 Floyd came by the shop and chose a nice piece of Koa that matched his binding. |  I found a scrap of Rosewood to match Caroline's binding and now I need to fair it in with the Shinto rasp. |
 |  The end piece was cut down flush with this very handy Japanese rasp and seems to match the binding nicely. |
Now it is time to add caps to the neck heels. The heel must be flattened and the rasp is perfect for that. I like to use wood that matches the fret boards so I searched my box of scrap Rosewood.
Found a nice piece of Honduran Rosewood and scribed the heel shape on it and then added a bit more to extend the "hook" a bit. And now off to the band saw.
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The small bench top bandsaw is very handy for little projects like this.
After cutting matching shapes of thin Maple veneer and darker Walnut veneer I stacked them on the heel , walnut/maple/ heel cap, all glued together, and then clamped them tight.
A couple of hours later the glue had set and it was time to trim things up. The sharp Exacto knife and a small rasp will do this job.
And now both ukuleles have their heel caps. There will be lots of sanding and final shaping before they are done, but they are looking good.
