This morning I printed the last chapter of my book, "The Donovan Diaries". Whew!, it's been a long haul. Took the manuscript to my dear friend Gayle Helgoe for her review. Gayle is a retired librarian, a grammarian and a historian. She will no doubt correct my errors in all categories. Then it will be off to Kate Weisel who will build it into a book, then off to the printer and hopefully by the Christmas season it will be available in the bookstores and on Amazon. This has been a four year project and it feels very good to have it to this stage, This afternoon i was able to spend in the workshop working on ukuleles for Gary and Sandra.
First I bent the East Indian Rosewood for the second ukulele. It bent very nicely and I will leave it in this Jig as it dries and sets. This was a nice piece of wood, should make a pretty instrument.
Now it is time to make the small tonebars that give the Kasha ukuleles their great sound. First I cut lots of stock from fine grained Sitka Spruce from Pacific Rim Tonewoods. Crucial to the quality of sound we seek.
Here are all to the bent sides for the three ukuleles I am working on, Always nice to get by this major part of building a ukulele.
Now to scribe on the underside of the tone boards the location of the tone bars. a crucial step.
Here are the unfinished tone bars set roughly in place on the ukulele top.
Each of the tiny tone bars must be cut to fit over the bridge patch. this is done very carefully on the table saw.
And now begins the artistry, The whittling of each tone bar so that they will transfer and control the vibrations of the strings about the sound board.
A little whittling with a sharp exacto blade, a bit of sanding to slick things up, and by the end of the afternoon just four of the tone bars are completed. Twenty more to go and I will be glueing them down. Lots of whittling tomorrow.
