builder - don't want to turn a joy into a job!

Neat design. Are you able get your fingers on those tuner buttons? The top row looks pretty cramped in the photo
Any plans to cover those pick ups?

...for adjusting up or down to pitch, i've found it's easy enough to just reach in there and tweak 'em. Anything bigger, the sides just come off with a little tug.

For the pickups, no plans to cover them at the moment, there isn't any noticeable hum that I've found, the grounding throughout has worked pretty well, and having the windings visible generates interesting conversations.

Will probably redo these (at least the front one) and change the pole piece heights so that the treble pole is a little shorter - as it stands right now, once I get to the 12th fret, the strings will contact the pole itself. As a first cut though, in first position, things are fine. First time I incorporate a zero fret on a build, very happy with the results there on the nut end...turns out that I reused a nut from my first build that I filed too low, worked well as the alignment nut here - don't throw anything out

_________________
Jim Brosseau

Three builds under my belt now...
I'll always be an amateur builder - don't want to turn a joy into a job!