The first completed work this month was a couple of banjos. #267 was a custom banjo, made mostly in a familiar pattern but with a narrower nut width, and using bubinga and wenge for all the parts except an ebony fretboard. This was my first time using either of these woods. This banjo has a wood tone ring but weighs more like a banjo made from my usual woods with a Whyte Laydie tone ring.

Banjo #268 is a 12″ walnut banjo with a Whyte Laydie tone ring and is shown on the Banjos page.

The guitar is now completed, after a long wait for the inlay to be delivered. I will start a new policy for 2023 that I won’t start on a project until all the materials are in the workshop. Since I don’t cut inlays my customers who want inlay have to order it, and I have had repeated experiences with orders from one company where people often buy complicated inlays being delayed. This guitar is my first dreadnought and I will plan to build more at some point. The customer requested brass ammunition shells as fret markers. He sent the shells to me and I cut the bottoms off. I could have set the shells under epoxy but the customer preferred to have them flush, with the lettering uncovered. This leaves them feeling bumpy, but it’s not very noticeable when playing.

My last project for the month was a new neck for a used pot assembly that I was sent by a customer. I had made a neck for this pot before but the customer wanted a new neck with a tunneled 5th string to replace it. The neck is made from hard maple with a Blackwood Tek fretboard and overlay.

I’m planning to build a lot more instruments in 2023 than I did in 2022. This was my least productive year in a while, though that was mostly because of spending so much time repairing the house, building the workshop and moving. I’m still working on things here but the bulk of the jobs are done. This month I finally built a large cabinet in the kitchen, a folding counter above the chest freezer and some other shelves. There are still more cupboards and shelves to build, but we’re able to put more things away in an orderly way instead of in totes on the floor.

The owner of last month’s neck kindly sent me this picture after reading that I had forgotten to take a picture of it after installation on the pot.

November was a bit odd in the shop. I started off working on my first dreadnought size guitar, and got the soundbox completed and the neck blank made before grinding to a stop because the inlay the customer wants is backordered from his supplier.

The first completed project was an unfinished neck, which the customer is going to fit to the pot. He sent measurements and I built the neck to them as best I could. The tuners were requested by the customer. I’ve never used ones with such thick string posts before. The neck is walnut and has a zebrawood fretboard with rosewood binding.

The other neck is fitted to a Gibson trapdoor banjo pot. It is made from curly maple with a rosewood fretboard. The customer supplied the inlay and I installed it.

Both these necks were actually not completed till early December. My plans for the rest of this month include a custom banjo, perhaps the completion of the guitar if the inlay turns up, currently 5 banjo rims to be made and fitted to flanges and tone rings, and maybe building a stock guitar.

I’m also still working on stuff inside the house. The last outdoor job was installing a small mini split heat pump for weather that’s not cold enough for the wood stove. I ended up getting one I could install myself since the person who was going to do it all summer and fall never did. It went in the day before Thanksgiving, and we have used it a few times and expect to use it more in the spring. This was my first time with this kind of job but it wasn’t too hard. The pictures are from before I wrapped the lines into a bundle.

Once it got too cold to hang laundry outside I made a “too big to fail” clothes rack for indoor drying. It’s about 6 feet long and 6-1/2 feet high.