I forgot to say in my October news that banjo #313 was built as a stock mahogany C scale, but was spoken for before it was completed and thus is not shown on the Banjos page.

November was disrupted by some back trouble, but the first and last weeks were pretty normal, so I was able to get some things done. I started a batch of 4 banjos and a neck at the beginning of the month. Then when I was able to work some again I put aside the three stock banjos and completed the custom banjo and the custom neck. The banjo was #314 and was a mahogany 12″ slot head with a WL/Electri type tone ring and a zebrawood fretboard.

The neck was a curly maple 5+1 fitted to a vintage Vega pot. The customer found the pot and shipped it up here for the neck to be made to match, and the neck was shipped unfinished so the customer could apply lacquer, which is beyond my skill level.

Once the custom work was caught up I completed the three stock banjos. 315 and 316 were experimental cherry 11″ thin rim pots with Dobson tone rings, and 317 was another mahogany C scale. They are all shown on the Banjos page. #317 was purchased within a day or two of being listed, and I plan to have another C scale completed by the end of this week. They seem to have begun to have a moment of temporary popularity, like happened back in 2018.

My plans for December start with the C scale banjo and a custom build, and then I plan to make a body for the cherry chicken head fiddle neck I made back at the beginning of October and carved on my last camping trip of the year. I’d like to make another octave mandolin this month too, time permitting. I’m hoping to make time to work on either a 14″ archtop guitar with a 12 fret neck or a 12 string guitar at some point this winter, just for fun.