My first cbg was a three string made from a really cool Niles and Moser Chancellor box. I think I built it in an afternoon. Against the odds it worked, stayed in tune and was fairly playable - if you ignored the biting fret ends. Since then I’ve built about 20 or so and like the first, each has presented me with questions or problems that prompted construction of the next.
Once my awe with the original cbg waned and I started to see it with a critical eye I was bothered by the lack of acoustic output. I built 3 or 4 the same way and all of them were pretty much useless without an amp. That (and the historical work by Speal and McNair) got me thinking about the sound of cbgs 150 years ago. Clearly they were doing something quite different from what I was doing, since they seemed to have produced a useful instrument that didn't rely on electrical amplification. I wanted to know how you could get enough volume and a pleasing tonal quality out of a cigar box without the pickup.
At the outset I was convinced that at least part of the answer lay in the difference between the cigar box as it is now and as it was in the past. Somewhere I had heard that cedar’s natural pest deterrence and delightful smell made it the wood of choice for cigar boxes. Well, that certainly wasn’t the case with the cigar boxes I had found. They seemed to be paper and very little wood that I could identify other than plywood. I surmised that older boxes were likely made of solid wood and more often than not that wood was cedar. I had installed enough cedar shingles and had seen some pretty sweet sounding classical guitars with cedar tops to realize that red cedar is very lively: roof shingles dropped onto a hard surface are almost musical. Okay so that was my “cave man” moment and I started to build my own boxes and tops in an effort to recreate what I thought was the character of an old time cigar box.
The first of these non-cigar box, cigar box guitars (?) was built on a cigar box with the original lid removed and replaced with cedar from my most likely source – left over cedar roof shingles. Planing a roof shingle to consistent thickness and still getting enough useable length meant the top roughed out pretty thin. I surmised that it was too thin to take the downward force of the strings and should therefore be braced in some way (later experiments have proven this). I adapted a ladder shaped brace from a mandolin kit I had built using ½ inch by ¼ inch cedar stock. Once I got it all together and set it up I found I had built a reasonably worthy acoustic instrument and ultimately had the answer to my question – the soundboard wood really matters, thickness matters, ie it must be thin enough to resonate and produce volume and tone and finally you've got to brace the thin soundboard from underneath as luthiers have been doing forever. It shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that the answer to my question was available via a non-experimental route (the collective expertise of luthiers)– but what fun is that.
The real test of usefulness of the aforementioned principles came when I found the ultimate cigar box. The box is a made entirely from cedar and originally contained Pandora cigars (circa 1940?). I planed the top thin and braced it. It is a small 5 by 9 by 2 ½ inch box. I didn’t expect much volume but I was hoping for some sweet tone. I wasn’t disappointed – the tone was very nice and the volume quite a bit greater than expected. It is a fine (to my ear at least) acoustic instrument that I could play around a campfire without an amp. Of course I put piezos in it and I can run it through an amp and rock out too...
The top..thinned and braced - further experiments with braces seem to suggest very little change in the tone if these braces are refined and shaped. I know that luthiers discuss the role of brace pattern and profile at length and they can probably hear the nuances. However, the big gains seem to come from "thin and braced"no matter how clumsily. As an added note I think gluing the braces to the sides of the box can result in acoustic dampening. In one case where I extended braces to glue into slots on the box sides, the result was a dead sounding instrument. I may be mistaken, but I think its important to be sure that the soundboard is allowed to vibrate as freely as possible.Finished Pandora's Box
And, by the way neck wood takes a close second for imparting tone - there is a real distinction between a red oak neck (very bright sounding) and the more mellow hemlock necks I prefer to use.
Check out the audio file - ..Pandora.mp3
Comment
I came to these exact same conclusions this summer. I was gifted a whole bunch of 100 year old cedar baseboards from a house reno. About a third of them were quarter sawn too. I wasn't sure what to do with the material until I had one of those light bulb moments while playing my steel string acoustic. It's a cedar top and sounds awesome. So...after some research, I resawed the wood, planed them down to 3mm and bookmatched them. So far I've built a dog bowl resonator and a ukulele. I still can't get over how amazing they sound. I just don't know what I'm going to do when I run out of the good stock of cedar. Maybe shingles are the way to go.
