Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by C Cook on January 6, 2012 at 3:59pm

Hi, I just finished making one out of half a set of an old Master Utiliphone intercom system. Posted pictures on my page if you want to take a look. I would think that any dimension you are comfortable working with is what you should do. After all you are making it to please yourself.

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Permalink Reply by blufloyd on January 6, 2012 at 5:06pm

I used a tabac especial coffee infused box. Swapped the red led for a blue one cause well cause...

Bolted everything thru bottom sides were too thick for that stuff. And had issue with speaker wire solder point melting away but it works.

Might move it into different box later with additional or new speaker.

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Permalink Reply by Ron "Oily" Sprague on January 7, 2012 at 1:42pm

Charlotte,

Was wondering if, when you finish your amp, if you could post a vid of you playing #4 through it? We're all interested in seeing and hearing how others' projects turn out. I enjoyed your progress pics.

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Permalink Reply by Charlotte Henry on January 7, 2012 at 3:05pm

Project #4 is sort of finished.  I was distracted by a mishap when installing the volume pot and I wound up not doing the soundholes simply because I was stringing up when I realized it and didn't want to risk losing a set of strings.  When new strings are in order I'll open it up and do the sound holes. I am pretty thrilled with the fretboard. The curly maple I found at Home Depot is making beautiful fretboards and the photo doesn't really do it justice. 

The floating bridge contains two piezos located in two cavities created with a 7/8" forstner bit and potted with silicone. The saddle is a very small allen wrench.  

Fyi, the mishap with the volume pot installation started out with me trying to thin the lid around the hole because the nut couldn't reach the threads.  The large bit I used had a screw tip and it grabbed the wood under the lid and before I could blink I had a hole the size of the base of the knob. I turned a piece of rosewood to fit the hole and epoxied it in and with the brown knob it's an invisible repair.

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Permalink Reply by Charlotte Henry on January 7, 2012 at 3:23pm

I had to make a string tree behind the bridge near the edge of the box right at the two screws holding the lid to the tail of the neck.  The B string was moving on the saddle when plucked from insufficient down pressure. The tree is a piece of rosewood with a single #6 screw and a finishing washer top keep the screw from splitting the rosewood. Scale length is 19 29/32 or like a baritone ukulele and it is tuned dgbe with light gauge strings. The sustain is really good.  Hopefully I'll get my daughter to do a video with it.

This is the most fun I've had in a long time. 

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Permalink Reply by Huntz Meyer on January 8, 2012 at 3:46am

I've done a few amps using the boxes too little for CBGs.

http://www.huntzmeyer.com/gallery.html

Charlotte - have you read Josh's book?  I think you belong in the advanced class.

http://joshuagayou.com/downloads/AdvancedCigarBoxGuitarConstruction...

Huntz

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Permalink Reply by MichaelS Country Boy Guitars on January 8, 2012 at 5:36am

I have made a few amps also and have found as with the cbg's, the bigger box's sound a little better. Mine are about 5 inch square with a 4 inch speaker. a 6 inch box is a bit fuller sound, to my ears anyway. But in the end use what you can get, juts make sure the speaker will fit, the rest is so small it will tuck in.

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Permalink Reply by Charlotte Henry on January 11, 2012 at 3:09am

Thanks for the comments. I've got some great ideas from you guys and picked up 3 boxes which should be great if I can do the soldering without ruining things.  I've picked up some great ideas also from looking at the instruments you guys have built and it's just making me want to get started on my next build and I glued up a quartered red oak and a nearly quartered maple scarf joint a couple of days ago, so I now have 4 neck blanks waiting on me. 

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