Making progress

As mentioned in the last post. I’ve been working on the hardware for Dave’s e-mando. The tailpiece is made from some chunky aluminium alloy angle. I like using ali angle, being extruded means that it’s always clean, crisp and dimensionally accurate. 

You couldn’t bend a 5mm flat sheet and get the same quality angle. Not having any metal-working machines means that it’s all done by hand.

So after, cutting, filling, drilling etc. here’s the tailpiece- it’ll need a final clean-up once I’ve had the e-mando playing.

Next is the bridge and this one will be adjustable for height. The base can be fully shaped, but the saddle portion is left rough until the strings are on and it can be shaped to give the correct intonation.

With some strings on the e-mando for its “first fix” I used some off-cuts of steel string to ascertain where the break point has to be in order for the intonation to be correct. 

Positions located, the bridge can be shaped and using my test pick-up, hey presto the e-mando is playing!

Next; take it apart and add Tru-oil!

I've been remiss!

I seem to have been a bit remiss with posting lately, so this one should make up for it!

Firstly, the octave electric mandolin is now complete and below are some photos for you; I must admit that I’m very pleased with the outcome.

Next; I forgot to show you the video of how I tackle the 8 tuner holes on a mandolin. If you use 4-on-a-plate tuners, you have to be extremely accurate with your drilling and here you’ll see the pains that I take. It’s worth mentioning that I use a StewMac drilling jig, but on the top/face side of the head. They recommend using it on the reverse side, the reason being that traditional F-style mandolins had tapered heads. Why? I don’t know, seems to make life even more problematic.

Also I’ve just made the fretboard and tailpiece for the archtop. If you look a few posts back you would have seen the bright colours that were exposed when the rosewood billet was first cut. As you can see it’s started to mellow a bit and is now tending towards an orange/brown instead of pink. I'm very pleased that I managed to get the tailpiece out of the same piece of wood, so that’ll match nicely. The tailpiece has had a good soaking of lemon oil hence the slight difference in colour and sheen.

Dave’s in E-mando, “in the black”?

You’ll be used to seeing my mandolins set-up in the white; a phrase pinched from violin makers, i.e. before they apply that coloured varnish that seems to appeal. Dave’s e-mando has reached the stage where I’ve been getting it set-up prior to applying the finish, and as there’s not a bit of white wood anywhere to be seen……….

I’ve got a spare pick-up that I use at this stage i.e. setting the action and intonation etc. As this one doesn’t have an under-saddle transducer, I thought I’d build an adjustable bridge (it will make action adjustment much easier for Dave). It took a fair bit longer to make than I thought and a couple of goes to get it right and it still needs some tidying up, but that said, I’m really happy with its performance. Whenever you go off-piste, you have to be willing to spend extra time designing and developing your ideas.

I’ve included a photo of me with the octave e-mando so that you can get a better idea of its size.

Octave progress

Made some good progress on Dave’s octave e-mando this week. As you can see from above, the body, neck and fretboard are now all one! The ebony and wenge are going to give it a dark, stealth-like look; very cool.
Below is a sequence of photos to show the neck joint going together.

Starting the Octave E-mando

I’ve progressed as far as I can with Pete’s e-mando (awaiting a shipment of Gotoh tuners!), so let’s make a start on Dave’s octave e-mando……

The body is being made from wenge; I know no other wood quite like it and although it’s a bit challenging to work, it’s a lovely material.

 I had to take it down a fair bit…….remember I’m the bloke without a planning machine.

Once the joint was made, but before it was glued together, the wiring channels were routed and drilled and coated with screening paint.

After it was glued-up the whole thing was covered in masking tape in order to facilitate accurate marking out.

A bit of routing, drilling and sawing and we’re up to here.

The next step will be shape the curves and contours that will make it comfy to hold next to your body.