Jim - glad the article is helpful. On the bridge (see my earlier article) I leave the nut and the bridge loose to provide some leeway to adjust for intonation (by adjusting string length at the bridge and height at the nut). Have a look at the video "Getting Perfect Intonation on a CBG by Justin Johnston where he completely demystifies the whole intonation thing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPTQmyNbwpY. By the way- if you haven't visited Johnsons roots music site or hear him play look it up - he is an fantastic cbg player and a very good teacher.
Wow, great article. As I;m working on my second CBG right now, I'm asking the same questions and your article has given me some great insight! I can see from your Pandora's Box guitar that you do quality craftsmanship, it looks great.
One question for you though... I see your bridge is canted in a direction that makes the treble strings longer than the bass. On my first CBG, I had to cant it in the opposite direction just as most commercially made guitars are. Did the intonation on that guitar dictate the way you did that? How well did that work out?
Started by J. D. Woods in Performances, How to Play, Lessons, Concerts. Last reply by Southern Ray 18 hours ago. 8 Replies 1 Like
Started by Southern Ray in Other stuff - off topic, fun stuff, whatever. Last reply by Southern Ray 18 hours ago. 6 Replies 0 Likes
Started by J. D. Woods in Performances, How to Play, Lessons, Concerts. Last reply by BrianQ. yesterday. 4 Replies 0 Likes
Started by Rich Butters in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Crazed Fandango on Tuesday. 4 Replies 0 Likes
Started by Nomad Jack in Performances, How to Play, Lessons, Concerts. Last reply by J. D. Woods Apr 17. 7 Replies 2 Likes
Started by Moritz Voegeli in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Southern Ray Apr 14. 6 Replies 2 Likes
Started by Timothy Hunter in Other stuff - off topic, fun stuff, whatever. Last reply by Timothy Hunter Apr 10. 14 Replies 3 Likes
Started by Tom T in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Southern Ray Apr 9. 9 Replies 0 Likes
Started by Southern Ray in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Southern Ray Apr 4. 7 Replies 1 Like
Started by Timothy Hunter in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Southern Ray Mar 27. 1 Reply 2 Likes
Started by Taffy Evans in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Southern Ray Mar 10. 1 Reply 3 Likes
Started by Cigar Box Nation in Feature Articles. Last reply by BrianQ. Mar 9. 4 Replies 3 Likes
Started by Ghostbuttons in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Timothy Hunter Mar 9. 5 Replies 1 Like
Started by Justin Stanchfield in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Taffy Evans Mar 8. 6 Replies 0 Likes
Started by Ken I in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Brian partington Mar 8. 8 Replies 0 Likes
Started by Southern Ray in Cool gear discussion - that's not cigar box related. Last reply by Southern Ray Mar 6. 5 Replies 0 Likes
Started by Taffy Evans in Other stuff - off topic, fun stuff, whatever. Last reply by Taffy Evans Mar 5. 4 Replies 2 Likes
Started by Justin Stanchfield in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Carl Floyd Mar 1. 15 Replies 0 Likes
Started by Joe in Performances, How to Play, Lessons, Concerts. Last reply by Carl Floyd Feb 29. 13 Replies 0 Likes
Started by Chance in Building Secrets, Tips, Advice, Discussion. Last reply by Southern Ray Feb 22. 12 Replies 1 Like
Posted by Vlad on March 31, 2024 at 11:48pm 0 Comments 1 Like
Posted by Vlad on March 6, 2024 at 2:32am 5 Comments 2 Likes
Posted by billy jones bluez on February 28, 2024 at 2:09pm 0 Comments 0 Likes
Posted by billy jones bluez on February 17, 2024 at 11:00pm 0 Comments 0 Likes
Posted by Vlad on February 11, 2024 at 1:06am 1 Comment 1 Like
June 2, 2024 from 11am to 1pm – BeeZr Gastropub
0 Comments 0 Likes© 2024 Created by Ben "C. B. Gitty" Baker. Powered by
Cigar Box Nation is presented by C. B. Gitty Crafter Supply, your one-stop-shop for Cigar Box Guitar parts and accessories!
You need to be a member of Cigar Box Nation to add comments!
Join Cigar Box Nation