I wanted to try my hand at a fretted uke. The only one I had made heretofore was when I retrofitted this uke with frets. It plays pretty well, and that along with the tenor guitars I have made have demystified the fret-setting process. So I set about making a uke with a box that I got at the flea market. It had been a syringe box that someone had decoupaged a couple of magazine photos to. I think they are covered with shellac, and a pretty heavy coat at that, so my sense is that the photos were applied quite a while ago. The box held a "Fairbanks Syringe, and the label on the inside is so cool that I almost tried to remove it and put it on the outside. In the end, though, I chose to just photodocument it. Here is what it looks like:
The frets came out well (the neck is red oak salvaged from a pallet, juts like the slide guitar that is IW#40). I made the choice to make a "0 fret," which makes the placement of the nut less critical. It works pretty well, well enough that I am ready to move on to other ukes that I have boxes for.
The lid of the box is plywood, so it is not a very bright sounding uke. Here is what it sounds like:
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