A little overdue bass maintenance

I’ve been playing a bit more bass lately. Much less frustrating for me than guitar. This is a wacky little 1968 SD Curlee short scale. My bass teacher had one of these and I found one on ebay a while ago. Its a neat little thing. Put on the first set of new strings in years. Cleaned up the maple neck and fingerboard with my favorite bees wax and turpentine mix. It works well and I just love the way it smells.
In fact, if the World Turpentine Council ever needs a spokesperson, I’m applying. I have my Billy Mays style infomercial all ready to go…
What if I told you that you that there was a product that could clean wood… and condition it… at the same time! I know what you’re thinking… Dave, there’s no way… But wait, there’s more… After a hard day of wood cleaning and conditioning, there’s no need to shower… this miracle product doubles as a unisex fragrance! Right from work to a night out on the town… there’s no telling what adventures are in store when you smell like this!
Unleash the power of Turpentine!

A bit much???

Guitar Stand

Making a couple quick guitar stands. Using some of the mahogany from my friends porch. Taking the opportunity to practice making blind sliding dovetails.

Pardon our appearance…

I just migrated my blog to this site.  There is a ton of housekeeping and organization that needs to happen now, tags to clean up, posts to be categorized, etc…

So please bear with me as I try my best to figure out a new platform and attend to the mess.

Thanks… Management (aka Dave)

Brooklyn Field Trip

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Field trip to Brooklyn. Part of my forced hiatus from the workshop. Spending a couple nights at my sisters place. A stop at Gramercy Tools and got a few items, luckily its not very retail friendly, or I could have … Continue reading →

Double Rainbow

Played a gig on upright last night. It was a party at a house out in the country. Weather was beautiful. It rained for 5 minutes at a set break. So I took a quick pic of a nice double rainbow.
Ran into some old friends. Was also offered to take a bunch of local wood from trees on the property. Including some Osage orange. Sweet.

First Guitars- Complete!

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Well… they are both done!  My first guitar(s). I don’t really have a bucket list, but if I did, building a guitar was definitely on it.  So, hypothetically speaking, could I check that off my list twice? Started these somewhere … Continue reading →

Quick bridge rebuild and replacement

Here is that wacky, cheap, 24” scale guitar that I rebuilt and replaced the bridge on.  The original bridge had no saddle, so I made the new one and put in a rosewood saddle.  I may replace it with bone. It sounds OK, but its really small for my hands.

I was hoping to glue the bridge on guitar number one today, but the humidity spiked in my shop.  Its cool and wet out so the AC didn’t bring it down.  So I’m on my second dehumidifier now, hopefully it brings the humidity back under 50%.  If so, then I’ll glue the bridge tomorrow.

I made new bridge clamps in the mean time and can still do more prep work, making clamping cauls, etc…

Big bugs are everywhere!

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Starting to look like the year of the 17 year locust (or cicada if you prefer) here in the northeast. Ugly little bugs. I love the way they sound. My dog loves the way they taste.

My japanese maple. Nicest place in the yard to relax.

Had to do a major pruning to the Japanese maple yesterday. Love this thing, especially when its red in early spring. It’s like sitting under a 16’ tall bonsai.

New use for an old pharmacy scale

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Short break from guitar stuff. Found this cool apothecary scale at my favorite antique place while I was looking for big jars for terrariums. Removed some minor parts from the bottom to convert it to a Wardian case. Now to … Continue reading →