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First build, and ain't it pretty!

Here's my first cigar box guitar, and I'm pretty stinking proud of it. 3 weeks from inception to completion, and I spent right around $50 on it, which was my goal. It'll be cheaper in the future, cause I know where to get things cheaper now.

It sounds great acoustically, although a bit quiet. I chalk that up to the small box mostly, haha. I electrified it just today, and so far it sounds good, and will probably sound better once I insulate the places where my younger brother soldered it up for me.

Anyway, so I got the idea for the tuners from here, and they really hold their tuning well! I had a bugger of a time figuring how best to attach the strings, but when I did, all the strings stayed in tune with one another easily. I did a preliminary stringing when I got it together enough to do so, and when taking it apart again I found that each time I took off a string, the others stayed in tune with one another. Overall I find the rig to be a bit unwieldy, but it really works.

Pretty much the whole thing is modular. If I wanted, I could unstring it and pull just about everything that's not screwed on apart. I did the whole thing with hand tools (excepting a small dremel to drill starter holes), so I was able to get neck and box to be pretty snug. I'm pretty proud of this fact, cause I can replace parts without too much worry.

The resonator's an old pie tin I found, and the nut a piece of antler (Oklahoma, ya know?). The soundholes I made by hammering over a quarter into an dealership plate, which I then cut out, sanded, hole-punched, and glued on. I'm pretty proud of'em, and I had so much fun working on all the metalwork on this that I think I ought to look into tin smithing.

Oh yeah, ha, forgot. The neck's 1x2 poplar I glued double, with crossed grains, and I made the headstock with what turned out to be a really rough scarf joint. Worked though. I just stuck a wood screw through it to make sure it doesn't go anywhere.

So yeah. I'm really pleased, and I had fun spending my last days of summer working on this CBG. I'd like to add that I got a loooooot of ideas for putting it together off of here, mostly looking through old forum posts and the like. In particular I'd like to mention Bairfoot Cajun, cause I honestly looked through ALL his photos for ideas on how to give this baby a bit of resonance.

Anyway, there's my lot. I'll post more pics if there's any amount of interest. I took lots of progress pics, and I can take more detail pics if you want.

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Permalink Reply by Dan Sleep on August 13, 2011 at 7:21pm

Cool!! That turned out pretty good, nice job!

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Permalink Reply by Clock The Wolf on August 13, 2011 at 9:50pm

Very interesting. Weird... in a good way.

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Permalink Reply by Lonman on August 13, 2011 at 10:11pm

looks good. You will find you will only get better as you do more research on here and do more builds.

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Permalink Reply by Brian Hunt on August 13, 2011 at 11:44pm

Ahh,

The Uncle Bob guitar style tuners. I have a 5 gallon bucket I intend to turn into an Uncle Bob style guitar someday.

Nice work.

Brian Hunt

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Permalink Reply by David "Dr. Dave" Davies on August 14, 2011 at 12:09am

Real purty. I'd like to learn more about the tuners. They look really innovative.

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Permalink Reply by Buck on August 14, 2011 at 2:03am

Thanks! I got the basic design for them from the site I list above. They're made with #10-32 x 3" bolts & matching wing nuts, a bit of wood with holes for the bolts, and a piece of steel cut from a coffee can and hammered out flat, which I then cut and re-hammered. I probably should have just used aluminum, because all the metal does is protect the scrap of wood on the back end and guide the wing nuts. You can do that part with your hand easy, it's just a hastle.

Tuning works best with a short screwdriver. I need to get me an easy one to carry round for quick tuning. But yeah, I think I may try and use them again, unless I come across bigger problems as time goes on.

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Permalink Reply by Rand Moore on August 14, 2011 at 5:09am

Hi Buck,

I like the home-made tuners, too. If they are too heavy on the head side of the neck, on your next build, you might try putting them on the tail side of your neck. There are a number of similar "headless" designed CBGs on CBN, so you can look around at photos of other people's work to get an idea of how to mount the tuners "south" of the bridge.

-Rand.

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Permalink Reply by Buck on August 14, 2011 at 9:38am

It is a rather top-heavy guitar, but the tuners are incredibly light. I considered putting it on the bottom, but putting it on the headstock made more sense for me.