As I mentioned in my blog, I've decided to build a banjo. I'll use this page to document this project, describing what I'm doing and showing pictures.

This first thing I ever bought on ebay - a nice walnut block rim made by Mark Hickler. This is the starting point for the project.

This is the unfinished neck I'm starting with. It's maple so I'll need to stain it somewhere close to the walnut rim.

Sanding and sealing the rim. It looks perfect out of the box until you start sanding - then you see all the (slight) imperfections. This is a beautiful piece of wood, though.

11/30/2007

OK the rim is ready for final finishing - time to move on to the neck.

This is the neck with the overlay in place with a paper template for the final shape (unless this shape proves too complex for my limited woodworking skills).

12/1/2007

I wimped out on the complex peghead design and did something simpler. I also changed the overlay to a nice burl walnut. This is the result. So far, I'm pretty happy with it. Now, lot's of sanding before the stain goes on.

12/4/2007

I've added  a cocobolo overlay to the heel of the neck - here I'm getting ready to shape it.

Fitting the square neck to the round rim is a bit tricky so I built this jig (is it still OK to say "jig" in this country?) to help shape the curve. In addition to the curve, it also needs a 3 degree angle, so this should do it.

And.......got lucky. It's nearly perfect.

12/8/2007

The rim is finished! And I think it looks pretty darned good. The lighting makes it look redder than it actually is.

Cutting the notch for the nut has had me worried but it turned out to be pretty easy. Here the first fret is installed.

The frets are laid out in order, ready to be installed.

December 9, 2007

OK, that wasn't so hard. All the frets went in smoothly and seem to be pretty straight. The file fixed those that weren't perfect.

The hole for the 5th string tuner is drilled and tapered. This one had me sweating a little - that's a big hole.

Well, this thing's ready to put together and string up.

December 11, 2007

The banjo's done (almost). I still need to build a cover for the truss rod (in progress) and do a little modification to the fingerboard, which I'll do later. In the meantime, it's all strung up and playing. I'm calling this an unqualified success. It looks great (OK I'm not Jason Romero) and sounds exactly like I intended it to. It'll take a few weeks to settle in and get tweaked, but I'm really pleased with it. Here's a link to some bigger photos.

December 15, 2007

  Just a few details left. I needed something to cover the hole for the truss rod adjustment in the neck and I didn't like anything available, so I made one.

Here it is finished. A lot of work for something that's practically invisible.

Here's a short piece of Cripple Creek to hear the sound

Here's Soldiers Joy, played by Mark Hickler on this rim before he delivered it to me