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February guitars, banjo necks and a fiddle
Early in the month I made a mahogany squareneck resonator guitar and when it got warm enough I put the finish on that and the archtop guitar and chicken-head fiddle that had been waiting. They are all shown on their respective pages. My first custom project for the month was a practice koto, the same
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January banjos and some other beginnings
I spent the first 17 days of January on a batch of 3 banjos. #269 was a walnut 12″ with internal resonator, Whyte Laydie-type tone ring, and a slotted peghead. Banjos 270 and 271 are stock instruments shown on the Banjos page. In the last couple of weeks of the month I made a cherry
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December banjos, a neck, and the other half of the November guitar
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
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November banjo necks and half a guitar
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
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Late October banjos and a neck
In the latter half of October and first few days of November I made one custom neck and three stock banjos. The custom neck was to fit a Deering pot. The owner brought the banjo up to have the neck fitted after I got it put together. It’s curly maple with a curly ash peghead
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Late September-early October banjos and necks
The shop is still coming along incrementally. I hope to have the insulation all covered with OSB panels by sometime in November, and to keep adding more shelves so I can be slightly less disorganized. From mid-September on I began working slowly on a couple of custom necks and three stock banjos, and now this
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Arrival at the new shop
I don’t have any instruments to post this time but figured I should make an update on the state of things, such as it is. I brought the last load of lumber and things up in the bus on the 26th of August, and now we are officially here. I misunderestimated (to use a once-popular
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A July banjo and (finally) an August departure
July saw the completion (or to be exact it was August 6 by the time it got done) of my final stock banjo made in Orwell at St. Francis Farm. #260 is a cherry C scale that I got about half built sometime in the latter half of 2021, as far as I can recall.
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June house repairs and a resonator banjo
I just completed my June banjo last night, though we’re well into July. That’s been how things go lately, but the end of the transition period may be in sight now, I hope. Banjo #259 is a custom resonator banjo with most of the hardware coming from First Quality Music. The tuners are the new
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May necks and house repair
My shop time has been very limited in May and it looks like more of the same for the next couple of months at least. I got two custom necks completed and mounted on the customers’ pots, and made a few armrests. Up in Piercefield the house is coming along. The replacement windows are all